A Trip to Remember

Did you ever miss an experience because you were fumbling with a camera to "capture the moment"?   Today's technology makes it easy to record events, but social media has changed the way I approach these experiences- perhaps more as a reporter than an active participant.

My daughter Shayna, a mid-20th century soul in a 21st century world, eschews my ever-ready phone and my need to share everything via social media.  She also frowns upon multiple shots of the same scene and computer-aided editing.  Shayna's honest photos of raw, often sad, thought-provoking subjects were a big hit at her exhibitions at the Sheridan library a few years ago.  She loved photography until she realized the extent to which most of us edit our pictures; the ease of technology made it less of an art form to her. 

We took a five-day trip to Washington, DC, last spring.  Shayna, ever the non-conformist, challenged herself to take only 24 photos on a disposable camera, while I, having visited that city with one roll of film in a cheap camera in 1986 (been there, done that) began the trip snapping pics of anything I found interesting -which is pretty much everything. 

Shayna noted the difficulty in framing shots on the disposable camera, without zoom, crop or focus features we take for granted on our phones.  With only 24 exposures for the entire trip, she chose her subjects carefully; they had to mean something to her to warrant the time, effort and film in her cardboard camera.  What scenes did she deem worthy of a photo?  Not the ones you'd expect in our nation's capital.  She got a shot of me walking several yards in front of her, always in a hurry (yep, sad and thought-provoking). 

 At the Lincoln Memorial, noisy people thronged the grand statue, most facing outward toward raised selfie sticks. Though Lincoln's one of her heroes, Shayna didn't lift her camera, but stood in quiet reverence, reading the walls.  I understood her point:  Are we here to experience it, or to snap a profile photo for social media?  If we spend our time looking away from that which we came to see, does it matter that we were there?  Why try to take a good photo of a national monument when you can see better ones online?

Those questions helped me slow down.  As we soaked our feet in a fountain on a hot afternoon, Shayna pointed out a policeman feeding a squirrel.  The moment was simple and told a story, like photos from her shows, but instead of taking a picture, we just enjoyed it.  It changed the way I viewed our trip.  Rather than rushing to every big attraction, we experienced fewer places.    I started reaching for my little sketchbook instead of my phone.  I got up early and toured art museums alone.  I listened to street musicians.  Shayna and I relaxed on a park bench at DuPont Circle every evening, waiting for the man with the basket, from which he'd pull a pet rabbit and let it run loose in the grass. 

I saw, experienced and sketched scenes and people I would have missed without Shayna to pull me from the throng.  We took in and remembered places not on a tourist guide, and we didn't need a flat photo to remind us that we were there, looking away from it.