Selfies

I’ll be the first to admit that I am not tech-savvy. I still use a flip phone, none-Mac laptop and a digital camera. My social media world consists of this blog (I know the basics), a Facebook account and a Twitter (I had to ask my cousin why people wrote with #hashtags as I was clueless.) It was only two weeks ago that I joined, what I consider, the elite ranks of e-readers, as my parents helped me pick a Nook that met my needs now that my hands are starting to change and holding books is not always an easy task. Considering all this, it should not surprise you then if I told you that it was only at the beginning of this year I learned a very important word in the world we know today. The word: Selfie.

By now you have probably regained your composure from having fallen off your chair in laughter, but think me not of being a complete hillbilly, because in my defense, I was taking “Selfies” longer than the word has even been around. And I did it with film camera and it’s timer. It was only this past weekend that I placed the two key facts together (my own pictures and term definition) to realize this discovery:

This is me–fresh high school graduate about ready to leave for my first year of college. It was a Sunday and when we got home, I decided to try taking a few “artistic” photos before lunch. I grabbed my golden 35mm Kodak camera and went to the barn where my eye had distinguished a few candid areas. I placed my camera on the third and final step that led to the upstairs recreation room, set the camera to timer mode, and quickly sat in the weeds smiling in the direction of the parked Honda. I didn’t move until I thought there had been plenty of time for the camera to “click.”

When I developed my film, I had no idea if my “Selfie” had even turned out with me actually in the picture; other past pictures had been out of focus, too far away or too close, cheesy, or vain attempts to remember my long locks of curled hair. And so as I sat this past weekend sorting my pictures, I thought of how we see pictures today: Instant. There is no waiting for the film to develop or anticipation of seeing the pictures while waiting in line to pay for them. No strenuous task of ordering reprints by holding the negatives to the light or frustration of even having bad pictures as we simply delete what we do not want before ever ordering prints online anyway. We share our pictures on social media then comment, like (or dislike), and tag each other. Everything in an instant.

I am not condemning “Selfies,” social media or even modern technology, because even I enjoy these and take part in them. It’s more the combination of having found my old pictures and then having to face my life in a new aspect of the “Selfie” living with NF2 that this past weekend caused me to slow down. Even just for an instant and face reality, choices. Life is about choices, change. And one day, it will be set for eternity.

It will all happen so fast, in a blink, a mere flutter of the eye. The last trumpet will call, and the dead will be raised from their graves with a body that does not, cannot decay. All of us will be changed! We’ll step out of our mortal clothes and slide into immortal bodies,replacing everything that is subject to death with eternal life.

I Corinthians 15:52-53