Theo

Jeff and Sandy and Theo and Kody came for a visit. Jeff and I were room­mates in Mem­phis for med­ical school. Kody had a birth­day. Lots of choco­late, an enor­mous lol­lipop, etc. I asked if I could make pic­tures of them all. I asked Rose to hold the flash off cam­era (great assis­tant) and we bounced the light off the ceil­ing, using a dif­fuser. Theo started ask­ing ques­tions about the strobe, light, bounc­ing. He stopped talk­ing, cocked his head and smiled. He picked up three bot­tle caps and made a per­fect golden reflec­tor to help out. The whole con­cept sunk in so fast. I was watch­ing synapses con­nect in real time. Delight is not a word I use a lot, but he it was delight in his eyes when he per­fectly applied the idea his mind learned sec­onds before.

Kids are mas­ters at learn­ing. The joy is the pay­off that keeps them com­ing back – until the world sub­sti­tutes money for joy and then the light in the eyes starts the inex­orable dimming.

When I pay atten­tion to the joy, the part in me that falls into align­ment when I learn some­thing like Theo did dur­ing our por­trait ses­sion, it is almost unspeak­able. I can feel it roll into me like the per­fect way a bowl­ing ball returns to the rack – right speed, nat­ural fit, the groove, the lit­tle clunk that lets you know it is back. I am not going out and find­ing some­thing; more like some­thing has come home to me. I love that.