Childbirth is a profound and bittersweet experience, but lucky you, this post isn’t going to dwell on that.
Home and away from the hospital, the moment I was strong enough to hold a camera and capture every twist or turn of my little angels’ sweet countenances, I was clicking and clicking, and clicking some more.
Thirteen years and three beautiful kids later, you’d think I should already have accumulated a cabinet or two of photographs and a truckload of memories. Or a hard drive full of digital images of the kids as they were growing up.
Well, you’re right.
And wrong.
Yes, at the same time.
Image courtesy of photostock / FreeDigitalPhotos.net
What went wrong
Thirteen years and three beautiful kids later, I still got the memories, plus an album with what remained of the photos and scrapbooks I so carefully crafted before Typhoon Ketsana’s lashing in 2009.
The flood had gone on to reach the ceiling. My wedding photos had been ruined, so were the kids’ christening photos. Class pictures, Recognition Day shots, birthday party mementos, the kids learning to bike or dance the Macarena – almost everything have gone up in smoke, er, drowned down the pipes.
I had hoped to keep those for the kids to see when they are all grown up. It was asking for too much, I guess. Those pictures had been taken with the help of traditional film cameras. And the only consolation I had was, amidst the ruins, I found two rolls of film that I had forgotten to take to a photo studio for developing. They captured my youngest child’s days while still in the crib.
Thank goodness for small favors.
What went right
When the storm cleared and the floodwater subsided, the family’s computer had also been destroyed, save for the hard disk drive. As soon as it was dry enough, the HDD proved immune to the flooding. (Isn’t that a miracle or what?)
Immediately, an external hard drive was purchased, and we made copies of all the important files and documents. Apart from uploading most of the pictures into the cloud afterwards, I still have that external disk drive locked somewhere safe, because as you may have already imagined, if I can help it, I am not allowing another flooding or computer breakdown to keep me and my children from their childhood pics.
Things to ponder
You see, disaster can strike at a time when you least expect. Even on a day with perfect weather, no matter how well-maintained your computer might be, there is always the possibility of a hard drive crash.
And if you’re sensible as sensible could be, you know by now that backing up your digital data is crucial to prevent data loss. An external hard drive is one viable option. External hard drives can do three things:
- back up your data
- expand your PC’s storage capacity
- allow for data sharing between computers
Conclusion
There are a lot of hard drive brands vying for consumers’ attention in the marketplace nowadays. But whether they’re hard drives from Novatech or some other manufacturer you’re looking into, it’s best to remember to back up your data before it’s too late, especially if that data captures memories of the good old days.
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a really must.. even there are softwares to get lost files sometimes you will get the files but it will be corrupted.. backup is always a must especially to those important ones..
Indeed, Baterya. Once data gets lost and we haven’t any backup stored somewhere, we can only blame ourselves, especially with the proliferation of backup software or media that are available out there.
Yes backing up your data is really important. My nephew used to borrow my laptop for his online games, since I can’t stop his incessant demands I let him one time it crashed and the repair guy was not able to recover my files! Al my travel photos are there! Good thing I have some backups. 😉
Kids, LOL!
Well, the laptop crashing is something to really frown about. But I bet you must have been very relieved when you discovered you got your files backed up. Way to go, Vivs!
It’s nice to take pictures of the moments and events, just to be sure don’t forget to print some if you’re using a digicam because chances are, it might get corrupted. It’s better to be safe than sorry. And it’s always nice to have something to look at whenever you want to reminisce.
You’re right about that, Mykel. Better safe than sorry, yeah?
oh no, I would probably flood vienna, crying over ruined photos. All my photos are in 2 terabyte external hds…thanks to the hubby who shares the same sentiments with me. cloud sharing is also very helpful!
I can only imagine, Marie. I’m sure it’ll be a gloomy day in Vienna if your pictures get ruined. Lucky you for having a hubby as sensible as you are.
When the unexpected happens, you wouldn’t want to be left unprepared. That’s what happened to me… I lost all the photos of when I just gave birth when I saved them on an online photo album. I don’t know exactly what went wrong, but I just lost all of them. Yes, we should always backup our precious files.
Sometimes, saving pictures in online photo albums can have its downside. In my case, when Friendster finally closed up shop, I lost a lot of photos, too. Good thing original copies of most of those photos are saved in my hard drive.
yay! thank you for the reminder. I haven’t done so since returning from our summer holiday. and that is about three months ago! I have ceased printing our photos opting instead to save them on pc. now will work on that external hard drive.
thanks a lot for the reminder
Not a problem, Kero. I am glad the post helped. 🙂
Hi,
What an amazing story (I’m so sorry for what you had to go through), and a great lesson to share.
I am behind in backing up my site & will get to it now. Thanks for sharing. Sally
Sally Brown recently posted…Hurricane Sandy – Disaster! Political Climate in US – Disastrous!
Sally, thank you so much for the visit! Yes, I’m sorry that it happened to me, too. Then again, lesson learned the hard way for me. 🙂