Seeing differently

I used my recent birthday money to buy a new camera. The stock lens that came with it has a wide field of view (14mm, 28 mm film equivalent). Up until now, my favorite lens has been a zoomed in, portrait lens (85mm, 136mm film equivalent). I love being able to stand across the room and catch the private expressions of my kids doing their thing. I love being able to focus on little nuances. But that's not what a wide angle lens gives you.

With this new camera and lens, in addition to getting beautiful color which is why I got the camera, I'm being forced to see differently. This lens captures the background environment even when I'm inches away from my kids. So I'm finding that this lens is forcing me to tell situated stories, layering what's happening in the foreground with what's in the middle ground and background. Now that I have more than one child, this is become quite useful and more interesting. It's a lens much more suitable for capturing context and interactions.

The dramatic life changes I've experienced these past several years has also forced me to see differently. As excitingly diverse my fields of intellectual interest were in graduate school, my life was extremely contained in specific spaces with specific kinds of people. Now as a new-ish mom, in a new neighborhood, mostly out of academia, I'm encountering a much broader variety of people, something I didn't expect when I moved out to the burbs.

I have relationships across more socio-economic strata and education levels than before; high school graduates with solid middle class incomes, college and post-college educated folk on the poverty line, the more usual college educated, middle to upper-middle class, the blue collar lower-middle class, etc. As I get to know these folk, life gets more complicated and less complicated.

More complicated is how people navigate their worlds: health care, government services and bureaucracy, family and friend obligations and needs. Things I've only read about I now hear about first hand. Less complicated are basic needs and general wisdom. Everyone wants loving, harmonious relationships. Nobody is sheltered from having family issues. Spending more than you have leads to problems. Being healthy is a blessing. Having friends in times of need is critical for physical, spiritual, and emotional well-being.

The academic life for all its goodness can easily be one of myopic theory. Out here in the everyday life, people have substance, and they don't fit in boxes. They are unique individuals, made in the image of and specifically loved by our Creator. While I may one day get to spend more time in academia or more time with my favorite zoom lens, I'm glad to be in this season learning to see in these ways.