One Picture Is Never Enough

When photography first hit the scene it somewhat told the truth, but it didn't take long for that to change. At first, portrait photographers traveled to locations and photographed people as they were, as they lived, at their homes or places of business. What you saw was what you got. There was no after camera touchups, no way to really lie. Then photographers began providing clothing, so that customers and subjects could look their best. A man who could never afford a suit suddenly was able to be immortalized dressed to the nines. Women whose best outfit was made from gingham passed down images of themselves in beautiful gowns to their children. A few generations later, their ancestors would lose a part of their grandmothers truth and her story, to them, would include her in that dress, and little else was known about her life. Soon, photographers had artists paint backdrops to enhance the photographs even more. Airbrushed dyes and paints were used to soften, hide blemishes, create an instant diet, whiten teeth, etc. By the time I was having school pictures taken in elementary school, even they were a misrepresentation. My mother bought photos of me to give to family of her son at school if an outfit he'd never wear to school if it wasn't picture day. My hair would be combed and white rained into static place. The result was an image that supposedly said who I was, but in truth I never looked like that except for perhaps the first five minutes of the trip to church on Sunday mornings. That illusion could never last long in real life, but photographs, could last forever. During family portraits with Olan Mills, backdrops told the viewer that I was standing in a beautiful field at sunset, while in truth I was miserably waiting my turn, trying not to move enough to mess up my hair or clothes, in a hotel room. Today we have digital backdrops, and with a few clicks of a computer button a subject can be made blemish free and placed in a location they have never even seen.

From the first baby steps of photojournalism, pictures stumbled away from the truth. Photographers wanting to show the glory of war or inspire those back home to support the troops, took photographs of happy victors, smiling young men, dances and games and clean, ordered army life. Those who wanted to see the fighting end showed crying men, fearful faces, horrible wounds and twisted corpses. Neither photographed was faked. Both lied. There has never been a photograph taken on purpose that did not have at least some editorializing from the photographer to make the subject look better, or worse, or to emphasize whatever the photographer believed to be the statement or message of the scene.

In many ways, photographers are like politicians. We lie for a living. Even when a photograph tells the truth, it's an accident, or a half truth at best. It wasn't always as bad as it is today, but photography has always been the most believable kind of lie. A photograph is a sentence taken out of a book, made to stand alone and then tell a chapter of the story. That's why they say that a picture is worth a thousand words.

But it's not. Because a single photograph can never be like Paul Harvey. It never tells the rest of the story, or the whole story for that matter. The story is manipulated by the photographer who chooses by what is included or excluded in the framing of the shot and the lighting and exposure what the viewer will and will not see. Angles and poses are chosen to convey a message. See how happy I am? See what a loving family we are? See how I good I look? See what I want you to see? Isn't my mask pretty? Nevermind we fought the whole way here, my teenager is just waiting for this moment to be over so she can bolt and go be with her friends or anywhere but home, and I never, ever look this good, especially when I look in the mirror. Or maybe this is a true representation of how good I can look, but it surely doesn't express the other side of the coin.

And that's OK for portraiture. Those lies didn't start with photography. Painters spent hours and hours on portraits that only vaguely represented the truth of who the subject was. And like I've heard in recovery from time to time, fake it till you make it kind of applies here. It's not so much a lie as an attempt to capture an image of who we aspire to be. There's nothing wrong with putting my best foot forward, or, to keep with the metaphor I've chosen, to present my best image.

However, I can not allow myself to remember that it's not the truth, or at least not the whole truth. It doesn't tell the whole story. I can not take one image, one day, one week, month, year or decade from my life, or anyone else's for that matter, and tell the whole truth about a life.

I am a forty year old man who runs his own business. I am married to a woman I love totally and completely, and I want no one but her. I do not drink or do drugs. I do not steal, and I am honest. I am slow to wrath, patient, abhor violence, and whenever possible I live in peace with my fellow humans, even if that means having to walk away from things some believe worth fighting for. I am often a servant and helper today. And as I think on what I just typed, I think it's not a bad resume, but it's not the whole truth. Anyone who only sees those things about me is missing part of the whole that is important, because they are also missing the miracle that made it happen, the truth that I am not the above because of anything I have or could do on my own. It's a God thing. The biggest miracle I have ever seen made it possible for me to write the above self description and be telling the truth, even if only a half truth.

The rest of the story is I am an alcoholic and a drug addict who has consumed enough of both that he should be dead. I am lazy, and with the exception of photojournalism, I never held a job for more than a year before quitting out of anger, boredom or laziness and having to find something else. I was 37 years old before I ever had a monogamous relationship. I had relationships that were supposed to be monogamous, but I was never faithful for long enough to make them work. This is a huge part of the reason why the wife I love today is my second wife. I am divorced. I am a man who loves family and is extremely family oriented, yet the whole truth is that I have moved through the lives of families, especially my own, like a tornado, leaving sorrow and destruction in my wake. I am a felon. I was and have done a lot of things that are not pretty. Some are downright evil. If I were a Hebrew 3000 years ago I would have been stoned to death long before I reached the age of twenty. But like the positive, this is also not the truth, at least not the whole truth.

The truth is that I have done good things in my life, even during my days of bondage, and I have done bad things, even during my recovery. I am not, and have never been, totally evil and worthless, even though I have believed those about myself and felt that way. And at the same time, I am not, and never will be on this side of heaven, a saint. Today, I am more the man God wants me to be than I have ever been. Tomorrow, I want to be even more so. But the man I am today is not a mask, or a photograph that I can present to the world and say, see, this is who I am. It is not the whole picture. I have to remember the man pre-miracle, Dalyn BC. Because it is the whole the picture, rotten and diseased tree recovered and bearing fruit that tells the story of my life. It is that story which can show others who are now or will be living where I was how to escape. It is the whole story that needs to be told so that I never allow myself to feel superior to another human being because of the mistakes they have made or because of how they deal with the pain and misery in their own life. But I also do not have to let those who only see an image from my past destroy me. I can be sad that they can't see the whole truth, because if they could they might find they way of escape for themselves, not just the escape from alcohol and or drug addiction, but escape from the hell and misery of living without understanding how much God truly loves them and desires relationship with them. It must make the angels weep to see someone in such bondage encounter another who has the key to freedom and reject it because of an image that is only half true, or less. It must break the heart of God.

I am finally coming to understand, really understand at the depths of my heart, why I do not need to regret the past nor wish to shut the door on it. This morning, I am grateful for the first time that no matter how much progress I make, no matter how much better I get, I will never be able to erase the record of my past. I am thankful today for my scarlet A. My past proves the power of God greater than any story about seas splitting in half to provide escape for slaves. It emphasizes an image that today's slaves can see, if they will only look. No, a photograph can not tell the whole truth, but two can. I can not hold on to the image of my present picture without the image of my past and tell the truth. And if I do not tell the truth I can not help free the slaves. Thank you Father for reminding me that while Paul served you, even 2000 years later we first learned about Saul, the legalist, self-righteous, murderer. Saul completes the story, shows the miracle and helps me to see that I can have what Paul had....relationship with you, regardless of where and what I have been before.