Zoey

I’m not big on carrying a camera around.  Yet, of late, I’ve decided that I need to photograph my personal life more.  I seem to be so busy creating portrait photography for other people that I often let the moments of my own life slip by.  And that can be a very bad thing since there is no one in my family remotely interested in holding a camera let alone using one!  So candid portraits, even snapshots, here I come.

On a recent warm summer evening, we had dinner outside with our kids and our granddaughter. ’Z’ always steals the show. None of us pay any attention to anything but her discoveries and delight of the most simple things.  She loves music and dances to everything including commercials.  She does yoga poses because she’s figured out it makes everyone laugh, especially when she’s stark naked which is a good deal of the time in the summer by our pool. She says “Mmmmm” whenever she tastes something good and blows kisses to everyone and anyone like her life depends on it. How can anyone not love babies?!

It’s occurred to me lately that I rarely take snapshot photos let alone print them. I’m too concerned with getting ‘the perfect shot.’  So I’m trying to turn a new leaf.  Tiny moments matter so much in our lives. They are here and with a whisper they are gone.  Get out your camera! Catch it.  It doesn’t matter if it’s perfect.  It matters that you have something to remember it by.  That’s my new motto for a while.

As our granddaughter grows, I want to catch it all.  Her mommy grew up in a split second. One day she was a tiny tot with her pony tail blowing in the wind and before I knew it she had grown up on me.  I have a chance to savor the moments more this time.  We intend to do just that.  I’m going to keep her one day a week (Mondays) for our daughter while she goes off to nursing school. Don’t worry, I will be exercising and eating my vitamins to make sure I have the stamina!

I’ve taken hundreds of photos of this sweet child since she was born 18 months ago. I love so many of them. But how ironic that my favorite portrait of her was one I grabbed on a hot summer evening just enjoying her thoroughly and snapping away mindlessly as she played. When I saw this image, it took my breath away. She so reminds me of her mother when she was tiny. Someone said ‘Life is not measured by the number of breaths we take, but by the number of moments that take our breath away.’

Get your camera out. Don’t let the moments slip away. Document them. Print them. Save them. Treasure them.