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| my daughter's impersonation of me... using her air camera |
I've been on the back side of a camera so much lately I'm beginning to feel it is a part of me. This little family is cooking up something wild and crazy and it involves photos. Thousands of photos.
When the camera's set down, I sit at my computer and watch the screen as picture after picture loads in from the tiny rectangle I've stuck in a slot.
They make me so happy, those photo words. They each tell a part of a story. A story in pictures.
Did you know that you learn about life, about yourself, when you see what you've caught through a lens?
I sit there, as shot after shot loads... ten, twenty or more of each little idea. They are all different, every last one. Even if I have kept the angle, the composition, the settings, each one is unique. Each has a minutely different focus.
It still surprises me.
I ponder how many times I have hesitated to write about the "very same thing" someone else has written about. But what slightly different composition, what tilted angle, what brighter exposure might my words bring? Not because of my brilliance or insight but merely because each one who writes is unique. Just as each photo is unique.
The photos keep loading in.
And I think about light.
I think how photography is all about light, beautiful light. About the way it slants just so at the morning and evening golden hours... the way you can miss that evening hour and it goes all red and glowy... the way a certain tilt of the head can pull the face into perfect light but a turning brings a stark shadow.
I see how the whole world around is a trampoline of light. All green bouncing in my kitchen with its mint walls, pink and soft in my girl's room, shadowy in the cherry wood floored living room. All those colors pour into my photos even if the walls and floor aren't seen... colors carried on a stream of bounced light.
I marvel at this, what Jesus Himself said...
You are the light of the world. A city set on a hill cannot be hidden; nor does anyone light a lamp and put it under a basket, but on the lampstand, and it gives light to all who are in the house. Let your light shine before men in such a way that they may see your good works, and glorify your Father who is in heaven. ~ Matthew 5:14-16 ~It is too much to understand when I feel all shadowy and rumpled that I am light. Jesus being light... yes, this I understand (John 8:12). But me?
Oh that I would be a little stream of light to carry the bouncing colors of Life to the lenses of those around me! That I might catch and reflect His glory!
The photos appear one after another in empty squares... a steady checkering of the open iPhoto window.
Then I laugh at the screen, because I see that of all the ways I like to take photos, pulled in tight and close up is my very favorite.
And it's how I like to read God's Word... peeling apart this Greek word and that Hebrew word, following the trail of them throughout the scriptures. A microscope focused by my need to understand... a quest to grasp the ineffable.
And it's how I like to be with my people... all snuggled in, arms and legs draping, hair mingled and sweet words whispered. In close and tight, deeply known and deeply knowing.
Today's pictures are all in, thousands of little squares each capturing a moment.
It's a small life I live.
A series of moments.
A small beautiful light-filled life, with tiny perfect details that come from the hand of the One True King.
This takes my breath away.
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