Begin with what you want to keep
If you want to store and browse pictures, a photo library may be all you need. If you also want to remember a conversation, a feeling or what happened just before the shutter, add a journal entry for a few selected photos. You can use both without moving your whole library.
One picture, two layers of memory
Imagine a photograph of a half-empty cup of tea.
- The photograph shows: the afternoon light, the cup and the person across the table.
- Your entry can add: you planned to meet for half an hour and stayed until closing. Something they said was still on your mind on the way home.
This is an invented example. Useful context is what the image alone cannot tell your future self.
Which photos deserve an entry?
Look through today’s pictures and choose one you would want to explain to a friend. Why did you take it? What happened outside the frame? Which detail might you forget in a year? Answer just one question in a sentence or two.
Avoid creating another sorting chore
Choose one photo, or a small group about the same experience. Not every image needs a caption. A picture without a story can stay in your library. A day with a story but no photograph can become a text entry.
Revisit both layers
Find an entry by date, look at the photo, then read what you wrote at the time. Let the old entry keep its perspective. If you see things differently now, write that in a new entry.