Photography Week - Telling Stories and Preserving Memories

A lot of the photographs I take are taken for this blog. Many times I see something and think: “I should show this to the people back home.” I take photographs of cultural events (see the recent post on Señorde Qoylurritti) to help me explain the culture I'm surrounded by to people who have never had any contact with it. Telling a story to others is a major reason for taking a photograph.

But I also take a lot of pictures for me. There's plenty of photographs I have that I haven't put on the blog. It's not that they are secret, it's just that they're mine. Then there are the photographs that I took for the dual purposes of sharing with you and reminding me.

It's a joy to sit down with photographs. It calls stories up out of the recesses of your mind. Things you didn't know you had forgotten come back when your memory is jogged by a photograph. It's also interesting to see how much people have changed. Just as my sister and I found it funny to look at photos of our father when he was in his twenties and had long hair and a beard, my kids will probably find pictures long haired, bearded, mid-twenties Benjamin amusing.

Having photographs from this experience, or any part of my life, is important. It's important for people who want to know me better; seeing old photographs will help them understand where I come from. And it's important for me to be able to “look back over my life and think things over.”

Having so many photographs from this experience reminds me that, like Mary Magdalene, “I have seen the Lord.” And putting them on the blog means others can see for themselves.

I call this one "see and be seen"