Photo by Evan Kafka

E Street Saving Memories By Steven Slon, July & August 2008 From the editor's desk (and video camera)...

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VIDEO: My mother, Jean Slon, tells the story of the alleged murder of her grandfather the sea captain Murdoch MacInnis.

My mother is a combination of the highly practical (never throws anything out; cuts out the bad spots on spoiled fruit and then boils the rest into a “nutritious” mush) and the exceptionally impractical (“Why doesn’t someone invent an aerial whirlpool that can gently lower airliners to the ground?”).

Jean Slon is 88 years old, and she has broken her hip, her arm, her other arm, and had two knee replacements. None of this has fazed her. She zips around New York City on public transportation visiting friends or going to museums. Taking a cab is against her religion.

For the Record

Photo by Marc Asnin/Redux

Here’s my mom regaling me and former classmates at her 60th college reunion, at Vassar in 2001.

My two sons know my mother well. They’ve heard the story about her grandfather, the captain of a ship out of Gloucester, Massachusetts, who died at sea in a mysterious accident—most likely a mutiny. They’ve tasted her cooking: spectacular apple pies, paella, and the occasional Julia Child special. Then there’s the unexpected side of this Connecticut Yankee, such as the jokes with a Yiddish punch line. I’ve often wished my sons’ children and their children’s children could know her, too.

So, it was good timing that, just as my mother was about to visit for the weekend, I was reading an early draft of Abigail Thomas’s wonderful piece on memoir, “Everyone Has a Story to Tell”. When I got to the part about video memoir, I knew what I had to do.

The camera was the hard part (I had to rent one). But the rest was easy. I just pushed “Record.” My mother very much enjoys remembering her childhood, her parents, and even the black sheep in the family—who after some prodding on my part was revealed to be her mother’s brother, who apparently swiped the family inheritance. That’s the key to a great video memoir: keep asking questions like a reporter, including some that gently push at the comfort zone.

I’m editing the thing now in Apple’s iMovie, which is amazingly easy to use. Once I get all my mom’s best quotes and add some stills of my dad, who died in ’94, I’ll launch this online. (The clip above is just a preview.) And then—well, this is the coolest thing—my mother’s moving, speaking image will be out there forever, not only for my family but also for people I’ll never even know.

It can make your head spin.

Steven Slon
Editor, AARP The Magazine
editor@aarp.org

601 E Street NW
Washington, DC 20049