Photography changes our perception of family
Story by visitor contributor
Sam Costello
Sam Costello, from Lincoln, Nebraska, participated in an 8th grade Language Arts writing project that explored how photographs can illustrate a true experience or event and also reveal an unspoken reality behind the image.
I look back at the photo of my family and I. In the picture of our family, it looks as if our family is united and together. The reality is it’s not that often that we are all together. Either someone is at work, school, or whatever is happening. But it is times like these, when we are together, that we cherish as a family. When we get together it’s usually over a holiday, birthday, or some kind of celebration. It’s not often we get to have those times and on top of that one of my sisters is on her own and my other is on her way. When we have our family moments they are fun because my sister always brings her dogs and they go crazy with ours but it only happens every now and then.
In my mind I pretend our family gets together every Sunday to eat dinner. I pretend we go on fun vacations everywhere as a family. In my mind things are fun, no work, having fun doing family things. We would have picnics at lakes, go swimming, eat out for dinner at a fancy restaurant, or just spend a day out in the sun. We would go on hikes in the mountains, walk on the sandy beach, or gaze out off to the endless ocean. We could visit different countries or just stay at home and watch home videos. We would do all these things as a united family together all the time.
