“Little clutching hands, so dear,
Grasping everything that’s near,
Reaching for each thing in sight,
Baby hands, so soft and white!…
How you pull at our heart strings
As you dance and as you sing;
Baby, dear, to us you bring
Comfort and eternal Spring.”
-Gertrude Tooley Buckingham, “Baby Hands”
The one constant of the universe, as they say, is change; nothing lasts forever, and as the wheel of time turns, our lives become peppered with farewells—winter gardens full of softly shrouded memories. This, of course, is the real reason that just seeing infants creates such profound joy in us; it is not merely that they are adorable, that they are innocent, that they are open and cheerful by nature. It is that babies create springtime in the heart; they remind us that for everything that ends, something else begins, that the universe is still full of possibilities unfolding all around us.
Recently, during a heartwarming christening in Limassol, I had the profound joy of following up on someone else’s story of beginning: I had photographed G back in December (here in Limassol), when she was 9 months pregnant, as part of a serene and touching pregnancy photo shoot. Luckily for me, G invited me back to photograph her new daughter, Maria Melina, a beautiful little princess who is just few months old, at her christening.
G decided to host this heart-melting christening in Limassol’s ancient church of Agios Minas, its great stone walls contrasting the delicate pink, blossom-filled decorations within. After a ceremony that was overflowing with emotion, the party headed over to an equally lovely (and well-decorated!) reception at the Terra e Marre restaurant (also in Limassol).
En route, I managed to steal a moment with the young family, and we set up a lovely little family photo shoot at the nearby Germasoia Dam. The lighting was perfect, as you can see from the photographs, lighting up G’s hair like a halo and bringing out the rosy glow of little Maria Melina’s cheeks. Nature herself seemed to join in this moving christening, adding a sunset glow to the sky around us that perfectly mirrored the happy light in our hearts and the golden optimism in our minds—the best possible way to end such a wonderful day.
