For Mother's Day, I posted a photograph that to this day I count as one of the best shots that I ever took as an amateur photographer. It is a photograph that stirs both a joy and a poignancy in me, because of the two people in it. Taken on a hot summer's day by chance in downtown New York City in the late 70's, it depicts an elderly women standing next to a young girl, presumably her granddaughter.
They were waiting for a bus and the protective stance in their body English makes you realize that the older woman instinctively shields her girl from the urban landscape - and as a parent, I know that the safety of my children is always in my mind when I am in public with my kids, so to be traveling in such a vast metropolis as New York would have me on heightened alert, since it would be so easy for my child to take just a few steps away from me and be swallowed up in the crowd. Likewise, the girl holds her grandmother and I caught her looking at the camera with a challenge of sorts on her face, as if to say, no one will hurt this old woman.
It is evident that they are poor. It is evident that it is summer, and New York City is not a comfortable place to be during that time of year, as the heat index is high in midtown Manhattan and is exacerbated by humidity. But what is evident is that they have each other. Think of the girl. Perhaps her parents are gone - dead, in jail, or simply gone - and all she has is her grandmother. Or maybe her grandmother is growing frail and she was told, go downtown shopping with your grandmother, make sure she makes it home. I think they are related - they share the same eyes. As I said, when I look at the two, I see St. Anne and the Blessed Virgin Mary. Have you ever seen the photograph by Getrude Kasebier, Blessed Art Thou Among Women? There she is. Or the young latina in the center of the mural at Union Station in Los Angeles? Everytime I would pass beneath it and think, there she is, at the age when she bore Our Lord.
Well, I guess I am blind as a bat, because offense was taken at my image. An anonymous commentator, calling herself Catholic Woman, wrote:
St Anne and the Blessed Virgin??? Dressed like that?!?!? I hope that wasn't really your mother or grandmother. What a shameful way for a woman to dress, at any age let alone an older woman. And to imagine the Mother of God so scantily dressed like that little girl? Where is your head?! Terrible! And if you don't think so, shame ON you. Was that supposed to be a joke? If it was, it isn't appreciated. At all.
Neither is your comment, lady. Go learn something about the world.
7 comments:
Right on. The comment was spoken like some burkha lady. Evidently someone who's never been in east coast humidity. I feel sorry for anyone who can't see the love and beauty in that picture.
I don't think the St. Anne - Blessed Virgin analogy would have occurred to me without suggestion. That doesn't mean it's without merit. And I certainly see the beauty in the picture. The little girl in particular is haunting (yes, irrespective of her tank top and shorts).
You already said the rest of what I was going to post, albeit in the combox from the original post rather than here: if we're supposed to see Jesus in everyone, how is it blasphemous to see His mother and grandmother in others? If I'm supposed to see Him in the crack addict, the homeless guy peeing on the side of the building, and the schizophrenic bag lady who's in the middle of the street shouting at someone no one else can see...and He is God...why is it a sacrilege to see His mother in a little girl?
The picture is beautiful, it shows the deep affection--love bond between the two. I love the young girls curly hair, the two are a bit messy, but hey when your out and having fun, you don't always bring a change of clothes, how absurd to be offended by this true life moment--sheesh!
I think that that the photo is beautiful. I also think that more than what people see in the photo, it's what they see in themselves that is so telling. I love the interpretation...I think you are a photo journalist first and lawyer second.
Thanks for the backstory.
Gee, I feel terribly sad for people who are unable to see the Blessed Virgin in anything but a flowing blue gown, her blonde hair covered but her blue eyes sparkling.
I feel sorry for people unable to see Christ in anything but robes and sandals - people who can't see Christ in the street bum.
How utterly sad.
Neither are those folks dressed inappropriately. They are dressed like poverty-stricken country bumpkins, but they are NOT dressed inappropriately. Forgive the little girl for not having a dainty blue pinafore and a parasol. She was probably too busy wondering where their next meal was coming from, or how long the bus ride back to Georgia would take.
Christ would wrap them in his arms. So would Mother Teresa.
SO SHOULD WE.
Bless you for sharing that photo.
I like it. It didn't remind me of St. Anne and Mary but it did bring back memories of South Carolina in the 70s.
It is a beautiful picture that shows love and protection. I wouldn't have thought of the Blessed Virgin Mary and Saint Anne, but I can see how you may.
I was one of those people who always thought of our Blessed Mother as beautiful until one day, when I was a teenager, someone pointed out to me how hard her life would have really been. How would she have looked? Tired under the eyes, her hands would not have been those of a 'lady' but hands that showed signs of hard work. Her clothes likely would have had flour or some evidence of cooking as anything Our Lord ate came from her hands, and history tells us she didn't just walk to the supermarket to feed Him. The market would have been open air, with raw foods for her to prepare. Hard work. Her skin would have been browned, and her hair hardly perfect on most days. A very humanized picture, but the love we know her to possess would have been under the pauper's appearance.
The visions of her are to show her glory, to help us of weak faith, soldiers fighting for Christ and against the propaganda of non-belief in Mary being the Immaculate Conception (etc.), to help us believe and to strengthen our belief. Getting past the glory and focusing on the every day life of her role as wife, mother, housekeeper and cook, that is also a very poignant and inspiring vision of her, motivational for women and makes her a role model for those aspects of a women's life which are downgraded as meaningless or below the status of women in today's society.
I can certainly see how this would remind you of St. Anne and the Blessed Virgin and I will pray for your judgmental commenter.
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