My Memaw did not like to have her picture taken. In fact, she was notorious for her ability to
dash out of the shot at the last minute or for covering her face, so that all
that was recognizable was her famous flaming-red hair. It actually became a game in my family to try
to catch her on film. People would sneak
up on her. They would try to catch her
from multiple angles at the same time.
They would go all private investigator, hiding and taking pictures while
she was distracted. But somehow she
still knew she was being filmed, and the pictures would end up blurry and
unrecognizable or with a hand over her face (she could move that hand like
greased lightning).
Later in her life, when she wasn’t as spry, she gave up
trying to avoid the pictures and just started making you regret trying to take
it. We have hundreds of photos with my
grandmother sticking out her tongue or flicking off the camera. But the best photos are the ones taken right
after she did something like that, because they capture her beautiful smile, as
she laughed at herself. Sometimes, she
was laughing so hard that she was crying, and she was just as beautiful in
those as well.
