I sort of had plans for today. I went to the basement to look for a palm sander to work on a project. I didn’t find the sander, but I found a couple of photographs and some old recordings I had made with my family in the early 1990’s.

We used to play this game called Life Stories. When you get to the end, it’s called your homecoming, and everyone is supposed to say something nice about you.

My family has a way of taking things to the next level.

On one particular night, I passed a cassette recorder around, and we recorded the homecoming comments.

A lot has changed in the 30ish years since we said these words, laying around on the floor of my parents’ family room. Most of my kids weren’t born yet. My brother wasn’t married yet. They have adult children now, too. I was married at that time.

Having lost my mom just over seven months ago, it was very emotional for me to hear her voice talking about me today. I wasn’t expecting that.

So I spent a good chunk of the afternoon making parts of it into a video so I can listen to it whenever I want to, and so I can share it.

It is really validating to hear that even three decades ago, people recognized what was important to me, and that those things are still important to me now. Family, specifically parenting. Art and creativity. Kindness and generosity. Saying what you think. Even writing made it in there.

Either the batteries died or the tape ran out while mom was talking.