My scanner has been broken for some time. And even before that, I had gotten very behind in my scanning. Well, my scanner has been repaired and I finally found time to scan my rolls.

I captured these photos of Bodie, California in September. While scanning them, I felt like I was going on a walk down memory lane, which is perfectly apropos for photos of this quaint ghost town.

In 1859, William Bodie discovered gold in the hills just north of Mono Lake. By 1880, it was a town of 10,000 people. Legend has it that it was a rough town having 65 salons. In 1898, the mill caught fire. While some people started to leave, it wasn’t until a great fire in 1932 that the town started its journey to Ghost Town status.

While walking the streets of this abandoned little city, I couldn’t help but imagine all that had been lost here. Not just history, but hopes and dreams. It was a somber walk.

It made me wonder what I leave behind and what things I don’t find important now, but my future self would want to hold onto. Sometimes when I go back into my archives, I see images I hated at the time but now find beauty in. I wonder what I have deleted in haste. I wonder what memories I have forgotten because I didn’t see the charm of the image at the time.

Have you journeyed through your archives lately? There might be some treasures you have forgotten about.

~Staci Lee