Do our photos keep us locked in the past, or give us a greater sense of the journey?
I once met a Bulgarian woman when I was travelling. We were skipping around the Greek Isles somewhere, and I asked her to take a photo of my wife and I, sunning ourselves on the yacht.
I asked her if she wanted me to take a photo of her.
She said she didn’t like photos.
I’m thinking, comes from Bulgaria. Doesn’t come up well in photos. Obviously a vampire.
But she bats away my hand when I try to drive a silver dagger into her heart, and laughs. No nothing like that. She says she doesn’t like photos because they anchor her in the past.
She wants to stay in the moment – or as close to the moment as she can get. Photos and memorabilia are just a burden from the past that pull her away from the moment and back into her own history.
And so she doesn’t have any photos of herself. They exist in other people’s Facebook accounts and so on, but apart from her passport photo and drivers’ license, she doesn’t have a single photo of herself. There’s probably some at her mother’s house.
I find it fascinating. I mean I could get it. We all have the capacity to rewrite our own stories. Re-cast ourselves into whatever we want to be – more courageous, more out-going, more savvy with money, whatever.
It’s useful to remember that our personalities are nothing but tendencies. Nothing is fixed. Don’t let who you were determine who you are or who you could be.
We are all capable of change. That’s what’s makes life exciting.
But I’d just never met anyone who had taken it to such extremes before. And personally I’m quite fond of all the memorabilia I have lying around the house – photos, awards, a photocopy of the title to my first investment property, framed and hung up in the kitchen.
But she says, “What do you care? They’re artefacts from someone else’s life. There isn’t a single cell in your body that is older than 7 years old. That version of you that existed 20 years ago is a totally different conglomeration of matter.
You may as well be looking at a picture of an elephant.
There are a few photos where I look like an elephant, I say, but they’re from my younger, wilder days. And it’s not entirely true, either. Memories exist in the filing cabinet of my mind, and every so often, when the memory comes, I write out a new copy and put it back in the cabinet.
It is true that no physical part of my mind is older than 7 years old, but the memories, get written and re-written by my inner admin-lady, and passed down through time.
In many ways, my memories use the different physical incarnations of me to hand themselves down. I am a just a temporary vehicle for my memories.
And I kind of like that. I love looking at old pictures of myself and trying to connect who I am now to whoever it was that was captured in that photo. To sift back through the various evolutions of Jon Giaan, to whatever drives and beliefs that younger man held back then.
For me it’s like climbing a mountain, and looking back at the village I’d left a few hours before. I get a sense of the journey, and that sense is often satisfying.
There’s ups and downs there too. Sometimes I look back at old sporting photos – when I was in my definite prime, and it is like looking back at some peak so much higher and more majestic than where I stand now, with my fading eyes and rickety knees.
That’s bitter-sweet, but I still enjoy the sense of journey. And life is most satisfying to think of as a journey – not as a graduation through various levels, or as a trophy cabinet of achievements. A journey – a path that has its ups and downs, good times and bad.
There’s a sense of peace in this idea. It keeps me from taking the rough times too hard. I can just say, oh well, this particular stretch of the journey is just a bit shitty. It’s raining and the frogs are a bit stinky. But it’s a journey, and around the next corner will be something new.
There always is.
And in a way, looking back at the old versions of myself captured in those photos is a kind of ancestor worship.
I know the things those men were wrestling with. I know that they were working hard to set up the life that I am now enjoying. They were putting time into my financial strategy to get the material side of life sorted, and they were working on my mindset so I would have the awareness of mind to enjoy the good times when they came to me.
I’m eating the fruit of the trees that they planted.
And so there’s a lot to be grateful for. I tip my hat and say thanks guys, great job. You made this life and it’s awesome. Thanks heaps. I owe you a beer.
Time also gives me perspective on my faults – the vanities I used to carry, the dick I was being to people, that haircut. With a bit of space, I can see my own faults with a bit more compassion.
And that reminds me to be a bit more gentle with myself now. The parts of me that irk me most right now, will, with the benefit of hindsight, be not such a big deal. No pointing beating current-moment Jon Giaan up about it.
So I don’t know. I get where this Bulgarian woman was coming from. I can see that it would be a radical and powerful practice. But I like the photos and little mementos I have in my life.
I asked her if I could take a photo of her to remind me of the conversation.
She said sure. In a few moments I’ll be a different woman and that woman just won’t care.
She was a strange woman.
Probably a vampire.
How do you relate to your photos?
ron goddard says
hi jonno,
is it really you? i laughed a bit about memorabilia. a blast from the past sort of. now how am i going? being 79 years i have quite obviously been replaced 11 times already!!! so who am i now? and i think of the ‘good old days’ when i payed footy and cricket, when i was younger. thats it. when i was younger. the only good about the good old days was that we were all younger! i would never, ever liked to have lived in 1757 a.d. or 535 a.d. !! yikes.. well then maybe i did , i just cannot recollect.
many photos of teams from my younger days show faces that have long since departed the scene. who is next i am being told? keep watching the death notices. oh dear, what an occupation indeed!. well, yes, i have missed many funerals. but i don’t think i shall miss you know whose. if i looked like i did the day i got married it would be nice; flashing smile, black hair, not a wrinkle anywhere! but now there is a restless moribund fella still wanting to conquer everything and anything. and why not; forsooth! i am being replaced every 7 years. thank you jonno, i have more hope now and i’ll keep looking at my photos and trophies and think about making a comeback!! cheers, ron
KatM says
I can relate to the Bulgarian woman, certainly due to my slavic ancestry. It is a religious tradition to not worship graven images. Some Jews, but predominantly Muslims don’t display portraits and sculpted bodies in their homes and places of worship. Some Christians could be just as strict when they take God’s commands to Moses seriously. I certainly don’t display portraits of my family in prominent places at home; definitely not on walls, but landscapes are permitted.
You should now begin to understand why Taliban iconoclasts destroyed statues of Buddha, while similar destruction occurs in hostile parts of the Middle East.
Most people take photos/selfies as exercises in vanity to show off to their mates, while making them feel good about their past achievements. Though it’s nice to take out old photographs to show the grandkids they look a little like your younger self!
Does anyone know the amount of paper wasted printing glossy gossip mags with pictures of celebrities? Then there’s climate change exacerbated by having to provide cooling for unnecessary digital storage for multiple copies of images that are often designed to provoke envy, promote beauty therapies, sell make up products and other current capitalist cosmetic procedures.
Indeed, with the physical body continually renovated by its individual living cells, it is continuously animated by a conscience which never changes during a person’s existence. Figure out this mystery and you will have the key to our earthly existence.
KiwiAl says
“… a conscience which never changes during a person’s existence…”
Wouldn’t that be nice. But I don’t believe it for one sec.
So all those American war commanders who have ordered the killing of so many people had just as little conscience the day they were born. Same for all the suicide bombers, etc, etc.
Born, not created, huh?
Rick Eason says
Wow – you’ve ventured into ontology today and touched on the puzzle of mind vs brain. The best explanation for how our memories remain despite constant physical renewal of brain tissue is that we are not a body. The body is just the taxi we ride round in – the “earth suit” that shows we have authority to be on the earth. The real you and the real me is “made in God’s image” – a spirit being that will remain alive with its memories long after our body is eaten by worms. The interface between the body and the spirit is what we call the soul – our mind, will and emotions. A successful life is one in which the real person – the spirit being – has allowed his or her mind, will and emotions to be renewed by believing the Word of the One who created us.
V says
I thought, Count Dracula comes from Romania, not Bulgaria.
As for seven-year renewal of the body, just Google this concept and you will see if this is true. In particular, the neurons in our brain stay the same, and this is where our memory (and memories) rests, our personality and everything that makes us humans, whether we drink blood for diner of tea.
Now, to the topic of the article: You want to take photos – you take them. You don’t want to take photos – you don’t take them.
Have a great weekend.
Rick Eason says
Wrong. Neurons transmit and receive INFORMATION, they do not create it. Millions are invested in the SETI program because science believes that the only source of information is intelligent beings. As I said, we are spirit beings made in the image of an astonishingly intelligent Creator.
V says
??
Tom says
“…I asked her to take a photo of my wife and I.”
No Jon.
So many Aussies get this wrong. (What, even our beloved politicians? Especially our numbskull politicians.)
As my father drummed into us as kids, when it comes to such doubles, just leave the other person out of the expression and see what personal pronoun is appropriate.
“I asked her to take a photo of my wife…” OK!!!
“I asked her to take a photo of I…” — NO!!!
“I asked her to take a photo of me.” YES!!!
So, “I asked her to take a photo of my wife and me.” VERY GOOD!!! Go to the top of the class.
I guess Greek has the same logic. Am I correct?