Framing the shot: Looking for good in the bad

He ran his fingers through his gray hair.  Strands spilled through his fingertips until he reached his scar. The scar that had almost cost him his life (and had taken the life of his best friend.)  Kicking Saddam out of Kuwait wasn’t the total cakewalk CNN had made it out to be.

In 1992, he put down his rifle and picked up a camera.  If he was going to shoot people, he wanted a clean conscience.  He touched his scar again: He’d seen enough death for a lifetime.

He walked through the city, looking for beauty. Beauty that normal men would never see.  Abandoned buildings. Broken glass.  A man sleeping in a corner.  Most people would just see urban decay and keep walking. Quickly. But not him.  Oh no.  This was his talent. An amazing talent given to him the moment the mortar ripped through his unit. He could now see God’s beauty in anything.

The sun peeked over the city’s skyline, chasing the shadows into the darkest of alleys.  The photographer smiled.  He remembered when the young kid came out of one of those alleys and attacked him. Apparently he was trying to steal his camera gear.  But he never quite got that far.  Poor kid.  You don’t mess with Mother Nature and you sure don’t mess with a former member of the United States Special Forces. The kid’s nose was probably healed by now. Probably.

He lifted his camera.  Looked at the broken brick and glass. Saw what he was looking for and adjusted his lens.  He waited. Waited. And nailed the shot.

The burst of the rising sun through the clouds. The red and violet cumulonimbus. The green of the random tree.  The flowing gold of the sunrise. The decaying Beaux-Arts architectural style. The vivid colors of the American flag in the distance.

The average person would have seen a city in decline. He saw a stunning image worth capturing. He knew the secret to life was looking for the good in the bad. That in every terrible situation there is an image of hope.  Life is all about how you frame the shot.

He smiled, touched his scar a third time and went looking for his next picture.