Reflections
The photographs that mean the most, hurt the most
Heads up. This one’s heavy. I won’t object if you skip it.
This afternoon was difficult. I walked into my office after lunch and for some reason took note of a framed photograph I’ve passed every day for a decade. It’s a portrait of a young boy, about 8 years old, standing in an open field. He has a hat pulled down over his eyes. It’s silly and charming. I remember the day we made it.
It was June 8, 2011. I was volunteering for Flashes of Hope, a nonprofit that provides no-cost portraits for families affected by childhood cancer. They bring studio-style portrait sessions to hospitals around the country, and in St. Louis at Camp Rainbow, a summer camp for kids with cancer and blood-related diseases.
It was my first visit to Camp Rainbow. That day, along with a handful of other photographers, I was fortunate to meet and photograph a dozen kids. There were happy kids and shy kids and goofy kids and quiet kids. There were kids who loved mugging for the camera and kids who didn’t really want to sit for portraits. The kid whose picture still hangs on my wall was one of the latter. He wasn’t too enthusiastic about having his picture taken, but we muddled through. The photo with the hat was a compromise. He’d sit for a picture if I’d let him hide his face. Win-win. But we broke the ice and I encouraged him to give me mean faces and silly faces and whatever faces he wanted to show. There were no rules, I assured him, and that helped him relax, knowing he didn’t need to force a smile or pose for the camera. I’d shoot whatever he wanted to offer.
I remember all this because, after taking note of the picture on the wall, I remembered his name. It’s fairly unique, a little like mine in that Google is likely to get you to the right guy. So I looked him up.
I found a foundation in his name. Hoping against hope that perhaps he was running a foundation named after himself because of the revolutionary treatment that had cured him, but no. The foundation’s website explained all about who he was.
The “was” in his bio hit me like a ton of bricks. I’m getting choked up thinking about it. I don’t know if it’s because I lost my dad this year or because I have a son who is just a little older than the boy in the photo, but I feel immense sadness at the thought of that young life cut short. I cannot comprehend what he and his family had to endure.
Secretly I found myself thinking that perhaps the reaction I was having, the pain I was feeling, would somehow lift some of that grief from his parents for just a moment. Like sharing the psychic burden. A preposterous thought, I know, but even now I hope it’s true.
Thinking about his family gave me an idea. I should go through my archive and find his pictures from that day and send them to the foundation to pass along. I know that in 2011 the organization asked us to deliver just a handful of images, so surely his loved ones never saw most of these. I would want to see everything, wouldn’t you?
As quick as the thought came I dismissed it. I decided I was being dramatic and moved on with my day. But imagining myself in their shoes, I reconsidered. I am operating under the assumption that anyone would be thrilled to experience any kind of “new” moment with a lost loved one, even if it’s just in pictures. I sure would. The out of focus ones. The blurry ones. The sad ones. The plain ones… I’d want to see every last one.
It would take an hour of my time, but what would it mean to them? Surely it would be worth it.
I retrieved the files. There were about 40. Normally I’d retouch them with an eye toward “perfection,” but in considering what his family might prefer I realized they’d want to see everything they possibly could, imperfections and all. That would be the most real. And because you never know what details might mean the most.
The littlest things kept catching my eye. A crooked tooth. A sly grin. A tiny scar. I thought about my own son, and how I could picture every freckle and bump, how I could map his face in my mind. Is it overly grandiose to assume a photograph could make a person feel closer to another, a surrogate for the real thing? It strikes me that it might, in fact, feel like some new small addition to the totality of a life. A moment that didn’t exist—at least as far as they knew—now does. What else, besides a photograph, could do that?
I looked at the details of this boy’s face and I pictured the freckle on my son’s cheek and transposed my love for him onto this child and I cried and cried.
Then another detail really caught me off guard. In some frames the boy was wearing glasses. And just like that, there I was. My reflection, clear as day, holding the camera. I’m right there with him. We are connected because we were connected. Seeing my reflection in his face, it all became that much more tangible. We were together. He was real and we were together.
And I could not stop crying. It’s not fair. Nothing is.
Eventually I hesitated and reconsidered again but kept coming back to the same idea. Here I am, a stranger, in possession of something precious his family has never seen. If I could give them the tiniest gift, even just a few new fractions of a second with their son, wouldn’t that be a small miracle? Would it feel at all like seeing him again in a way they never had before? It must. I keep telling myself it must.
I was so unsure and still am. I hope I’m not bringing more pain and sadness out of the blue. Sometimes, I am ashamed to say, photos of lost loved ones make me turn away from the pain. I hope I’m not creating a moment like that for them.
I spend so much of my time thinking about how to make photos my clients want, how to express myself creatively, how to order the world through my lens. But when I think about my best photos, the most important ones, they are always the least technical and the most personal. I remember the reaction of a friend seeing the pictures I made of his wedding. Or the photos of friends’ kids that live on their walls. I’m certain they mean infinitely more than the best commercial images in my portfolio.
Sometimes the families of past customers call about getting a print for a memorial service. Knowing that this work will be helpful at such an important time means so much. When I find myself convinced that what I do isn’t very important, I think about this kind of photograph and can’t imagine a better use of my time.
It strikes me that giving someone a new moment, even just a fraction of a second… That’s profound. A superpower. Magic, or as close as we can get.
Think about all the shoeboxes that contain unseen snapshots of our mothers and fathers, our sisters and brothers. Think about the pictures in which you appear in the background of someone else’s story. What if, years after you’re gone, your loved ones could access those images? What would they discover? How would they feel?
I spent this afternoon processing these images before uploading them and composing an email. How do you explain this? Is there a need to? I wrote to them what I told you: I stumbled across these photos, searched his name, found the organization, and thought his family would want them. I also mentioned the large framed print I would love for them to have as well.
I clicked send and now I wait. It’s up to technology to do its thing.
Those shoebox photos of your parents and your siblings, the ones that live in strangers’ attics… What if those strangers could reach out and give you this? Would it feel like a gift? Would it be received like a little miracle? Seeing a loved one anew is being with them again, I am convinced. It’s a reminder that they were real. They were here and we were together.
I had a similar experience shooting at Camp Rainbow. ❤️
😢