Me and my nine-year-old self

Several years ago, my dad started converting to DVD the many hours of videotape he shot of my sisters and me, and the rest of our family, when we were growing up. It started with a DVD here or there, arriving in the mail without explanation or a note, and I liked that it didn’t need one. Then several weeks ago, a larger envelope, with six or seven DVD cases inside; he’d been on a roll.

The first tapes were shot with a video camera that was about the size of what TV news crews use today, complete with two or three light stands, set up around the room. Our Christmas mornings in Michigan were hot—red flannel nightgowns and Dad’s camera lights.

I’m grateful that he documented our lives in such detail. He got holidays and birthdays and vacations, of course. But in between are moments when we’re just riding bikes or reading or playing in the snow.

Tonight I watched a couple hours, starting with my ninth birthday. It is such a strange feeling, even still, to watch the younger version of me in action. I often feel like I haven’t changed at all, that I’m still that little kid with the buck teeth and the wild, chlorinated hair—until I see myself on tape and feel like that’s someone I once knew, not someone I once was.

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Things my nine-year-old self and I have in common:

We both like opening other people’s presents.
We’re both moody.
We both think we’re shyer than we really are.
We both love Grandma and Grandpa so much it hurts.
We both like being alone.
We’re both curious.
We’re both stubborn.
We’re both a little sad whenever we’re happy.
We both know what we want and what we don’t want.

Me, after getting a blue ten-speed Schwinn from my grandparents