What Do I See?

Fifteen years is a long time ago. This morning, I was transported back to a life I barely recognized. A photo, then another, and another. Ones I remember taking of people. People I loved, people I knew, people from another life. I wasn’t looking to go down memory lane. But God had other plans.

I read a message a few weeks back from my sister, that a boy she helped raise suddenly died from an overdose. I knew I had some really great photographs of him at about age 7 that I took long ago but couldn’t for the life of me find them. Why weren’t they on Facebook? Then in an instant, I remembered that before I put all my pictures on Facebook, I had a photoblog. I barely recalled the name. But I went hunting for it and sure enough after a few failed attempts there it was. It was like finding a time capsule.

I quickly saved the images of the boy and sent them to my grieving sister so she could have them, and because I’m overwhelmed with Easter preparations at church, for my job, I quickly moved onto my next task. I have a terrible habit of never closing my tabs or programs I use, or shutting down my computer. And today, on this lazy Friday, I found myself with some time for reflection.

It’s raining but because I live in a two-story house, I can’t really hear the rain. So I asked for Alexa’s help and am playing Thunderstorms on all my devices. With socks on my feet, I snuggled in under the covers, sipping coffee in bed. I reached over and put my computer on my lap and I checked the new numbers for our Egg Hunt. I clicked over to my web browser and I found the tab to my blog once again.

This was before I started to write. Before my life came crashing down. I saw the post from my second honeymoon cruise that was supposed to reignite my marriage. It was one of my last entries. I kept scrolling back and reliving the memories of my life before divorce.

I was a professional photographer. Families, events, children, and lots of photos that were journalistic in nature. I remembered scouting the locations for each shoot, the circumstances around each one – how nervous I was every time until the shooting started. I even remember the position I had to get into in order to get some of them or the feeling I felt after I knew I snapped a good one. It made me feel young again. It reminded me of that other girl who used to exist.

Even with all the filters that exist today, many of these photos would still be considered high quality. But I especially liked the candids that I took as part of just living my life. The expressions that were moments in time forever captured because I saw them and snapped a photo.

I was so good! No wonder all my friends paid me to take their family photos. No wonder I sank thousands of dollars into a better camera and studio lights. No wonder I was considering a career as a photographer. And then I remembered something I had long forgotten.

My photo blog ended on February 26, 2009. My husband moved out in March. My life shattered. I didn’t pick up my camera again for 8 months. Photography all of a sudden was in my past. I lost a spark, a drive, a desire. That life that included my family and photography seemed a cruel joke. I couldn’t take pictures of other smiling families when I didn’t have one. I couldn’t see the joy in the way the breeze moved a woman’s hair, or the flow of the sun haloed behind someone’s beaming face. Maybe I didn’t want to see it so I avoided it.

There was a break. And nothing was ever the same. Travels came and went. For years I took my camera with me on my expeditions of hope for a new life. With the men I loved and who I thought loved me. But this time, I just posted like a normal person…not a professional. I stopped doing stock. I stopped taking paid jobs. I lost my confidence. I was lost in life, heading nowhere but in all directions, hoping that this path was the right one. Or maybe this one. Or God, help me, maybe this one. I quit believing in me. I wanted to find that one that was missing. The one that made sense. The one that was gone forever.

For a while, I’d do my thing at my next job when they needed me. I became the headshot girl. My camera got older. I got older. I stopped keeping it charged. I put it away in a storage bench. I tucked that life away with each new heartbreak. Fancy travels to Europe ended. Hope for a new life and new marriage ended. With each move, the lights got packed away and then put on the highest shelf in the garage. I knew I probably would never use them again. Now they are too old to be considered professional equipment. So is my camera. So am I.

This is where I have been stuck for 6 long years. Stuck not believing what I say out loud. I say that the best is yet to come. I say, I still believe. But every time I strike out trying to get unstuck…God pulls me back to exactly where I am. Waiting. Waiting for something new. To see life differently. To start my next chapter. Sometimes I get discouraged and believe I’m better stuck on a shelf like my camera.

My new job, I oversee the photographers. I taught one of them how to shoot from scratch five years ago, and now he’s a professional photographer. The new person we hired to replace him already had photography skills, and I don’t even think she knows that I know how to shoot. She’s good and doesn’t need any tips from me.

But I was so good.

And today, it just kind of shocked me that fifteen years have passed. I’ve talked myself out of starting again a few times. Mostly because the cost of updating my equipment is cost prohibitive. There is a faint dream still alive within me though. Of a girl who travels and talks to people and then writes about them. That is where I was headed fifteen years ago. It’s like a dream that you wake from and only remember the feeling…none of the details are there anymore. But that dream is deep within me still. The girl in her 30’s had no business dreaming that dream. She hadn’t experienced enough of life yet. She hadn’t even failed yet. I have. I know. I was her and now I’m not.

My passion is still there though. I have it and it annoys people sometimes. When life is happening at such a fast pace and I want to keep trying to nail the right tone…and won’t quit until we get it right. That girl is still there. It is the professional in me. Not taking pictures anymore but writing, and creating in other ways.

Hope and belief had to fight its way back into my heart. I had no idea what I was in for. But I am on the other side of that pain now. It makes me wonder if I picked up a camera, what this older, wiser, me would see. What stories could I tell with pictures and words. How could I share what God has shown me about life with others. How could God use all my talents and skills and lessons from the pain for “good.”

My daily prayer is to get unstuck. God clearly has me where I am for a reason. I’ve never tried so hard to leave something before. I’m always the one who stays. But these last six years all I wanted to do was leave. God knows more than me. I didn’t want these lessons I’ve learned but here I am. Better for them. Prayer aligns our hearts with God’s will. And in the last few months I’ve surrendered to that will. It’s given me a new refreshed spirit of willingness to see this current path through without trying to see what is next before this one is over.

What do I see right now?

I am still good. I don’t need to hold myself back from experiencing the joys this life has. I see God at work. I see Him using little things like my photoblog from fifteen years ago to remind me of who I was but also who I am. I see the little wins as I listen to Him. I see that each day brings with it opportunities to meet the divine with the ordinary. Sitting on my bed, listening to the fake thunderstorm, He met me here today. And I’m somehow more connected to myself than I was before this day began. Thank you God.