Life through the lens

If you ever want to find out the truth about your life, let a four year old borrow your camera. You can learn a lot about yourself, your home, and your family, by simply taking a look through the lens.

I came face to face with the ugly truths of my life the last time I downloaded the camera card onto the computer. Two hundred thirteen frames of honesty, staring out at me from my 17 inch screen. I started to simply hit “delete all” and give him a lecture on playing with Mommy’s camera, but of course I didn’t want to stifle any creative genius that might be lurking behind those sparkling eyes and that ornery smile.

No, I decided to take a look at his work. See if there were any lessons I could glean from his three and a half foot perspective. And, as luck would have it, I discovered that our little artistic virtuoso did an amazingly honest job of capturing the essence of our family’s life through his lens. I’ll begin with the most infuriating.

Most days I don’t sit around wondering how clean my house is or isn’t. I pretty much know the answer by how many times someone has changed clothes or whether I’ve had extra help in the kitchen, or whether or not it is sunny outside or pouring down rain. But then there are those days when I take extra care in mopping the floors, cleaning mirrors, making sure the house has that lemon fresh scent because I cleaned it, not because I simply lit a candle. Yes, those are the days I sit back and feel proud of myself at all I have accomplished…and then along comes Brisco. And his Cool Pix camera.

Suddenly, my sparkling home takes on a whole new angle. The bathroom sink I just cleaned yesterday. The oven door that gets wiped down once a day. The kick plate in the kitchen that provides the perfect place for that rolling Cheerio to hide. And that’s just the inside.

Shall we talk yard maintenance? I have pictures of fallen leaves piled high against the chain link fence. Photos of toys strewn about the yard as if they had rained from the sky. And my favorite...piles of dog poop, zoomed-in and focused upon as if they were buckets of gold.

Wanna be inspired to get fit? Let your little one loose with a device that can capture an unbecoming image from an unflattering angle and be replayed at any time with just the click of a button. It’s a great motivational tool.

Then there are the random shots that nobody understands unless they are blessed with the mind of a four year old. Hubcaps and car seats and the change laying in the door handle. Halloween decorations on doors and in yards, with all seven ghosts getting personal close ups from the master himself. Knotholes on Maple trees zoomed in so close that at first glance they resemble the backside of a baboon. And finally, pictures of his own feet. Dozens, actually, silently reminding me that he has yet another toe trying to poke through.

Thankfully, I’ve found an upside to all this unsolicited memory making. It seems to have left us with an array of candid, individual portraits of the members of our family. A barrage of surprise attacks from a toe-headed twerp with a flash, which surprisingly has led to some of the most fun and unforgettable photos of the year.

Like the laughable pics he’s snapped of me, when the most unflattering ray of light hits the smile lines around my eyes or my darkening roots.

Or the photos he’s captured of Bessie, beloved canine of the Smith clan. Ears upturned, graying muzzle, tongue hanging out, begging for a kiss.

Photos of Dad and all his crazy faces, the kind he creates when he knows the camera’s pointing his way.

Action shots of Cooper, always doing something whether it’s raking baselines or building barns of nothing but dirt and sticks.

And we can’t forget the many self-portraits that show up more often than any other. Whether it is the stern face or the cheesy grin, an eyeball up close or an under-the-tongue shot—these are the pictures that make us smile the most.

So what is the most perfect pic to date? The most precisely timed click of the shutter on an evening riddled with mishaps and chaos. A moment frozen, captured and duplicated, now sitting forever on the memory of my hard drive, and earning its place in the 2010 Family Album. Nicely done.

Like any true artist, he is disgusted and offended if you try to delete any of his work, even though there might be 60 pictures of the same pile of dead leaves out back. Every picture has a story, a masterpiece awaiting discovery.

Thanks to our little guy’s newest obsession, the truth of our world has been laid out before us in a bizarre yet strangely normal pictorial. It has told the story of our personalities, our quirks, and the things and people that are important to us all. Comical at best, brutally honest at worst, but always anything but boring. That’s our life through the lens.

And that’s All in a day’s work!