Deena Riley Photography :: The Blog

Hello all… I know it’s been VERY quiet around here the past week, and I’m here to explain why.  I’d like to thank everyone for their patience this past week – many of my clients know out of necessity what’s been going on, and some of you are probably wondering from my “Vague-Booking” on Facebook just what’s been up.  Well, here’s the short version of the story:  last Monday, my very loved Uncle passed away suddenly and unexpectedly.  We are a VERY close family on that side (my mom’s side) and it has hit us all like a ton of bricks.  There were little to no warning signs, we had all seen him recently (as recently as last Saturday and Sunday for most of us), and he was much too young – 60 – to have this happen.  To say we are all shocked and saddened would be the understatement of a lifetime.  I have spent the last week with family and helping my cousins prepare for his memorial service which was this past Friday.  There are orders to process/deliver, and sessions to blog about, and those will be handled this week.  Again, thanks to everyone who has been SO patient with me as I have needed this time to be with the ones I love.

I’m writing this post because all of this has made me realize that something that seems so trivial can become so important on a moment’s notice – photographs.  Now, don’t roll your eyes at me.  I’m not trying to use my dear Uncle’s death to sell photographs.  I’m talking about the everyday, point-and-shoot photographs that we all take at birthday parties, family gatherings, etc. – the ones that many of us (myself included!) try to dodge every single time someone takes a camera out of their purse or pocket.

My main task this past week in helping to prepare for the memorial service was to put together a picture slideshow to play at the memorial.  I helped my mom and cousins cull through thousands of pictures in albums and boxes to try to find a good representation of my Uncle’s life.  There were plenty to be had of his childhood and early life with my Aunt, but we began to notice as time went on and we moved towards the “digital age” of photography, we had gaps in coverage (so to speak).  We found ourselves asking why we didn’t have photos of him with this person or that person.  Cameras are so ubiquitous these days – they’re in our phones, they’re in our music players, they seem like they’re everywhere – and I think we all tend to take it for granted that we “must” have a picture of “that” somewhere.  Pictures that would mean so much to us now especially that we were “sure” existed seemed to be completely non-existent.

So, what I guess what I’m trying to say is that we all (me included!) need to be more purposeful about photographs in this day and age.  Would it be great to have professional photographs with every single family member that’s important to us?  Sure!  Is that usually possible?  Probably not.  But I know that I am going to be more aware of capturing the day to day images that may be important to my children and grandchildren one day – not that I’m planning for my death because that’s really morbid and scary, but because I have learned from experience that while I may hate to have my picture taken, being there and being in photographs is ultimately the way that we choose to record milestones in our lives and it’s important to honor those occasions.  We can’t let technology make us lazy in recording our family’s history – we MUST take the time to take, organize, and *gasp* even print those photographs that we stick in a folder on a desktop with a mental note that says “get to these one day.”

Okie dokie… that’s all I have to say.  I hope it makes sense.  Forgive any grammatical errors… it’s been a long week.  I’ll end with a photo that we are so grateful to have of my Aunt and Uncle dancing at my wedding in 2006.  Thanks to Photogenic Images for this one.

We’ve got a virtual garage sale going on over on Craig’s List… will you please check it out?  Lots of furniture and home decor items!  Help us make room for baby!  http://dallas.craigslist.org/ndf/for/1781980741.html