I don’t have a lot of photos of myself, at least not very many upon which I’ve bestowed lofty “keeper” status. Like the trout big enough to be kept when caught, a keeper has to meet a certain measure. Like the photo of me dangling from a radio tower some 300 feet above the ground for an assignment at the Coos Bay newspaper back in the early 1990’s. That’s a keeper. And if I could find it, and you were to see it, I’m sure you’d agree.

I actually found a keeper a while back while riffling through my archives. It’s a Polaroid picture I took of myself with my trusty Spectra Pro shortly after moving to Pueblo in 1998.  My initial reaction: “Christ, I look young.”  I was 36 years old, actually, and flecks of grey had already begun to assail my brown hair and beard.

I posted the photo on Facebook for “Throwback Thursday.” It’s a social media convention in which people post a picture of themselves from the relatively distant past (and most certainly is now passé since I have participated in it). My post garnered a smattering of “likes” and a few people commented on it. Monica’s “What a handsome man!” however obligatory, was most welcomed. But the comment made by Scott Vanhorne, a former colleague from my days at the Daily Press in Victorville, gave me pause. “I remember that dude,” he wrote.

I’m glad Scott does, because I certainly can’t.

Just where the hell did those 16 years go, anyway?

For grins, I tried to recreate that 1998 picture. I took another Polaroid photo using that same Spectra Pro camera using Impossible Project’s recently released black-and-white Spectra film. While it doesn’t quite meet my “keeper” standard, it certainly does make for an interesting comparison.

But honestly, some things are better left undone.