MOTHERS ARE IMPORTANT
Dearest,
How was your week?
Jack and I went to the funeral of our beautiful friend Joy last Friday at 930am at the local funeral chapel. The day was humid and pouring with rain, the pouring rain on the day of any funeral feels fitting- like even mother nature is crying in loss. Joy was our next-door neighbour. The definition of Joy in the dictionary: an emotion of keen or lively pleasure; great gladness; delight. And our Joy from next door with the flaming red hair, fair skin, and most beautiful kind heart to all of us especially my boys was the definition of Joy.
The chapel was standing room only for the service and there was triple the amount of people at the wake. There were words; so many words said at the pulpit, she was deeply celebrated as a stay-at-home mum and wife. Her son spoke from his broken heart about every seemingly insignificant thing his mother had done for him, and he remembered the feelings with great clarity of what it meant for him to have a mum who made it her art to be a mother to him and his sister (these were his words) and love to their dad.
With all the people and all the words there was also a lack of recent photos. There were photos of a newly adopted toddler, lots as a child on the family farm and teen years at the beach, wedding photos, some very badly composed maternity photos, holiday snaps and of course selfies mostly with her husband. There were no thoughtfully taken photos of a recent Joy, no photos that showed Joy as the woman who won volunteer awards, a mum with her children (there were photos with her kids, but she was generally not looking or taken by surprise.) No photos of her and my heart felt this fear and grief of – she is gone there is no opportunity to take photos of her now.
Once we are gone, we are gone – all opportunities are over.
Maybe I was feeling overly sensitive about the photos, maybe the ones shown as a slide show really did show her. Always doing for others, always in the background and somewhat invisible, but the impact of her actions huge in the ripple effect.
Last week I wrote about letting go and what this year looks like for me.
In late 2020 I did some mentoring and I tried to brainstorm with the idea of motherhood photography as something I found important, valuable and would like to explore the idea of offering it in a business setting. I let the mentors negative comments and scoffing laugh create a block for me in offering this in my business. I have personally taken mother photos of mothers who let me near them with my camera. But I have also added it to my business. It is of high importance to me that I take photos of mothers of all ages and stages. Pregnancy to Great grandmother. I want women to see themselves in these photos, to have thoughtful photos of them. THEM. Mothers are important (I wish I had the vocabulary that describes a bigger, broader, deeper term than important) they are the glue, they are the center. As I said in Remember – Words for the beautiful mess that is motherhood.
Page 21 - You are your child’s first home.
There are hard days and glorious days a mother, we feel frustrated, defeated, loved, celebrated, invisible, too visible. We feel it all – and so do our children.
That was something I have thought about a lot since Friday – that Joy made a very conscious decision to be a stay-at-home mother and wife. And the outpouring of gratitude and love from her children for this had everyone in the chapel reaching for the tissues at the end of every pew. They had many hard times and made lots of beautiful memories. And at the end when she is not there to physically hear the words the celebrations, conversations, memories, stories told about her; how she was always there, always being kind to someone, thoughtfully baking a cake and dropping it off, lending love and support, the center family and friends orbit around.
Mothers are important, and I will photograph as many as possible.
Women over 40 photo project.
“As women over 40 we have untapped and under appreciated knowledge, wisdom and life experience this project is to give face to all of those amazing qualities while also acknowledging women who are experiencing changes in body, mind, health, wealth, families, relationships, careers”.
If you would like to be included in the project please reply to this email or book via this link:
If you would like to book a motherhood photo session please reply to this email or book via this link:
Motherhood photos are pregnancy to great grandmothers, they can be in person or virtual/ remote via an app ( I am obsessed with these). You will receive an online gallery, prints and a photo book - this isn’t optional, it is included in the price. I choose the photos for the prints I send you and I curate the photo book. The price is as low as I can financially make it because I want to photograph alllllllllllll the mothers. You can pay in full or payment plan.
Thank you to everyone that engages with this email, I am grateful and it brings immense joy when I get to reply to you in a conversational way.
Have a beautiful week
Love
Melinda
PS
Have you listened to the latest podcast - Conversations from the Gap.