“Teresa”

"Don't we all look back in longing”, wrote Carolyn Hart, “those of us who had happy childhoods? “Because the greatest loss we ever know is not the loss of family or place or money, it is the loss of innocence.” I found Teresa at a sensitive time in her life. She was no longer a child but not yet a young woman. She was a young girl about to pass from the safety of unaffected innocence into the uncertainty of expectant awareness. I remember that long ago evening, watching Teresa moving about the room, so casual, so spontaneous and graceful, while I, knowing all along that change, the sole Universal Absolute, would soon arouse unfamiliar sensations within her and without. I raised my camera firing just once. It has been decades since I last saw Teresa and now her image, captured in that single unguarded moment, remains Timeless to me.

Dennis James Laux, 2012

"Jennifer Irene"

"The boundaries which divide Life from Death are at best shadowy and vague. Who shall say where the one ends, and where the other begins?"
Poe, 1844

We are all vainly aware, perhaps vaguely but undeniably so, that Death is looking for us, searching with an unrelenting dutiful purpose and just how close He is to finding us, no man can know. Such was my belief on that bleak moonless evening with its chilly intermittent rain, although hardly remarkable and seasonably typical for any New England early spring evening. It was April 27.
After years of struggle freelancing my photography, I was offered and readily accepted, a position as assistant art director with a small but growing Providence based advertising agency. As I have stated, it was April 27. At precisely 9:21pm my editor called down to the studio informing me, I had received a telephone call on the outside line. “This is Dennis Laux”, I said picking up the phone. “Hello Mr. Laux, this is Dr. Howard Waterman from Rhode Island Hospital, I wanted to let you know that we did everything we possibly could to….. “ Doctor”, I interrupted, “I’m afraid I don’t know what you’re talking about”. (moment)…. (moment)….(moment)….”You don’t know what happened”, he said. This was a statement not a question. (moment)….(moment)….(moment)…. “No”, I said. (moment)….(moment)…. “Mr. Laux, I am sorry to tell you this but there was an accident earlier this evening, your daughter sustained severe head and chest injuries. She died fifteen minutes ago.

“SHE DIED FIFTEEN MINUTES AGO.”

It is hard to explain how a simple English sentence composed of simple English words could so shake and change a man and I can only state that in that very moment the changes were immediate, profound and permanent. Death found her on an unremarkable early spring New England evening. It was April 27. My daughter was twelve. Today is her birthday.

Dennis James Laux, 2013