Since I shared my Knight Rider experience last week I thought I'd share something today that had an enormous impact on me and the way I thought about life.  

Warning: It's very long.  It's personal.  It's sad.  It's happy.

It all started with a cross country trip....

About 15 years ago my family family of four, my mom and my dad and my sister, Lori, all piled in a Dodge Caravan and drove cross country to ultimately see the Grand Canyon.  

We had the whole trip planned out from start to finish.  We were going to stop and take a tour of Graceland, the painted desert, the petrified forest, of course the Grand Canyon, Hoover Dam, Las Vegas, Zion National Park, Denver, Kansas City, St. Louis and then back home.  

It was a fantastic trip.  One I will never forget and hope to do again someday.  I remember that trip plain as day but the one thing that had the most impact on me and I was certainly NOT expecting was the the stop we made in Oklahoma City.

Backstory:

I don't know how many of you remember this but on April 19th, 1995 at exactly 9:02am a 7000 pound ammonium nitrate (standard garden variety fertilizer) / fuel oil bomb exploded in a rented Ryder truck parked at the north entrance of the Federal Building in downtown Oklahoma City. 

The blast was so strong that it demolished 1/3 of the building.  The axle from the Ryder truck was thrown about 1/4 of a mile away from the bomb site and landed on a parked car. 

168 people were killed and approximately 850 were injured.  It was the nation's worst single act of domestic terrorism up until that point.

Parents lost their children (there was a daycare near the Federal building back then that was impacted).  Children lost their parents.  Families were never the same.  It was a sad day in that city and the country as a whole.  

Soon after this horrible event people from all over came together to build a memorial to all of the people who lost their lives, lost loved ones or who were injured.  The current memorial and museum now sits on the former site of the Federal Building.  

Read more about the layout and all of the different ways they are memorializing the people affected.

Back to the trip...

It was my mom's suggestion to stop at the memorial.  I'm glad she made that suggestion.

I'll never forget the first thing we experienced when we entered the museum.  The volunteers lead you to a round room with benches along the walls.  You're asked to sit on those benches and wait.  Once they have enough people in there a volunteer tour guide comes in and tells the story of what all happened up until the bomb exploded. 

Then the lights went dim and a recording started to play over the speakers. 

The Oklahoma City council was having a normal meeting that morning starting at 9:00am.  You hear them calling roll and they get started with their first item.  Then at 9:02am all you hear is an extremely loud boom, people yelling, people screaming, then the recording stops.  

I was not prepared to hear that. 

I think everyone in the round room we were in was crying.  I'm tearing up now just typing this email.  

After we all gathered ourselves we started the tour of the actual museum.  On the walls were pictures of the devastation and different facts about the explosion itself.  In the middle of the room were different "artifacts" recovered from the rubble.  They were each in their own glass case with an explanation as to what they were.  

Then we worked our way outside to the reflection pool and the "Field of Empty Chairs" which represents the 168 people killed on that day.  Each chair bears the name of someone killed.  Nineteen smaller chairs stand for the children.

I don't think any of us said a word on the walk back to the van and probably for the next few miles.   

This visit taught me the power of collective remembrance and resilience. The memorial stands not just as a tribute but as a testament to the strength that emerges from tragedy. It reminded me of the importance of unity in the face of adversity.

Over the years I’ve tried my best to apply this to my life and work. Just as a community came together to rebuild and remember, I strive to build strong connections with you, my clients, treating you like family through out your entire photography journey.

In sharing this experience, my hope is that it encourages you, like it did for me, to appreciate the strength that arises from unity and shared remembrance. Life is full of unexpected lessons, and sometimes, they come from the most unexpected places. 

And if you get the chance I strongly encourage you to visit the memorial site.  It is so well worth your time.

Here is the link to the museum if you'd like to check it out.

Jonathan

Mess E Photos

P.S. For those of you who missed my very informative email from this past Friday, click here to catch up!

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