Our refrigerator used to be the hub of our home, mainly because it was covered with photos that depicted almost every milestone or significant event in our lives as a family—to include preschool graduation, Halloween costumes, photo booth fun, birthday parties, family vacations as well as a snapshot or two of an ordinary Tuesday here at home. Of course, in those days there was also a giant calendar wedged between the photos upon which we had scrawled important upcoming dates and phone numbers. By contrast, I keep practically everything in my smartphone calendar and contact list now. No need to hang a ridiculously large master schedule smack in the middle of the fridge anymore.
At any rate, we remodeled our kitchen and replaced our old fridge with a stainless steel one a number of years ago. So I boxed up the wealth of photos and kids’ artwork and put them somewhere safe, although I can’t recall where just now. For longer than I’d care to admit, I pined for the antiquated fridge with its canvas of snapshots and magnets inscribed with favorite quotes, often finding myself standing in front of it, reminiscing over times when my children were small.
In all honesty, it took more restraint than I had imagined to refrain from plastering the entire surface of that new fridge with an embarrassment of photos once again. Self-imposed restraint, I might add. I don’t think my husband, or the kids for that matter, really had an opinion about how pristine (or not) the new fridge looked. They probably would’ve been fine had I festooned it from top to bottom and on three sides once more. But I didn’t. However, I couldn’t completely kick the “refrigerator art” habit. I settled, instead, for designating just one side of the new fridge for photos and the like. As a result, the part of me that appreciates an unblemished, smudge-free surface that gleams in the morning sunlight is happy. Similarly, the part of me that reveres seeing the cherished photos and reading the inspirational messages on a handful of magnets is thrilled. It’s a win-win situation, I guess.
Not surprisingly, I chose photos of my favorite people and pets this time, too, although most of them are updated, more recent versions of the originals. There are favorite images of our twins caught in mid-performance in the marching band they so loved, some of them during their college years, some printouts of old holiday greeting cards we had made, some of my parents and mother-in-law who have since passed away, a dear church friend we also lost and even a picture of our old fridge—the one that was inundated with the trappings of life. I also added a smattering of pics (and even an ultrasound image) of our granddaughter, who is now eight.
I think the pics of the pets we’ve lost get to me the most. They pull at my heartstrings. Even though our curly-haired, pint-sized Bichon whizzed indiscriminately on the floor almost every day and our 95-lb. yellow lab “puppy” occasionally dragged us across the street because she wanted to eat other dogs, I still miss them. And our black lab mix, with the caramel-colored eyes that made me melt—he is missed, too, along with our black cat, Mr. Binx, once feral and eventually tamed. And I can’t forget our long-haired orange tabby, who was known for fetching things like a dog and for sleeping on whoever happened to be ill, to perhaps make them well again. Since the space on the new fridge is limited, I framed and hung pictures of nearly all of our pets in an adjacent room. The Pet Wall of Fame, if you will. Now I rekindle the abundance of memories I possess standing somewhere besides the kitchen when I want to revisit a time when they were all here. Of course, I’ve included images of our current cats who are alive and well in that room, too.
It’s a far cry from the coveted fridge space, I suppose, but it’ll have to do.
Welcome to my world. It’s where I live (probably admiring my refrigerator). Visit me there at www.facebook.com/NotesFromPlanetMom. Signed books are available on Etsy at PlanetMomMarket.
Copyright 2026 Melinda L. Wentzel
