The Power of a Photograph

As I have sat here all morning watching the coverage of 9/11, I am blown away by the power of photographs. I see the crowd of the families holding up the treasured photos of the lost and I wonder about the moment the photo was taken. What were they doing? Was it a birthday party? A formal posed photo? The photos of the lost fascinate me much as the photos of the buildings destruction saddens me. One shows a terrible loss and the other shows a much loved life and the fact that they are entwined and intermingled in the tragedy of that day ten years ago speaks to me in a way I am having trouble conveying and even comprehending.

I think of the instant those photos were made. No one knowing that these people would be gone way too soon. Fathers, mothers, children and friends smilimg out at their families and now the entire world. Moments frozen in time becoming timeless

When I was in New York two weeks after 9/11 we saw all of the missing posters. Faces plastered on every surface of walls and utility poles. All of those images that were once just photos stuck in an album now pleas of help. "Here he is. He is lost. I love him. Help me find him".
Those beloved pictures became something else entirely and watching the coverage today I realize they have now become something else once again. Previously a memory of a moment, a single instance caught on film, they then became a tool, something used to help recover that person. The images are now not a memory of a moment but of an entire life. Seeing the families grasping these precious symbols in their grieving hands I look at the faces of the lost and I can hear them speaking to me. "I was here. I was important. I was loved. Do not forget". And I bow my head and make them a solemn promise, "Never. I will never forget".