Say Cheese!

I have a couple of friends who are very opposed to having their picture taken. I used to hate having my picture taken. It was, for me, nothing more than an opportunity for me to berate my appearance, make excuses for how I looked, and degrade myself. Then I figured out that I'm pretty damn awesome. And that I look exactly the way I am supposed to look. And that the people who look at me every day, choose to do so. Then I had my first baby and my life changed. Not only did I start to feel acceptance about how I look to others, I began to realize that I'm beautiful. Because my daughter has my nose... my cheeks... my whatever... and to disparage my own appearance means I am also tearing her down. And my heart wants nothing more than to build her up. What message would I be sending her if she sees me looking in the mirror, criticizing how I look and then we go out and someone tells her she looks just like me... somewhere in her head, she's going to connect those 2 ideas. This is all stuff I've spewed out before. But I want to connect it to this idea of having your picture taken. I have a poor memory. Really poor. So by taking way too many pictures, I get to preserve all these little moments in the hopes that these pictures will spark memories for me. So to my friends... let your picture be taken. Don't worry about your makeup, your hair, your face, your clothes. The important thing is capturing the memory, capturing the moment, holding on to this little second of the feeling, the happening. I don't take pictures to capture physical beauty. I take pictures to capture a glimpse. To hold on to the way you look at my kids, the way you laugh, the way you tell a story. It isn't about how you look. It's about who you are.