When the girls come home with the "bring in a photo" assignment, I'm toast. What the teachers don't realize is that I have thousands of photographs of the girls' childhood. Yesterday the photo request came on a particularly horrible day. My dad had a heart attack, and I couldn't keep the world from spinning or the tears from falling. I can't keep my babies from getting older. I can't keep my parents from getting older.  The tears made my screen blurry as I searched for the photo, and yet they made something else very clear to me. My passion for photography is driven by the fact that for one two hundred and fiftieth of a second, I CAN make the world stop. I stop the world so that I remember all of life's details. I remember pink tights, round tummies, giggles, stamps on hands, undies hanging out, and crooked eyebrows checking themselves out in the mirror. I know one day my daughter will understand my tears when she remembers this day.  Until then, I will continue to stop the world from spinning one photograph at a time.

 As I cleaned the house this morning with the music from Downton Abbey playing in the background, it was hard not to compare life in my log cabin to life in that glorious castle.  I play the role of Lady Edith splendidly (in addition to the role of dressing assistant, gardner, butler, social engagement coordinator, floor scrubber, chauffer, tea fetcher, mail poster, launderer, silver polisher, and animal caretaker). Bert plays the role of Earl rather well (in addition to the role of cook). It was at the moment that I tried to imagine the Earl of Grantham cooking in Ms. Patmore's kitchen that I suddenly became very tired and changed the music (and sat down for a cup of tea).

 Today Maddy was in the spelling bee. Standing on that stage with a smile from ear to ear, she knew the words being called out by heart and her face showed how proud she was. She made it to the eleventh round with two other great spellers and finally got knocked out on the word "disingenuous".  Years ago she had horrible stage fright. Her eyes would well up with tears, and it was all I could do during those performances not to snatch her off stage and hide her from the world.  We worked and worked on it, and I told her how hard it was for me to sit in the audience while she cried on stage.  Today during the spelling bee, I was the one with tears in my eyes.  I didn't expect the tears, but they sprung up out of nowhere and threatened to flood my face.  It was one of those rare moments when you are so happy that you can't figure out why you are crying. I hoped Maddy wouldn't see the tears from where she sat in seat eleven, and the irony of a world that had just reversed itself didn't escape me. I was watching a little girl so full of confidence, exuding pure joy and pride, and there was absolutely nothing disingenuous about it.  As she won the hearts of those watching her, I realized that she had won something much larger than a spelling bee {love l-o-v-e love}.

 I have taken many photos over the years that captured a look, an expression, a moment in time. Recently, I opened this shot of my youngest and was immediately carried back to the moment that my kids decided to stop listening to me. They figured out that maybe everything I said was not always right. All of those years of listening were down the drain with the discovery that maybe, just maybe, they could have an opinion of their own. The power to "just not listen" was discovered. If they closed their eyes and didn't face me, it was as though I had magically disappeared into thin air. They were left in a world of bliss, while I was left in a world where my dialogue had magically morphed into something that sounded  much like Charlie Brown's teacher. In this shot, "It's time to come in, Maddy" translated nicely into "Wah Wah, Wah Wah, Wah Wah Wah Waaaah".