As a child growing up in the Middle East, I had the gift of the Mediterranean. Summers stretched endlessly by the sea, with the soft murmur of waves and salt-laced winds painting my earliest memories. We would spend entire days and nights at the beach, diving under the warm, glistening surface of the water in search of treasures buried in the sand. Sometimes we’d find trinkets—jewelry, coins, or just a shell so perfect and shining it felt magical. We brought those home, and they lived on our windowsills or in little treasure boxes, holding the sun and salt and joy of those long days.
That same feeling of discovery returns to me now, years later, in a completely different way. Today I found myself diving into my archive—half a million photographs, stories in pixels—and just like back then, I stumbled upon something I had completely forgotten: this image taken in India. It was buried deep, overlooked in the first rush of edits, but today it surfaced like a glimmering shell in the sunlight.
The young girl in the image, with her playful defiance and quick spark of mystery, covered her face for just a moment—but that moment lives on. And when I saw it again today, I was transported right back to that dusty road, the laughter echoing, the smell of incense in the air. This is the gift of photography—it holds memory like water in a jar. It reminds you of the things you lived, and sometimes, the things you nearly forgot you lived.
If I didn’t have this medium, this tool, I truly don’t know how I would be. Photography is the place I go to every day. It’s a way of seeing, of breathing, of remembering and being awake. It’s my lifelong treasure dive—and I’m endlessly grateful that it keeps delivering hidden gems.
3 responses to “Diving for Hidden Gems”
No matter what happens, those two young women will always be. As they were when their bodies and eyes stopped a few electrons… They have become eternal… Thanks to you.
The magic of photography 🙏🏻
Ha! I answered that on the previous comment.