This is one of my favorite photos.
This is it. My dad donned with his trusty grey pocket tee and a fishing cap, his classic look. Whenever I look at this photograph, I get instantly transported back to the moment it was taken. I was in photography for the yearbook in high school - the first place I held a camera that wasn’t disposable, the first place where I got a new glimpse of how to save moments as memories forever. I had an assignment to go take pictures at a cross country meet. I had a few friends on the team, so it easily doubled as me supporting my friends and collecting a grade. My dad drove me to the cross country meet - and to several spots along the running path so I could get all the photos I needed. The entire time we were at the meet he cheered on my friends, yelling out their names and clapping as they whizzed past us as I clicked the shutter down. As we waited at one of the stops, I turned the camera around to him for just a minute. In that moment, I had no idea what this one quick click would mean to me years later.
It isn’t a perfect photo…
The image itself is grainy, my dad’s hat casts a pretty fierce shadow over his face - but underneath that shadow, the twinkle of my dad’s eyes still shine through.
Right out of college, my entire world was rocked to its core when my Dad passed away unexpectedly. After his funeral, I would search for this one photograph for years until I finally found it tucked safely in with some other keepsakes. It’s my favorite photograph of him, because it truly represents a moment we shared in something that he taught me - to believe in myself, to cheer for those in my lane and those running in their own lane, and that people matter more than anything else.
When I think of my dad, I remember the small things most like how we used to frequent the Houston Zoo and take in the sights of all the animals and the Natural Science Museum of Houston to see the dinosaurs. I think about every coffee cup and pair of glasses he left in his wake as he tended to his garden of beautiful amaryllis flowers.
Ever since losing him, any scrap of paper with his handwriting or old photograph of him that I find is like finding a piece of long lost treasure. It’s a small part of his legacy that was left behind. Unlike the lessons he taught me, or the moments we shared, these are things I can cherish by tangibly holding in my hand while transporting me back to time with him. It’s because of losing my dad too soon that I first felt led to be even more intentional with my life than I thought I was, and to try to savor and document as many moments with my loved ones that I can.
Preserving Memories to Keep Them Alive
Preserving memories is something I’ve always done, ever since I was a little girl, even when it hasn’t been at the top of my mind. I’m a saver - ticket stubs, family recipes, playbills from watching friends on stage, old photographs taken during sleepovers and on camping trips. It’s what I’ve always done. Saving memories is a part of my DNA. It’s what I do, even when I don’t fully realize that is what I am doing.
It’s through these tangible things, like cards and photographs, that memories and legacies are able to live on as they help jog my mind
to recall stories and moments that may have otherwise faded.
Over the years, I’ve gone back through the things that I’ve kept and been able to relive memories. My Grandmother’s mac and cheese recipe was one of my favorite childhood things and I’ve tried to match it time and time again thanks to the fact that I have a record of it that has been kept safely tucked away for years. Even with the hundreds of attempts under my belt to make my macaroni and cheese just like hers, I haven’t been able to get the consistency quite like she had. I will keep trying though, because it’s the process of using the recipe she sat at and printed on her typewriter, putting all of the ingredients together and feeling that connection to her as I sink my tastebuds into her mac and cheese recipe that matters.
It’s part of why I keep these tangible memories - so that I can still interact with my memories and relive them in ways that I might not otherwise be. After having seen several of my family members pass away, it is a true treasure to be able to see them in photographs and relive my memories of those moments. This is what fuels me as I continue to document my own life so that as seasons change, I have these things to look back on.
This is what I want for you too.
It is why I became a photographer - to document humans in every life season for a lasting legacy so your memories don’t go extinct. (Like the dinosaurs!)