Some of the students in my current online workshop and I had been talking recently about this photography rut I've been in, and quite honestly, I wasn't even sure what had been causing it until I began typing up a response to one of their questions.
I also wasn't aware that there were four or five different things that had become the key ingredients in what was feeling like a melting-pot of lackluster creativity, photographic-melancholy, and self-doubt.
As I wrote though, it became glaringly clear that one of the factors feeding into this rut was the ages of my kids.
My kids are getting older and that means several things:
1. They're not so little anymore.
I feel somewhat remiss to even write about this because the truth is that I have four healthy kids (which is all the mother of an unhealthy kid is praying for,) but we're saying goodbye to a whole lot of things around here that have been our 'norm' for years and while that's wonderful in some ways, it's also painful in others.
Cole isn't dressing up for Halloween this year, and Courtney Lee isn't far behind him. That means, I'll never again walk down those oak-lined streets where we go every October 31st with three little kids of trick-or-treating age.
In fact, my kids don't really enjoy doing a lot of the things that they used to enjoy. There's a whole lot more time spent in this house listening to iPod's than there is spent playing with Matchbox Cars or Barbie Dolls, and we all know which make for cuter photos.
Even little Yans is saying goodbye to the ponytails, and the dresses, and the baby dolls - and since there isn't one after her, I am having to say goodbye to those things as well.
And no matter how much I accept or rationalize those kinds of changes, they are still going to affect what I see and feel behind the camera.
2. They hurt my feelings frequently and deeply.
Trust me, I have no desire to go back to having kids that are too young to reason with, kids that throw themselves on the ground when they're not getting what they want, or kids that require diaper changing. But I've traded up to is kids that are of an age where they think their own reasoning is superior to mine, kids that throw attitudes instead of tantrums, and kids that sometimes seem bent on making a mess of their relationship with me - a mess that is much harder and more painful to clean up than any dirty diaper I've ever encountered.
This is particularly true of Cole and Courtney, who seem to have purchased annual, Ride-All-You-Want tickets on an emotional roller-coaster. And though I keep saying 'no' to purchasing any ride-along tickets, it's dizzying just watching them and worrying about whether or not their seatbelts are secured tightly. And even though I'm trying to keep both feet planted firmly on the ground, I can't help but feel like I'm on the ride with them at times.
Their words.
We immediately put the kibash on anything that even resembles disrespectful words, but some days, it feels like kibashing is all we do.
Their tones.
Yep, we put the kibash on those too. We're like kibashing-machines.
Their expressions.
Cole's blank, 'I'm-pretending-to-listen-to-you-but-really-I'm-just-dismissing-everything-you-say-as-the-stupidest-thing-I've-ever-heard-in-my-whole-life' stare. Courtney's eye-roll that she tries to convince us was just a tic, even though we're smart enough to know that tics don't ironically occur immediately following a statement that a teenage girl disagrees with.
Their non-stop disagreement.
It's amazing how opinionated someone with only 13 years of life experience can be.
Annie is little (eight) and therefore, she is annoying at times. I can take pictures of kids that annoy me - no problem.
The two middles are at ages (Cole will be 14 in a couple of weeks and Courtney will be 13 in March, but she looks and acts like she's 16) where they don't really annoy me anymore. Instead, they hurt my feelings - sometimes multiple times a day, and I can't take pictures of people who have recently hurt my feelings. I also can't take pictures when there is a rift between me and the person in front of my lens. Nor can I create a genuine photo in a moment that feels disingenuous to me.
My heart is all tied up in shooting and that means if my heart isn't right with someone in my family, I don't shoot.
2. They're more aware of themselves in front of the camera.
One of the great things about little kids is that they just act like themselves in front of the camera. If they feel like being a ham, they act like a ham. If they feeling like being quiet, they act quiet. If they feel like picking their nose, they pick their nose.
That doesn't always make them the easiest subjects to photograph, but it certainly makes them the most genuine subjects.
Older kids sometimes act like they're too cool to be themselves in front of the camera, or that they're too annoyed by you to be themselves, or that for some unforeseen reason that is subject to change on a whim, they don't even feel like themselves in the first place.
But I'm a photographer whose heart and camera starts racing whenever I see something real and authentic unfolding in front of my lens, and a photographer whose heart and camera begins to sink whenever I feel I am about to photograph something fake or inauthentic.
And trust me...
I know I'm not experiencing anything that parents of teenagers aren't accustomed to experiencing. (Remember, I have a full-grown, 22 year-old son, so this ain't my first rodeo.) I think it's just that a lot of those experiences feel particularly magnified and crushing when you're literally holding a lens up to them.
I actually sat down and talked to all the kiddos still in my household about this the other day.
I waited for a time when I felt like all three of them would be receptive to what I was saying.
And they were.
I really felt like they heard me and could empathize with my struggle.
I was surprised though at how hard it was for me to say the things that were on my heart and how much emotion it stirred up in me when I started telling them why I hadn't been shooting. (Cole and Courtney had both asked me on separate occasions why I hadn't been shooting or blogging lately, so they had both noticed the absence of my camera.)
I asked them to support me in the same way that I support them when they're struggling.
And they agreed.
Not too long after, I spotted Cole playing the piano. He was wearing a bowtie (something he opted to wear for school chapel that day) and his hair is growing out long enough to have curls again, so he looked particularly handsome to me.
I asked if he'd mind me taking some photos, and with my heart on the line like a high school girl who had just asked a boy to the Sadie Hawkins dance, I awaited his response.
He smiled and said, "Sure Mom!" and so I grabbed my camera and felt my heart race for the first time in months as I snapped away at the shutter...
And with all the vulnerability and enthusiasm and optimism I was feeling after taking those shots, I asked Courtney Lee if I could take some photos of her doing homework.
And let's just say her response was not what I had hoped.
And let's just say that my heart sank a little.
And I felt a little deflated and defeated.
And if I'm just being honest, I may have said something childish like, "Thanks for showing all that support and encouragement we had just talked about."
And despite that little set-back, I shot on and off all evening and into the next day as well.
And what I think (hope) I'm beginning to realize is that if I truly love photography (I believe I do) that I have to be willing to change, if for no other reason than that the subject's I most love to photograph are changing, and they're not going to quit changing.
There are a couple of teenagers in front of my lens right now and I can't expect them to look and act like the little kids that they once were.
So I have to change the way I see them and respond to them from behind the camera if I want to continue to be a photographer.
And all too soon, there will be teenagers on the verge of moving out on their own in front of my lens.
And I will have to change the way I see them and respond to them from behind the camera once again.
And then, there will be adults who are only occasionally in front of my lens because they no longer live at home.
And I will have to change the way I see them and respond to them from behind the camera yet again.
And then if I'm lucky, there might be some cute grandbabies in front of my lens (many, many, please God, let it be many years from now) and I can once again photograph kids who enjoy playing with Matchbox Cars and Barbie Dolls.
And the way I see them and respond to them from behind the camera will force me to change once again if I want to continue to be a photographer.
And as I write all of this, It almost sounds comical that I thought I could be the every-growing, ever-evolving, ever-improving photographer that I desire to be without being willing to change.
