Yesterday, James and I ventured out in the yard to reinstall a honeysuckle support that had blown over during the rain and wind of the past few days.
On the way out there, I noticed James looking at some really pretty purple flower "weeds" in the back yard. They've been thriving, even with the drought before the first rain we've gotten in over a month, and I've spot-mown because our septic leach field does spur some grass to grow in spots... but I've left the weeds because they're cool-looking and because they don't produce stickers!
James and I both took pictures of the weeds, and it wasn't until later when I was looking at something on my computer that I realized how different the pictures were.
Here's the photo that James snapped:
And here's the one that I took:
Now... some of this can be explained by the fact that I have more of a photographer's eye than James does. But I also think this might say something about how we see the world, though I'm not sure exactly how it applies across the board.
For instance: James's picture makes the alien flowers themself kind of challenging to see, but what comes through is that they're an anomaly. The rest of the ground cover is dormant from the heat and dryness. Whereas my picture shows the loveliness and focuses your attention there, where I want you to look.
James and I were talking this morning about some pictures coming up in my Google Photos feed, and I mentioned that I can usually remember just by looking at a plate of food where it came from and what was going on at the time. James is someone who requires more information to hold on to memories. It's one reason he has so much stuff: That stuff pins his memories in place and he'd lose the memories without the prompts.
Very often when we're on a road trip (I always drive, a habit we got into when James was commuting a long way every day), James will take pictures of, say, wildflowers in the right-of-way or mountains in the distance without any framing whatsoever. He'll just point and shoot, capturing the door frame, the bird poop on the window, and hopefully the actual subject he was wanting to remember later. I'm much more curated. Unless it's so bright out that I can't really tell what I'm doing, I frame up shots. I move over a bit to make sure there's some greenery in the corner so the subject looks more lush. I'll move back and zoom in to fill up the background.
Neither of those ways is better. They're just different. Just like James and me. And I think we make a great team!