Edgework

Documentia: A condition in which documenting events is seen as more important than fully participating in them (personal definition).

The person being interviewed about “documentia” on CBC recently suggested that our urge to document every aspect of our lives has been made much easier with digital technology. However, he suggested that if we are not careful, this technology can also keep us from fully participating in an event. I found the idea resonated with some of my thoughts.

My experience with documenting events with a camera began quite early in life. My family owned a small box camera. When full, the film had to be sent to a processor in Winnipeg. The prints that came back cost considerably more than the film itself. So you might say that economics limited such documentation.

In my late teens I became serious about photography. I bought an expensive, single-lens-reflex camera.  Gradually I added a telephoto lens, a flash attachment and much more. I even enrolled in a photography course at the YMCA to improve my photography skills.

Amazingly, this state-of-the-art technology, coupled with my enthusiasm, began producing good results. Soon I was asked to take wedding pictures. I took this seriously and actually registered a private business called, “Jack’s Photo Shop.”  I was on a roll (no pun intended).

The first time I had second thoughts about my new passion came when it dawned on me that I was spending all those wonderful weekends in June taking pictures at weddings. That usually meant leaving my new bride at home alone. So I chose to cut back on wedding photography in order to spend more time with Ruth.

However, my interest in photography revived quickly when we were asked to go to Bolivia on a mission assignment in 1972. Surely, I thought, there would be many things to document on film during our time away. So I added a movie camera to my collection as well as a film projector and dragged it all with me to Bolivia.

Upon arrival in Bolivia, I began snapping pictures left and right, just like tourists do. Soon, however, I was deeply involved with the work at hand. The problem I now had was that I had no one to take pictures of me involved in ministry. Ruth wasn’t interested. And soon I discovered that the big camera hanging around my neck actually was a barrier to developing relationships. The unspoken question I often heard was, “Are you here for real or just to get a picture?” So I began leaving my camera at home and found it helped me develop deeper connections with people.

But when “tourists” came they wanted to get all the pictures they could. On one occasion I was driving a couple around when suddenly the husband insisted that I stop a local farmer leading his loaded donkey so that I could take a picture of him beside this total stranger. I pretended not to hear him and kept on driving. I was furious at such cultural insensitivity. And so my grand visions for photography in a mission setting began to evaporate.

Fast forward thirty some years and some things have changed dramatically. Now it is easier to conceal a small digital camera. And it doesn’t cost any more to take a thousand pictures than it does a hundred. Not to be left behind, I purchased my own digital camera and have learned how to take pictures by the hundreds and edit them down to the ones I really want to keep. We have taken it with us on our trip to Egypt to visit our son Nelson. We also took it back to Bolivia when we visited Carl and his family there a few years ago. Some of the pictures we took have turned into prints and are neatly arranged in photo albums which we hardly ever look at. The rest are stored on my computer which will most likely be deleted after I am gone.

Is it possible that we have over-rated our modern propensity to “document” every moment of our lives? I remember standing on the balcony of our hotel room in Coroico, Bolivia, breathless because of the absolute beauty spread out before me. Like a good tourist, I took many pictures. But still the best picture by far is the one in my mind that is fully connected to my sense of awe and wonder I felt at that moment. I think that memory is worth a thousand pictures.

Is it true then, that our digital devices can get between us and the moments we are trying to capture? For example, at a typical birthday party there is always the dramatic moment when the child attempts to blow out all the candles on the birthday cake. But precisely at that moment nearly all the adults in the room go into hiding behind their cameras. No one seems to be there simply to participate in this special moment. In a sense the child is left behind to face a wall of cameras alone.

In order to understand the problem of documentia, I recommend an experiment. When going to an event to which you normally would take your camera, leave it at home. Focus all your attention on being fully present to the moment without feeling the need to capture it on camera. Then reflect on your experience. Perhaps it is my age, but for me, I find myself being more fully present to the moments that create lasting memories when I leave my camera at home.

Don’t get me wrong. I am not against taking pictures. For some it will remain a passion and that is okay. Perhaps it is such persons we could designate to be the official photographer at special events who will share pictures with the rest of us at a later time.

We could just keep moving with the trajectory we are on. But is it possible that “documentia” will then rob us even more of life in real time?