| Gregory Bedore is pictured here in a 1990 St. Petersburg Times article about his camera collection. [Via Newspapers.com] |
| In the summer of 2021, I sat on the floor of my mom’s garage, surrounded by several past versions of myself. Into heavy duty trash bags went the high school yearbooks, the albums with those sticky pages and clear protectors filled with photos, wristbands from youth group trips, concert tickets, pressed flowers, love letters of old beaus and printed out emails from accounts I’ve since abandoned. It spanned from high school through the two years I spent in the Peace Corps. I curated a pile of favorite photos, but I wanted to keep five, not 500. I hauled off as many of the trash bags that could fit into my mom’s trash can and walked away with no regrets. I promise I’m not heartless and I’m not unsentimental. I write obituaries for goodness sake. But I’d just spent a day looking through albums and boxes from my great grandmother, who saved everything. Greeting cards. Labels. Photos. Birth announcements. Death announcements. Recipes clipped from the newspaper. I didn’t want some future generation to have to cull through my paperwork. And I felt like the things I’ve made — books, art, journalism, traditions — will tell my story best. My archives went into the trash. But my real treasures? Who knows. The jewelry I’ve found while traveling, the small bits and bobs from vintage and antique shops and even decades worth of journals feel special. To me. Will they matter to my kids or their kids? This week, I wrote about a local gemologist with two remarkable collections. Gregory Bedore curated Zeiss German cameras and guitars made from recycled and found objects. He was a man devoted to the details. “He’s possessed,” his wife told the St. Petersburg Times in a 1990 story about his camera collection. “Greg doesn’t do anything 50%; it’s always 110%. I thought he got a little carried away. But it must be nice to be that passionate about something.” You can read more about the camera and guitar collector here. Do you have any collections of treasures? Tell me about them (even better, send a photo), and I’ll share some favorites next week. |
| Here are some obituaries from the past week that I found in the obits section of the Tampa Bay Times, in the news and from local funeral homes. If you see any with great details, please share them.
• Randall Stack, 75, of Tampa "was an avid reader of both fiction and non-fiction, sometimes finishing two to three books a week. If you have not read 'Undaunted Courage' he highly recommends it."
• John Kelsey of St. Petersburg "was a caring and selfless man, always lighthearted and jovial. A long-time customer greeter at Walmart on 34th St. S. in St. Peterburg, his winning smile will be missed."
• Cynthia Keffer, 79, of Seminole "especially loved her cats Buttercup and Tasha."
• Robert Ballou, 74, of Floral City "served as Fire Chief in the city of St. Petersburg for 35 years."
Thanks for reading, hug your people,
Kristen |
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