Emotional Pictures

I have a new carrying case now for when I travel. It will hold my 17" laptop computer, all its accessories, my Canon camera, and all the files and other things I need for working away from home. I use the camera a lot to get pictures of places to keep in my memory for locations in stories, or for examples in non-fiction. I like to just take pictures in general of the places like we all do too and I have seven scrapbooks bursting at the seems that regale travels and events over the past 10 years. You wouldn't think a simple stationary picture could evoke such emotional responses when you sit down to analyze it, but some things go way beyond any analytical thinking. They just move you. The memory is a powerful thing and pictures evoke those memories and jog the parts of your brain that hold precious feelings from events of the past. There have been times when my daughter would look through the books at pictures from her youth and be moved to tears or laughter at the memories they bring. For me as a writer words are a powerful source of emotion, but even I have to admit that pictures trump words a hundred fold. They say a picture is worth a thousand words, and that saying is as true today as it was when it they were first uttered. I have volumes of 'words' in my scrapbooks and they are stronger than any library of books.