Upside-down

 

Minutes before the above photo was captured on the beach in St. John, I was trying to coax my kids into sitting nicely on a piece of driftwood so that our photographer could capture the perfect picture of them together. I felt the need to stand behind our photographer and try to choreograph the kids’ positions. When they did not respond to my gentle coaxing, I bribed them with the promise of lollipops after the photo shoot. They still did not listen. It was towards the end of our session, and I knew we had already gotten some great photos, so I pretty much threw my hands up. Larry and I told our photographer we were all set, turned our backs and began to pack up our stuff. The kids went back to playing with each other on the wide, open beach. I remember having that anxious feeling of needing to hurry the packing before one of them started pushing the other down in the waves.

However, when we turned around, our kids were nicely laying in the sand with our photographer taking this awesome upside-down photo. No coaxing or bribing, no talk of lollipops, just fun and ease.

I laughed to myself. Of course. Of course they would be fine once I turned my back. Of course they would listen to someone else without me needing to try and micromanage a photo shoot. Of course a great photo would be captured when I declared the photo shoot to be “over.” Of course. Because life is like that. We try so hard sometimes. As mothers, as parents, as grownups. We coax, we bribe, we push, we force. And then sometimes we just throw our hands up, walk away, maybe even drop a few balls, and stuff just falls into place.