An Accident of Hope

4.07.2006

Photo Friday: Pieces and Parts

The assignment: photograph your favorite body part and post it, along with a love letter to it. Love your body.

This was the most difficult assignment so far. I spent the week pesting Kristin to tell me what her favorite body part of mine is. Because I don't really like ANY part of me. I was looking for ideas. She refused to help me with this assignment, said I needed to do it for myself.

So, I thought hard about the parts of my body that aren't disappointment and pain. I thought about what I enjoy doing with my body. I thought about what my body gives me. My flat-out favorite body part is my hand. But we've already done pictures of hands. So I kept thinking. And after many days of thinking and pushing down the body-hatred that kept rising, I ran a bath, dropped some bath salts in it, and bathed with my camera for company. I wanted a picture of my skin.

It took me a while and a lot of laughs before I got a shot that I loved. But I do, strangely, love this shot. Am I skinny in it? No. But I'm not nearly as fat as I think I am, so that's gotta be a good thing, I hope.

You can read my love letter to my skin if you click on the picture.

After the bath I decided to take pictures of the other two parts of my body that I don't completely hate and include them, too...





(click on the images if you want to see their accompanying letters...)