Take Lots of Pictures

My dad always carried a camera. Everywhere he went, he took pictures . . . and I do mean everywhere. When I was a child in the ‘70s he took pictures of me at the park, standing on my toes to reach a drinking fountain, and riding in the shopping cart at the grocery store. Long before the age of social media and documenting every move, my dad did just that.

There are thousands of photos of me as a child singing in school performances, playing at a park, waking up on birthday with a sign indicating the date and my age. After my parents separated and eventually divorced, he wasn’t a daily part of my life, so the sheer quantity of pictures of me declined significantly. But, when we got together on weekends, he would often plan where we would go so he could take pictures . . . usually of me. By the time I was a teenager, I wasn’t a big fan of these photoshoots. There is a series of me and my best friend in about eighth grade when we experimented with some extreme make-up in an effort to look “New Wave” or something. We have those serious trying-to-look-edgy expressions that teen girls can really nail. There is a particularly awkward series of me in a bathing suit at the beach. I look angry in every one because I was so embarrassed to have my dad take pictures of me at the beach.

On my wedding day my dad took lots of pictures, too. This sounds like a given, but my mom was remarried and though she and my dad had a cordial relationship, it was. . . rather utilitarian and mostly based on what I was up to. The small wedding for about 10 people was at the home she shared with my stepdad. As if that dynamic wasn’t strange enough, my mom had to pick up my dad and take him home because he had no car. Oh, and he had cataracts and was almost completely blind. So, my dad followed shadows and voices and tried his best to focus a Canon AE-1 SLR on me, my soon-to-be husband and the small number of guests. Surprisingly some of those shots came out okay.

My dad was very resistant to going to any doctor, but eventually agreed to have cataract surgery. And, so, he started taking pictures like crazy again. Not too long after this digital photography became popular and cameras became affordable. This meant my dad did not have to be so careful conserving film and reducing developing costs. So, he took pictures everywhere. I was his favorite subject. He took pictures of me driving, eating in a restaurant, cleaning his apartment. He took pictures of the neighborhood cat, squirrels, and birds. And, pictures of . . . the neighbors. When I took him to the doctor, he would take pictures in the waiting room and of the nurses and doctors in the examination room. He even took shots of the phlebotomists who drew his blood. Later, he would print these pictures and send to the subject if possible. Somewhere out there are a bunch of healthcare professionals with candid shots of themselves at work.

For much of my life, I was annoyed at having my every move documented. I mean who wants a picture of themselves mopping their dad’s floor because he won’t do it himself? How irritating is it to clean your dad’s apartment to only have him sit there and take pictures of you doing it? But, there are many photos that I really cherish. When I was pregnant with my only child, every time I visited my dad, he would take profile shots of me. After I had my son, he printed them and gave them to me in a small photo album. Again, this was 15 years ago, before such things were regularly documented weekly for Facebook or Instagram. 

After my mom died, I discovered a whole box of tasteful nudes he took of her when they were first married. It gave me a glimpse of what their relationship must have been like before things fell apart.

In addition to taking thousands of pictures, my dad constantly prodded me to take lots of pictures wherever I went. When I traveled to Costa Rica for five weeks as a college student, he implored me to take hundreds of pictures. I took two cameras, just in case. It was a good thing, since one of them (that Canon AE-1) jammed and was unusable for the duration of the trip. When I purchased my first digital camera, he would remind me to take lots of pictures because it didn’t cost anything and I could print only the ones I wanted. 

At one point my dad purchased a printer for his computer that was great for printing photos. He connected a scanner, too and spent many, many hours scanning old slide photos and printing them. He put these in photo albums that he gave me and my mom with notes as to where and when they were taken. At the time, it seemed like too much money and too much time to spend on such a project. Of course, now I am so thankful for these memetoes. 

Three years ago my father passed away at 89 years old after a short illness. I am his only child and he was estranged from his nieces and nephews. He only had one friend who came to visit occasionally. There was no funeral. As I was processing our unusual and often difficult relationship, I sorted through many photos–those of me, my mom, my son. What I couldn’t find in all of those photos was one of me . . . and my dad . . . together.