I generally ignore most holidays, including my own birthday. But I have a special soft spot for Christmas and that particular feeling that is in the air as it approaches. It’s the one holiday where I do pay attention and try to celebrate what’s good in the world. But that doesn’t meant that there aren’t parts of it that I still dread.

At the top of my list of holiday loathing is the ever-present, annual Christmas photo cards. (Least this sound hypocritical after my last post, let me explain; the Family Christmas Photos I just did are a special community/charity event. That’s fine. It’s my OWN family’s photo card that I hate doing.) 

I have to wonder if other photographers have the same experience I do, which generally includes my mother remembering that she wants the photo taken, say, 5 minutes before I’m supposed to get in the car and drive 300 miles home after Thanksgiving. Yes, that would be after the gear is already packed. It also includes rounding up the rest of the family – all 3 of them, if you include the cat, and we usually do – followed by some complaints about their current attire, a short argument about what said attire should be modified to, stomping up the stairs to go change the attire (or in my case, digging yet another bag out of the trunk), and finally assembling the now-completely-pissed-off crowd in the living room and telling them to smile (while my brother holds the cat, who would rather claw his face off than be present for another of these sessions).

Yeah, right. At this point, I’ve got a snowball’s chance in hell of making a photo that doesn’t look like the people in it are about to go for each other’s throats.

It’s the old self-timer & dash method, everybody grits their teeth as the strobes go off, and after a couple of frames the subjects mutiny and leave. Repack the gear, repack the trunk, assure mom that the picture will come out fine, and hit the road.

I spent the next 300 miles trying not to thing about the festering image on my flash card. And how next year, I’d like to hog-tie everyone in Christmas lights, stuff a bow in their mouth, and really have a memorable photo.