To Polaroids

Dad, Christmas morning

I have to stare at the pictures. 

Christmas morning. The wrapping ripped off and the boxes torn into while I snap pictures. I’m 12 and beginning to think I may be an artist,; at least, I think so; I want to have a vision. I can’t draw so I consider taking pictures instead.

So while my brother is trying out a new remote control car and my sister plays with a new hand puppet, I’m lining up the polaroids photos on the coffee table, watching them.

First just the outlines: my sister’s head, my mother’s shoulders, the tree in the background. Second by second it becomes more clear. The blue in her shirt, the red in his socks, the gold tinsel on the tree. The images swim slowly to the surface.

They emerge, finally. My brother looking at something just out of the frame. My sister studying the face of the puppet.

Mom, Christmas morning

My mom is watching all five of us. She has her coffee. I don’t notice it when I’m looking at her, but in the picture I can see she’s pleasantly exhausted.

Years later, I will learn about those Christmas eve’s when they went to bed two hours before we got up. The truth swims slowly. Images develop, the colors brighten, and the lines, finer and finer, define the faces I love.