Sweater Weather
Do you reflect on memories through Photography?
Every season is a reminder of growth. Every spring it rains. Think of rain drops as memories. I think a lot when it rains, so I often take time to reflect, eventually all this thinking leads to the camera. Some of us have intense backlogs, and with the current events of the 2020 Quarantine, some may be editing past work.
I’m here trying to be productive, but I’m too busy thinking.
Others are capable of keeping a light footprint. Create backups, edit and upload, then delete.
As I scroll through my library of over 40k photos, looking for new things to edit. I see many events labeled with lots of cities and seasons scattered throughout. They all make me smile. Yet, some are beyond painful. Because as photographers we retain our emotions in those photographs. Sometimes its scary to face them.
And its like landmines if you are unorganized like me.
scroll therapy
Scrolling through photos, is like the raindrops falling.
Memories just flying by or slowly moving down.
We control the shutter, but not time.
Anything can happen afterwards.
Some of the happiest shutter presses, are now the saddest ones.
And some of the painful ones, have bonded, or are at peace.
Embracing these photos is therapy.
Creating them is therapy.
To know they happened. It was real.
And you pull out that feeling you captured.
“Artists need some kind of stimulating experience a lot of times, which crystallizes when you sing about it or paint it or sculpt it. You literally mold the experience the way you want. It’s therapy.”
– Erykah Badu
Growing Pains
So as I’m going through this backlog, considering what I can add and edit,
Facing these images hurts.
It’s like unpacking a box of emotions.
In this case, a 2TB hard drive with 8 years worth of videos, dash cam trips and endless photos..
My dad also packed tons of memories this way. Only on tapes.
Lessons learned
It’s overwhelming. I mean this has taken me almost a week.
I love my photos, and I’m often always dabbling in them.
They deserve my respect.
I even spent 48 hours.
Just organizing and transferring them on Linux.
I made the choice to reflect on these raindrops, these images, hoping to be ready for spring. Because I need them.
And sometimes when you miss someone or something, you pull out a picture.
That’s poetry in effect. Your heart feels something when you look at it.
