A few months back, after Thanksgiving, I posted the picture above of the Hochheimer clan (my grandparents' family) gathering at my brother Eric's house. My confession is this: I have always preferred the pictures like the version below:
I like the pictures that show the real people coming through, almost from behind the photograph. The traditional family portrait has everyone on their best behavior (and sometimes we take the pictures over and over until everyone has their eyes open and no one is talking and everyone looks just right). But often it's the "imperfect" pictures that more candidly show who we really are. The next picture was taken by a professional photographer in Provincetown (Cape Cod, Massachusetts) in 2001; my brothers and I had organized family pictures in honor of our parents' 45th wedding anniversary. This is the "official" picture:
I have that picture hanging in my office -- but framed with it is this one, taken just before the "official" portrait. I love the way in which we are all interacting, being ourselves, before we straighten up and put on our "smile!" faces.
I thought of all this because last weekend I had the honor of being at Coby Goodhart's Bar Mitzvah and celebration in Wilmington, Delaware. I took a lot of posed pictures at the party (and the official photographer took even more). But before all the guests arrived, I asked Coby if I could take his picture; he knew that soon he would be posing over and over again for family pictures. Very handsome, with tolerance and humor, he stopped and struck a pose that was completely himself.
My favorite photograph of the gathering: Claire and her grandmother only had eyes for the mirror and the reflection they were playing with. I came up behind them unobserved. "She lives in D.C. and I live in Cleveland," Claire's grandmother told me later. "I wish I could see her more often."
