I received the most beautiful letter today in my post office box (P.O. Box 205, Cambridge, N.Y., 12816), it was from Paula Foreman, writing me from St. Paul, Minn. Paula bought a camera recently. She wrote me to tell me how I factored into her decision about which camera to buy, and how photography has changed her life, in much the same way it changed mine.

Paula spent some time with a salesperson explaining the difference between a Nikon and a Panasonic, he said the Nikon offered telephoto power, the Panasonic was good if she wanted to go for the light. “We chose the light,” she wrote. Paula said she has never thought of herself as a visually creative person; her running line is that she can successfully pair a white T-shirt with blue jeans, and that’s about it.

Her message is about creativity, the way so many of us think of creativity as beyond being us until we try it and realize that it has always been a part of us, waiting to come out. Paula’s letter is really about the power of the creative spark. The camera, she says, has changed her notions of herself, “I’ve never loved an inanimate object like this. I’m stunned by what I see through the lens, by what I don’t see, and by how I see. (Paula I hope you will consider joining the Open Group At Bedlam Farm). I didn’t know before how my eye is drawn to line and structure, giving me one more reason to love winter. My photos of our border collie capture both his image and his essence, and when I look at him now, I am aware of his essence.”

Amen.

Paula says her husband told her she would now be able to take good photos, but, she says, “I don’t want to take pictures. I want to make images and doing so brings me joy. Your writing about light named some thing that’s true for me, visually and emotionally, but that I didn’t have words for. A good reason to take care with words; you never know how far they’ll reach.”

What a touching  letter Paula has written me, what a jewel to find in my post office box. This is how I feel about photography, it is not about settings or exposures or photos for me, it is about capturing the images of the world, and capturing the color and light of the world in a way that helps me – and others – see the world anew, in a fresh and very powerful way. I had not really seen it before. I am a warrior for light now; I seek it out and it finds me wherever I go. Thanks Paula, for reminding me why I love photography so much, and for telling me that I shaped your love of it in some small way.

You are a light unto the world, another creative person who came out and freed your inner spirit. Wonderful to get a letter like that.

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(You can write me or Maria c/o Bedlam Farm, Post Office Box 205, Cambridge, N.Y., 12816.