To be, not seem to be.

I love books, especially old ones. The ones that grab my attention are usually old, dusty hardback books. I love to thumb through the pages, find hidden treasures that someone left within the pages: a pressed flower, an old love letter, a lock of hair, a cherished one's obituary.
While perusing a sale this past weekend, I was picking up some books and came across this non-descript magazine, or what I thought was a magazine. I had opened it quickly and saw the word Glee in it and assumed it was an old magazine that the cover had been torn off of. Much to my surprise (and delight) I discovered later what I had bought was someone's 1924 graduating yearbook!

I was completely enthralled in my new treasure. I poured over the pictures, looking at each face, each signature, noticing the smudges of ink from the brush of someone's hand 80 years ago....

...it  has many life stories, recaps of events, poems about class members, well wishes to the departing graduating class...all providing a miniscule glimpse into the lives of these young people.

I remember gathering everybody's 'autograph' in my yearbooks and excitedly reading what they had written later.

Was Grace excited to read her yearbook after having passed it around? I almost felt guilty, like I was reading someone's diary...

...but not guilty enough to stop! Her name was Grace that owned this precious yearbook and how anyone could discard it or even put it in a garage sale is beyond me...perhaps someone had bought her home and didn't care to keep it..I can't even guess as to how it came to be on that table that day I was there. I have no blood connection to Grace but that doesn't matter, I am now the keeper of a small part of her history, a tiny fraction of 1924 in the United States, and in that regard we are connected. 

One of the things I love about history is the rich lessons it holds for us: the importance and value of faith, family, love, hardships and all that other stuff in between.

The 1924 class motto was, "To be, not seem to be."

TO. BE. AUTHENTIC. GENUINE. TRUE.

They sure were smart in 1924, weren't they?

Lisa :-)