Comments on: Coda to Official Photographer

By: Sarah

Sarah — Mon, 23 Nov 2009 02:18:09 +0000

I don't think we can expect ourselves to dive deep into every moment. I am exhausted enough already to put that pressure on myself. I also am not always that comfortable with myself to be able to jump in. My mind is not always clear enough. My heart is sometimes full of sadness that I feel I must respond to, and I cannot ignore.

I get it. You. The idea. The post. All of it.

By: Aidan Donnelley Rowley

Aidan Donnelley Rowley — Sun, 22 Nov 2009 20:46:36 +0000

I like this follow-up because here you acknowledge the fact that living with a bit of distance from the moment is not necessarily a flaw, or a handicap, but a fact of your (and all of our?) existence. No one is fully engaged, fully enmeshed, in the world. There is always distance. There is always a divide. I love the fibers of self-forgiveness here.

By: BigLittleWolf

BigLittleWolf — Sun, 22 Nov 2009 20:38:06 +0000

I have been the "official photographer" as well, always. Partly, it does prevent you from living fully in the moment. But it also helps you to preserve the moment, and so many of those with family are fleeting.

I wish I could've "traded off" some of the photographer duties, but it wasn't an option. Still, I am so glad I have as many moments captured as I do. They give me enormous joy, when I look. And I hope they will give my sons joy when they are older, and their children.

In a way, snapshotting these moments is another sort of honoring of the present. We may be slightly less feeling the moment, but we are ensuring that it will be relived in a vibrant and meaningful way. A kind of echo or second life and third life and more, for very precious times.

By: slouchy

slouchy — Sun, 22 Nov 2009 18:48:59 +0000

I also have trouble living in the moment as opposed to observing it, deconstructing it…

But when it does happen, it is all that much more special, I think.