I Built Our Family Photo Archive For Thirty Years — Then My Sister’s Slideshow Showed Me What Was Missing

PART 8

The week before Mom’s birthday, I became irritatingly aware of cameras.

Not photography. Cameras.

They were everywhere. Phones held up at restaurants. Doorbell cameras. Video calls. Little black lenses on laptops. I had spent years worrying about being photographed badly as if avoiding one bad picture meant avoiding visibility itself.

At work, our receptionist took a group photo because one of the optometrists was leaving for maternity leave. I almost volunteered to take it.

Instead I stood at the end of the row.

The picture was fine.

My left arm looked thick.

Nobody died.

That evening I printed it on ordinary office paper and brought it home to show David.

He stared at it.

“Why am I looking at a blurry picture of people I barely know?”

“I’m in it.”

He found me.

“Oh.”

“Your support is moving.”

“You look nice.”

“Do not patronize me.”

“You look like you are standing beside coworkers.”

“Better.”

He handed the page back.

“Is this about the birthday?”

“Everything is about the birthday until the birthday happens.”

He nodded as if Linda had trained him too.

Two nights later, Mom called.

“I changed my mind about the cake.”

My stomach dropped.

“About the flavor?”

“No. About the candles.”

“You want eighty?”

“I want eight. One for each decade. I am not trying to burn Linda’s deck down.”

“Reasonable.”

“And I want you sitting next to me.”

“I said I would.”

“I am confirming.”

“Mom.”

“You make promises and then you see a reflection in a spoon and wander away.”

“That has never happened.”

“You photographed my birthday cake in a serving spoon in 2017.”

“It was interesting.”

“It was upside down.”

“That was the interesting part.”

She laughed.

Then she said, “Sit next to me.”

“I will.”

After we hung up, I opened the camera cabinet in my office.

My DSLR sat on the shelf. Two lenses. Flash. Batteries. Tripod remote.

The remote was small enough to hide in my palm. I had used it for family group shots whenever I could convince everyone to stay still long enough. Set the camera. Compose. Run into position. Click without leaving.

It seemed like the perfect compromise.

I put it in my bag.

Then I took it back out.

The whole point was not to engineer a way to remain in control from inside the picture.

The point was to let someone else decide where the camera pointed.

That sounded almost spiritual when I thought it.

In practice, it made me itchy.

Saturday morning, the day before the party, Linda called at seven-twenty.

“The tablecloths are wrong.”

“What does that mean?”

“The rental company sent ivory, not white.”

“Mom does not care.”

“I care.”

“Then you have two options. Return them or stop caring.”

“Who are you?”

“I’ve changed.”

“Since yesterday?”

“Rapid growth.”

She groaned.

I went over at ten anyway, because I loved her and because chairs did need to be moved before the heat got worse.

I did not bring my camera.

Linda’s backyard looked like a party supply company had sneezed. Folding tables. Coolers. Flower buckets. Extension cords. Paper lanterns.

I spent two hours helping with the things I had actually agreed to help with: table placement, name cards for older relatives who liked assigned seats, coolers under the shade.

Three times Linda asked, “Should we take a picture of this before we move it?”

Three times I said, “Why?”

By the third time she laughed.

Rachel arrived with her camera and immediately put it on a table without a lens cap.

I nearly screamed.

She caught me looking.

“Don’t,” she said.

“Dust exists.”

“So do therapists.”

“I raised you badly.”

She kissed my cheek.

“Tomorrow I’ll do the formal group shot. Do you want me to use your camera?”

Every cell in my body said yes because my camera had settings I trusted and a lens wide enough for the group.

Then I thought about what that would mean. I would spend the whole time watching her hands.

“No,” I said. “Use yours.”

Rachel stared at me.

“Who are you and where is my mother?”

“Ask your aunt. Apparently I changed rapidly.”

Late that afternoon, Mom came over to inspect the setup.

She wore the yellow cardigan despite the heat until Linda made her take it off.

I watched her stand by the maple while Rachel tested her camera.

The sun hit one side of Mom’s face too hard.

The hydrangeas behind her were brown.

The background was busy.

I knew exactly how to fix all of it.

“Mom, stand there,” Rachel said.

Mom stood there.

Rachel took the picture.

I stayed quiet.

The photograph was not going to be perfect.

Neither, I suspected, was tomorrow.

For once, I was beginning to think that might be an honest advantage.

That evening I laid out clothes for the party and caught myself evaluating them the way I evaluated a location. The blue blouse would photograph better. The green one was more comfortable. I chose the green one and immediately hated how symbolic the choice felt.

David walked past the bedroom, backed up, and looked in.

“Why are you glaring at shirts?”

“They are making demands.”

“Do you need me to leave?”

“Yes.”

He left.

I changed my mind and chose the blue blouse anyway.

That was useful. I did not want this new experiment to become another set of rules I could perform correctly. Wear the unflattering shirt. Refuse the camera. Prove I was liberated. That would have been the same control problem with better branding.

I wanted to take good pictures tomorrow. I also wanted to eat, talk, sit beside Mom, and let other people make images I could not supervise.

Both things could be true.

I packed one spare battery, not three. I left the tripod remote in the cabinet. Then I wrote a note on a scrap of paper and put it in the camera bag: PUT IT DOWN.

It was ridiculous.

It was also probably necessary.