Wednesday, June 18, 2008

Oops! I Forgot To Post My Thoughts ...

A few days ago, I posted an article and links on postmortem photos, but I forgot to add something. Well, I forgot to include my thoughts on this topic. My apologies to those who were disappointed.

So, what are my thoughts about postmortem photographs? Well, postmortem photographs have struck me as a bit surreal and creepy. I know I did read somewhere else about postmortem photos before footnoteMaven posted her articles on the subject, but I can't remember where or when I read it. The only postmortem photograph that I have seen in my family was a picture of an infant taken sometime in the 1910s. I knew the infant was dead because he was lying in his casket in the photograph. Of course, I also knew who it was from what my grandma had told me. When I first looked at that photograph, it was surreal to me. I could have easily mistaken the baby for a doll, if it were not for the fact that the baby was in the coffin. (Well, the baby was small, so that's why I almost mistook it to be a doll.) Of course, one does not expect to find postmortem photos in their family collections, so it would be very easy for someone to want to believe the deceased was not real. I obviously was not prepared to see a picture of that type, the first time I saw that photo.

None the less, the photograph struck me as hauntingly beautiful in the way all of the objects were arranged in the picture.

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