My late Great Aunt Susie sent me the pictured card and newspaper clipping along with “a little spending dollars” on May 29th, 2002. At that point in life I had recently taken a leap of faith and moved to Atlanta to attend advertising and photography school at The Creative Circus. It was a sincere effort on my part to learn to be the best photographer I could be as I have always believed that it is a sin to waste a God-given talent you know you have.

Fast forward fourteen years to the year 2016: I was showing select images from my Southern Living series at Anne O Art Gallery here in Atlanta for Atlanta Celebrates Photography that October. The artist in residence there at the time was Billy Newman. To me, he was a true artist in every sense of the word when it came to photography, as at that point he was doing wonderfully unique and abstract shots of water in its solid form as ice and then presenting the finished images as large prints that he was printing himself. He also struck me as a true Christian in every sense of the word. He just had that Christ-like joyful light and charisma to him. Like me, he too had recently gotten married to his wife, Katie, and he just seemed to be in the perfect place in life doing exactly what he needed to be doing. At that point, I had no memory of the newspaper clipping my Great Aunt Susie had sent me, though.

Fast forward another few years to around 2019 or so. I was going through a lot of old boxes and came across the card and clipping. I recognized the face and name on the newspaper clipping she’d sent me this time. I immediately wanted to reach out to both Billy and Anne at Anne O Art with a picture of the clipping and card. The memory of me having taken some shots of Billy at work at the gallery one day stopped me from doing so right then though. I wanted to find and get one of the shots I remembered taking of him years prior processed to include with the email as I felt Billy may appreciate it. Due to being as scatter-brained as I am, and having pretty much wanted to keep to myself these past few years, I never did.

Fast forward again to this past Saturday: I learned that, sadly, Billy had passed on December 2nd from ALS after having had it for about a year. It totally caught me off guard and immediately brought my mind back to the card and clipping my Great Aunt had sent me close to twenty years ago now, and the photos I’d taken of Billy five years ago. I immediately was struck with a profound feeling of sadness and guilt that I’d missed the opportunity to possibly put a smile on his face and in his heart by sharing the same story and photos I’m sharing now with him. I set out to locate the card, clipping, and photos I’d captured of him yesterday and these are them.

After locating and reading the clipping again yesterday, what Billy says about him fulling his calling in life, not by reshaping himself, but by using his God-given talents in photography and writing. That hit me pretty hard and left me unable to get it out of my mind while at work last night putting out produce at Publix.

Here is where I’m going to circle back to my thought that I believe wasting a God-given talent you know you have is a sin: We all have innate talents within us. All of us. Some of us are lucky enough to have discovered them, and some aren’t. Billy and I were both lucky enough to have been the former rather than the latter. I’ve shown ability in photography ever since I was a little boy, and have had more and more people seem to appreciate my writing these past ten years or so, telling me I should be writing for magazines and writing books.

I wholeheartedly pursued a career in photography up until the year 2017 when I experienced a major sea change in thought. I had gotten married the previous year and both my parents had gotten very sick that year. Up until getting married and having to pretty much forget about my business to look at for my parents, photography was my whole life. So much of my self-identity and self-worth were wrapped up in photography. To the point, I realized it wasn’t healthy. I felt as if it was all I knew how to do. I didn’t want to feel as if I needed to put it in front of my marriage for photos that likely wouldn’t even matter to clients that had paid me to shoot them in a few years. Additionally, the frustration I felt towards the healthcare industry during that period left me feeling as if I needed to not just fuss and complain about it, but instead, do what I could to be a positive force within it for future patients of mine by becoming a nurse, just as the nurses involved in my parents care were to me that year.

So, I put photography on the back-burner for the most part to go back to school in my 40’s to become a nurse. Doing so has taken its toll on me emotionally as I’ve often asked myself if I’m doing the right thing in God’s eyes by not continuing to do something I felt He had put me here to do.

Such thoughts have weighed on me heavily these past few years. To the point that I often don’t even want to think about photography when I’m not occasionally shooting and processing jobs for clients as I do. When I do, I’m often reminded of how naturally photography comes to me, and am forced to emotionally deal with the decisions I’ve made to “reshape” my life by becoming a nurse.

Additionally, I have a ton of images I’ve shot over the years, some of which that I know ought to be great and worth sharing, that I’ve yet to process and share. The shot of Billy at work I’m sharing here would be one of them. I have a nagging sense of guilt and anxiety regarding all this work I’ve shot, yet haven’t bothered to process and share with others. Particular the work that includes people in it, like this shot of Billy, because I feel I owe it to them. I feel guilty that I’ve taken for granted that I’m able to create images easily enough that I don’t care to even bother with processing them when I know so many others out there, others that may not have my or Billy’s ability, would have loved to shot themselves and have to share as their own. Whereas with me, so much of it is just sitting on a hard drive and hasn’t seen the light of day since that split second I captured the image.

I realize that much of what I’m sharing is a bit of a downer to any of you that are reading this, and that’s intentional on my part. Because learning that Billy was stricken by such a horrific and sad condition like ALS, and just passed from it, was a real slap in the face to me. I have all this work I’ve shot that I feel a sense of responsibility to get out and shared with others, particularly the images with others in them, yet I’m just letting it sit there. I’ve been letting it sit there when I could suddenly have my ability to do so taken from me due to no fault of my own. Just as Billy had happen to him.

Needless to say, I’m feeling like a pretty selfish photographer right about now, and am feeling as if I need to be asking for forgiveness for letting a God-given talent I know I have go to waste in recent years. I feel as if I need to ask for forgiveness for having not gotten these photos processed and the story of my Great Aunt’s card to Billy when he was still here so he could have experienced whatever amount of joy they may have brought him.

Billy, please forgive me for not making the most of my God-given talents by not getting these images to you in a more timely manner. I sincerely hope that me sharing so much about how reading your words have given me a kick in the pants, and me making much of this tribute to you more about me than you, will also do the same for others that may need the same. Because life is too short to be complacent when none of us are guaranteed our health and the next day. I pray that God will be looking out for your family in the coming days and years ahead as they adapt to living life without your creative spirit and light in their lives.

Edit: I forgot to include a link to Billy’s website in all of the above. Do check it out as his work is beautiful. Viewing it feels like a glimpse into another world: www.billynewmanphotography.com