Vintage Photos

I love my camera.  I have loved my camera for a long time.  A long, long time.  It’s an ancient digital camera (so…not as ancient as a camera that uses film, but that’s beside the point).  Even though it takes a whole minute between turning the camera on until it is ready to take a picture, it’s worth it.  It takes beautiful pictures!  Although I’ve tried to update to newer cameras (and yes, my phone), I still revert back to my old one when the picture-taking matters.

Last week, one of these occasions popped up.  I grabbed my beloved old camera and packed it in my bag.  All was good until I turned it on and realized something.  The memory card was missing.  All I could use was the internal memory, which was enough for about 15 pictures.  Well, all right–I figured the memory card was in my schoolbag, or inserted in either my home laptop or my school laptop.  And that’s when the panic hit…

About two months ago, the tech people replaced my school laptop (nicknamed “Old Wheezy”) with a new ThinkPad.  WHAT IF MY CARD WAS IN OLD WHEEZY??  Immediately my mind raced through the catalog of pictures that were undoubtably gone forever.  And it was a traumatic barrage of  of them, because one little memory card held over a thousand pictures from my completely outdated camera!  (Step into reality–yes, most of those pictures are actually backed up on other storage, but that did nothing to stop my panic.)

This began a long week of trying to solve my camera problem, since it was rendered useless without a memory card.  My first move was to send a passionate plea for help to the tech department to see if Old Wheezy was still on the premises somewhere and the card could be recovered.  Next, I went online to order a new memory card.  I found two 8GB cards for a very reasonable price.  (I knew they had to be at a minimum of storage capactity or the camera would just give up trying to read them.). Perfect!  I pressed the “Place Order” button and they were on the way, still in time for use over Spring Break.

Once the new cards arrived, I popped one in and turned the camera on.  And waited.  And waited.  And waited.  And…WAITED.  I had a sinking feeling that 8GB was still too much for my camera to handle.  I went online and investigated.  Yep, true.  So I ordered (UGH!) a pair of 2GB cards at a bit of a higher price (UGH!) which would still arrive just at the edge of the end of my break.

And mistakenly had them sent to the wrong address.  (My home, instead of my parents’ home where I was visiting.)

It seemed that the deck was stacked against me.  And I reluctantly considered that maybe it was finally time to let my favorite camera go and just rely on my phone.

And then the email came.  The tech people went on a  mission to search for Old Wheezy in the depths of wherever-laptops-go-to-die and FOUND it!  “We have recovered your memory card,” said the note, “and it is on your desk in your classroom”.  Hooray!  I thanked them gratefully for their efforts and regained my hopeful attitude.  I may not have been able to use my camera over break as I had wanted to do, but at least my pictures were safe and the camera was back in operation.

I know it’s silly to use something so old, but in normal circumstances my favorite camera takes beautiful pictures.  And in the meantime, I think I had better buy a few more of those 2GB cards in preparation for the day that they don’t make them anymore!  (I’ll store them near my stash of blank VHS tapes…)