Many years ago, a friend told me that he never took a picture without a person in the picture he knew. I don't recall that he used the term but I like to think of it as placing the picture in a context. I haven't always followed his advice but I have mostly regretted it when I haven't.
Two days ago I finished scanning 72 slides that were processed in June 1982. That doesn't mean the pictures were taken in June of 1982, only that they were taken some time before that. None of the slides have any annotations on them and the boxes only have England '82. Elsewhere I had written down that we went to England on a hospital tour in 1981 so that means one of the dates is wrong and without any further context there's no way to resolve the issue. I might be in one of the pictures but only if I was 40 pound lighter at that time (which is certainly possible).
But worse than not knowing the date is not having any idea what the pictures are about. As they are, they are virtually useless. Imagine what a difference just a small note about the above photo might have made. Or if a photo in the same batch had shown a signpost for a village in England or Ireland. Another good reminder to me to keep things in context.
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