I shall be telling
this with a sigh
Somewhere ages and ages hence:
Two roads diverged in a wood, and I--
I took the one less traveled by,
And that has made all the difference
Robert Frost (The Road Not Taken)
Somewhere ages and ages hence:
Two roads diverged in a wood, and I--
I took the one less traveled by,
And that has made all the difference
Robert Frost (The Road Not Taken)
This
last stanza of Robert Frost's poem
doesn't quite describe my life. Oh, I suspect I've often taken the road less
traveled by. I also suspect I've taken it less often than I like to imagine I
have. What really describes my life, but
would not sound nearly as desirable, is that I have taken the road I didn't
want to take. The most obvious examples of this are the road I took to an MBA
and the road I took to lose 90 lbs.
This past year is the most recent example. While walking one day last summer, I suffered a creative fit and wrote a picturesque bit of prose comparing the clouds to a Sunday afternoon idyll on a lake. That first was the best of a series of analogies. Eventually, it came to mind that if I took pictures, people could see what I was writing about. I pulled out the camera with which I had previously taken pictures of tombstones and began documenting my analogies. Slowly the clouds lost their allure, but I saw a tree filled with small black birds, and quickly snapped a picture of "Hitchcock in Miniature."
I argued with God, and with anyone who tried to encourage me, that I really didn't need another hobby. I wasn't a photographer. I didn't want to be a photographer. I had neither the time nor the money to be a photographer and even if I did want to be a photographer, I argued that I don't take good pictures! This wasn't the road I was supposed to be on.
Then fall and winter came and I was forced inside. I struggled to force myself to continue walking on my treadmill, and I was losing that battle. On Christmas day, I returned to the outdoors and learned how to walk in cold and snow - another road I hadn't intended to walk. On one walk I got some magnificent shots of a hawk; closer than I had ever gotten. I hurried home to discover that my beautiful hawk was, from the camera's perspective, blue and white. If I had arranged for the special effects of the pictures that followed, they would have been great. The hunt began for a new camera, with me growling the whole time that I couldn't afford it.
As I shopped, and purchased, one concept became clear. If I was going to get this new camera, I wanted to glorify God with it. I knew I didn't really have any idea what that meant, but two points came out of that decision: I would have to take the camera everywhere with me and I would have to learn to see things like a photographer sees them - to my thinking, I would have to learn to see things and I would have to learn to see them differently.
One morning, I was standing in a circle of praying women. The thought came to mind "I should take a picture of this." I did. It wasn't a great picture. Another morning we had an installation service for our new pastor, and I noticed that no one was taking pictures. Out came the camera and my attitude. "But, God," I complained as I snapped away, "I don't do people."
Very clearly, God answered, "You aren't taking pictures of people, you are documenting history. You're doing the same thing you've been doing for years with the pictures of tombstones."
Months passed with me taking pictures of anything that caught my eye. At the beginning of May, on facebook, the challenge going around was to post a picture of your mother in honor of mother's day. Never one to do things by halves, I decided that one picture was not enough, that I should put a whole photo array. Out came old photo albums. My grandmother's birthday is about the same time. I decided I should honor her memory by doing another array of her. My sister's birthday is about a week later, so shots of her joined the others. My niece asked for more pictures of various relatives. I found some pictures I'd forgotten about, and some negatives, but most of our family photos are on slides. After some investigation, I got a scanner that would allow me to scan either slides or negatives into my computer.
I found myself looking once again at images I haven't seen for years: some taken before I was born, some taken of places I have been, some taken of me. My memories of all three are about as equally blank. I know that little girl is me. I know I've been there and seen that, but I don't remember the reality. The thing that I noticed about the pictures of that little girl who I was is that many of them, many more of them than I expected, show her-me smiling. I had to wonder - could it be that the childhood that I don't really remember, the childhood in which there were a few childhood traumas that seem to have overwhelmed my impressions as I looked back, was not the negative experience I have believed?
And the prayer I prayed 6 months ago came to mind - if I am to glorify God with my pictures, then I must learn to see as a photographer sees, I must learn to see differently, I must learn to see.
This past year is the most recent example. While walking one day last summer, I suffered a creative fit and wrote a picturesque bit of prose comparing the clouds to a Sunday afternoon idyll on a lake. That first was the best of a series of analogies. Eventually, it came to mind that if I took pictures, people could see what I was writing about. I pulled out the camera with which I had previously taken pictures of tombstones and began documenting my analogies. Slowly the clouds lost their allure, but I saw a tree filled with small black birds, and quickly snapped a picture of "Hitchcock in Miniature."
I argued with God, and with anyone who tried to encourage me, that I really didn't need another hobby. I wasn't a photographer. I didn't want to be a photographer. I had neither the time nor the money to be a photographer and even if I did want to be a photographer, I argued that I don't take good pictures! This wasn't the road I was supposed to be on.
Then fall and winter came and I was forced inside. I struggled to force myself to continue walking on my treadmill, and I was losing that battle. On Christmas day, I returned to the outdoors and learned how to walk in cold and snow - another road I hadn't intended to walk. On one walk I got some magnificent shots of a hawk; closer than I had ever gotten. I hurried home to discover that my beautiful hawk was, from the camera's perspective, blue and white. If I had arranged for the special effects of the pictures that followed, they would have been great. The hunt began for a new camera, with me growling the whole time that I couldn't afford it.
As I shopped, and purchased, one concept became clear. If I was going to get this new camera, I wanted to glorify God with it. I knew I didn't really have any idea what that meant, but two points came out of that decision: I would have to take the camera everywhere with me and I would have to learn to see things like a photographer sees them - to my thinking, I would have to learn to see things and I would have to learn to see them differently.
One morning, I was standing in a circle of praying women. The thought came to mind "I should take a picture of this." I did. It wasn't a great picture. Another morning we had an installation service for our new pastor, and I noticed that no one was taking pictures. Out came the camera and my attitude. "But, God," I complained as I snapped away, "I don't do people."
Very clearly, God answered, "You aren't taking pictures of people, you are documenting history. You're doing the same thing you've been doing for years with the pictures of tombstones."
Months passed with me taking pictures of anything that caught my eye. At the beginning of May, on facebook, the challenge going around was to post a picture of your mother in honor of mother's day. Never one to do things by halves, I decided that one picture was not enough, that I should put a whole photo array. Out came old photo albums. My grandmother's birthday is about the same time. I decided I should honor her memory by doing another array of her. My sister's birthday is about a week later, so shots of her joined the others. My niece asked for more pictures of various relatives. I found some pictures I'd forgotten about, and some negatives, but most of our family photos are on slides. After some investigation, I got a scanner that would allow me to scan either slides or negatives into my computer.
I found myself looking once again at images I haven't seen for years: some taken before I was born, some taken of places I have been, some taken of me. My memories of all three are about as equally blank. I know that little girl is me. I know I've been there and seen that, but I don't remember the reality. The thing that I noticed about the pictures of that little girl who I was is that many of them, many more of them than I expected, show her-me smiling. I had to wonder - could it be that the childhood that I don't really remember, the childhood in which there were a few childhood traumas that seem to have overwhelmed my impressions as I looked back, was not the negative experience I have believed?
And the prayer I prayed 6 months ago came to mind - if I am to glorify God with my pictures, then I must learn to see as a photographer sees, I must learn to see differently, I must learn to see.
Two roads diverged in
a wood, and I--
I took the I wanted not,
And that has made all the difference
I took the I wanted not,
And that has made all the difference
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