A Life’s Moments are Worth Capturing

Sometimes pictures are all we have to remember a loved one, a special event, or places we have been.

These days we see a large portion of our lives documented out on the net on personal web pages, school web pages, Facebook, and Myspace.  Some sights, such as Shutterfly, even specialize in inexpensive, creative ways to print or publish our photos.   For the most part, in our society we follow the mantra “a picture is worth a thousand words”, especially when it comes to our children.

Just over a month ago I lost my grandfather, my “papaw”.  Pappaw was an artist.  A very good artist. A great artist, in fact.  For more than a half-century he made a living taking pictures and putting them on canvas.  Like most artists of his day, he was an excellent photographer.  I guess the very same qualities that makes it easy for a talented artist to convey what they see on canvas also  blesses them with an eye for capturing life on film.

Pappaw was always taking pictures and when he did, he would ask us, “Are you ready to be immortalized in film?”  To him, photographs were more than just a medium to be used in his painting.  To my papaw, photographs captured and stored for posterity the very essence of life he tried so hard to portray in his artwork.

When papaw passed away, my family undertook a search through the boxes of photographs he had taken over the half century of his career.  Pictures of us, various subjects for his paintings, and scenery throughout the Smoky Mountains were plentiful.  Many pictures we saw for the very first time.  Some pictures evoked strong senses of emotion, as long-forgotten places and times were pulled back from the depths of our memories as we worked our way through the boxes of pictures.  Of all the pictures we discovered, there was one glaring subject missing from the mounds of pictures—my papaw.

Throughout all the years it was always papaw with the camera, and when it came time to put together a memoriam to be shown at his memorial service we could barely find more than 50 pictures to commemorate a life spanning over 70 years.  There were many years in the prime of his life that we were unable to find pictures of him at all.  This is when I realized, maybe for the first time, how very important the photographic record is in our lives and our legacies.

How many times have you looked through a history book and studied the pictures of things you can only imagine and wonder about?  Where would we be today in our understanding of American history if there was no photographic record of our civil war, our foreign wars, our presidents, or great events throughout the 20^th century?  When I was 10 years old the space shuttle Challenger unexpectedly blew up shortly after take-off.  When I was 15 years old, the Berlin wall came down and America found itself in Operation Desert Storm.  In my 26^th year I watched as airplanes hit the twin towers, sending them to the ground in a massive collapse of steel, concrete, fire, and smoke.  Poignant photographs exist of these memorable events in our history.  They mean something to us, and keep us from forgetting those events that define us as a nation, as a civilization.

Taking photos of our loved ones, as my papaw used to say, “Immortalizes them in film.”  Long after our family and friends are gone, there will exist a record in photograph.  Once we pass on to join the heavenly chorus a record of our lives will be left behind, as well.

How much of a record depends on the steps we take today to have family photos and pictures taken at important family events.  Losing my papaw so quickly reminded me of the necessity of capturing life’s cherished moments on film, and I believe it is a lesson we can all benefit from.

Share on Facebook