available light
Orrin
I sometimes think that what makes modern holidays ‘holy’ is the power of absent friends and family to make their absence felt. It doesn’t matter what holiday is being celebrated or what culture is doing the celebrating, there will be moments when we wish somebody…some specific person…was there sharing it with us. Somebody who has moved away, perhaps. Or somebody who has died. Somebody from whom we’ve become estranged. All we know is that the celebration would be better, richer, more meaningful if that person wasn’t gone.
That’s one of the defining attributes of love. Time is irrelevant. Distance is of no consequence. Love can reach across the decades and the miles and the very borders of death to move our hearts.
So while you’re celebrating, when you see an empty chair,.take a moment to fill it with the memory of someone who isn’t there. Do it deliberately. Do it like you’re going to take their photograph. Visualize the person in that chair, smiling and happy and there. There, with you. There, where that person belongs.
Blog photograph copyrighted to the photographer and used with permission by utata.org. All photographs used on utata.org are stored on flickr.com and are obtained via the flickr API. Text is copyrighted to the author, greg fallis and is used with permission by utata.org. Please see Show and Share Your Work
