This photo on my Facebook newsfeed today reminds me that pictures can carry meaning far beyond what they show.
Bob snapped this while setting up the camera timer for a family photo on the beach in Mexico 6.5 years ago. We're in a hurry, because it's dinnertime (in other words, the kids' good moods are about to expire), and the bright sunshine we enjoyed all day has blown away with an approaching storm. But it's our last chance for a family photo, because we leave in the morning for home and winter. Sally is shown mid-sneeze; squinting Huckle is clutching the well-traveled stuffed cat he brought on all our travels back then. But this photo represents far more to me. It was taken in February 2011, several weeks after I learned I had breast cancer. This vacation was a blessed respite between the emotional hardship of cancer diagnosis and the looming physical hardship of cancer treatment. It was a bittersweet time of facing the vulnerability of being mortal but also of awakening to the everyday joys of being alive--not simply the photogenic sunny days we all love to post, but every sneezy, overcast, hungry-and-tired-kids second that makes up life. These moments, these now-teenaged children, my re-grown hair and middle-aged survivor body, today's cool fall weather, the dog whining beside me for another walk, the stack of homework I need to grade, the cold cup of tea by my elbow--they are gifts, not entitlements. I praise God for every one of them.
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