What do you see?
My Medium friend Rodrigo S-C wrote, “A photograph will ask a question.”
I’ve strolled through my 74 years with unanswered questions about many of the 39 million moments of my life. For example, at age nine, did Becky and I hold hands as we walked alone in her backyard in Cedar Rapids, Iowa?
Photos pause moments, allowing the questions to catch up and linger.
When they do, the past comes alive.
But not just for the photographer. Rodrigo also suggests that images can start a conversation.
My partner Rebecca and I spent January in San Miguel, Mexico. It was our first visit. Every moment was precious.
Here are five frozen in time, with questions and stories that awaken memories.
Perhaps, for you as well.
The Aldama two-step: Do these sidewalks help nurture the habit of gentleness?
On our first morning, we walked up Aldama Street from our apartment to San Miguel’s city center, guided by the steeple of the Parroquia de San Miguel Arcàngel Catholic Church, as you can see in the first photo.
After walking these narrow, cobbled sidewalks for about a week, we developed the habit of attention, which required our heads to swivel — up to see who was coming and down to watch that we were not too close to the sidewalk edge.
When you behold, you make room. Since you must share a narrow space, gentleness becomes the norm. Another Medium friend,
, writes about the norm of Mexican kindliness.
Look at the subtle two-step with Rebecca in the cap and her partner making room for the other in that tight space, with a slight tilt of their shoulders.
It was a half-mile up Aldama from our residence to the city center, and we performed that two-step hundreds of times, going up and coming down. It became a habit to accommodate and to be accommodated.
Returning to our apartment late the first Friday afternoon, we followed a Mariachi Band walking single-file down Aldama. The band was at the end of a procession of well-dressed people of all ages who turned into Párque Juarez.
The Wedding Celebration at Parque Juárez: Are you tired yet?
Once inside the park, we accompanied the parade as it stopped four times in its 45-minute public festival. At each pause, the participants formed a circle around the married couple who danced to the accompaniment of the Mariachi Band and the Mojiganga figures.
I’ve never seen anything quite like a Mexican wedding celebration. This article includes an excellent description with a video clip from Párque Juarez.
I took the photo just before the celebration ended. We had watched the couple you see in the middle joyfully twirl around four times, always encouraging others to join them. I tried to understand the couple’s chemistry, how well they fit together, and what the future might bring.
I got lucky.
The answer is in the image.
Jardin Watching: What do you think about tourists and ex-pats?
The Jardin, a central city park across from Arcángel Church, was one of our daily walking destinations. San Miguel, a central Mexican city of 70,000, has 10,000 expats, primarily from Canada and America, and over a million tourists each year. Most mornings, I observed this lady with the cane watching this favored photograph location in front of the church.
I wanted to ask her what she thought of all these visitors.
In 2018, Rebecca and I traveled to Morocco with college students. Our guide, Mohammed Oujrid, repeated every morning of the eight-day visit,
Be a traveler and not a tourist. Travelers get to know local people.
When I see her next January, I will join her on the bench, at a respectful distance, and ask:
Qué piensas del tourista?
A visit to an Otomi village: Dona Maria, what advice do you have for living a full life?
Dona Maria lives in an Otomi village, Augustin Gonzales, 20 minutes outside San Miguel. She is a mother, grandmother, and potter. The 93-year-old showed us a “first-draft” pot and the finished creation on the left in the photo.
The lady extending her arm, part of our Rancho Tour group, knew a bit of the Otomi language, so she was helping our guide, Patrick, in the ball cap with the translation. Patrick moved to San Miguel from Alaska twenty years ago.
On the way back to San Miguel, Patrick told us that if his wife died, he would want to live out his life in this village. He said:
They would take care of me, and I would take care of them.
Dona Maria, a lifelong resident of the town, exuded serenity.
I wondered, what does she know that we don’t?
Serendipity: What do you see, Buzz Lightyear?
I again got lucky. I wanted an image of Arcàngel Church from its front and how it dwarfs the Jardin and San Miguel’s plaza. Instead, I got a look-alike for my favorite Toy Story character.
When friends asked us what we would do in San Miguel for 31 days, we didn’t know what to say. We’d read Julie Meade’s excellent guidebook but mostly planned to explore.
A few years ago we spent four days in Paris. My favorite story from that visit was that we never, not once, even saw the Eiffel Tower. We had nothing against Paris’ number-one tourist attraction but filled our days wandering its neighborhoods and museums.
The San Miguel moments, photos, stories, and questions I’ve shared with you were unpredictable before we lived them.
Each is serendipitous.
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