Why are we here?

Ok, I know - it's a big question, but I'm catching up on a few things here.

I've been a wedding photographer for over 20 years. I shot my first wedding in 2003 and then built up my business from there. I was 23 when I started and this year I turned 50.

A couple of years ago I bumped into an old friend - someone who I used to work for in hospitality nearly 30 years ago. It turned out that he was in charge of a group of wedding venues, so I thought I'd re-connect with him to see if he could put me in from=nt of his clients as they were booking their venue, kind of like an inside track to being a recommended supplier. After covid I needed all the help I could get.

Sounds like a good idea, and somehow we got talking about the possibility of me running one of the venues as the manager. Honestly, I hadn't thought about it, but the talks became more productive and one of the venues was close to where I live, so it started looking like an opportunity. It was going to take a while, as there were already managers in place, although the thinking was that they were young and not likely to hang around for much longer, and my selling point was my wealth of experience and a touch of maturity to add to the mix.

And feeling fragile after scraping through zero weddings through covid lockdowns, the offer of an OK paycheck seemed like the opportunity it was being dressed up to be. I had to take it seriously, and to do this I had to stop taking bookings for my wedding photography, and in some ways, I started to give up on what being a wedding photographer meant to me. I privately started shutting down the business that I had built and really loved, changing my own narrative and convincing myself (badly) that it was all behind me now, and it was time to move on.

So the managers left and I was fast tracked in to the Manager position at the venue. Lord of the Manor, if you will. This all happened last Summer (2023).

I still had a few weddings in the diary, so I knew it was going to be a juggle, but I had a good support team, and program in place to get to work establishing where I could be most effective in my new role. There were weddings already booked in and happening at the venue, and I had an amazing team of managers and staff to enable a smooth transition. I became professionally very close to these people, and they really showed me what direction we were heading in.

"Stand back. Observe. Digest". That's what I was being told. "It will take time", and "Don't try to run before you can walk". Ok. Maybe a little cheesy, and it might have been a little frustrating, especially as I had to break off a couple of times to honour a couple of photography booking I had, but I was there at the venue all of the time that I wasn't shooting another wedding. In fact, I was there 6 or 7 days a week, showing up, observing, digesting. 12 hour days. 14 hours. I'm used to long days as a photographer, but it was quite different to be required like this. part of the onboarding everyone's been telling me about, I thought.

And then it happened. 'The Kick'.

My once boss/friend, now new boss, took me into the car park to deliver an awkward dressing down, followed by an email which was referred to as my 'Kick'. It detailed how I was ineffective as a leader, how I was losing control of the team. How the team had no respect for me as a manager. How I wasn't present, or visible at the weddings that were booked. I had to have an eye operation, which unfortunately meant that I had to miss a day or two, and was told that this wasn't something that the company cared about. I was told that this is a 'big boy's job', and so on and so on.

My salary had been leaked by the previous manager who I had replaced, and I was told that I'd have to work extra hard to show my worth. I don't think the powers that be were too impressed by this either, but the damage had been done.

It was a bit of a shock at the time, though I now know that it was the paper trail beginning part of a due process, as they fired me just a few weeks later. My 'friend' didn't do the dirty deed in person.

A day before they 'let me go' I had a panic attack. The email had sent me on a spiral, and I was working my ass off, spending as much time as a person could devote to their job. I had conversations with managers who would say things like "It's just what they're like, and I'm just sorry it's happened to you so soon" and so on. I felt betrayed by a person I trusted, who by now seemed to be focussed on making an example of me to the rest of the group. So that day I called my wife. We were already trying to mitigate the amount of time I was suddenly away from home and family life, and we had talked through the fact that this magical opportunity might not be worth the money after all. I was earning more as a photographer when things were going well, gicve or take a bit of Covid, and a couple of hard years. She said something along the lines of "That's enough. You're not where you belong - come home"

A day later, the decision had been made for me. What a car crash.

"You're not where you belong. Come home"

Almost immediately I felt better. I mean, I felt angry at the utter betrayal, and I felt that I hadn't been treated fairly, and I certainly felt poorer, but most of all I felt like I had dodged a bullet.

The thing that really hurt though was the fact that I had let someone talk me in to giving up on who I was and who I am. I was led by temptation and promises of power over my own future. It would be run how I wanted it to be run, and I would be the master of my own time, and destiny. It turns out that this is just how corporate people speak and believing it all hook, line, and sinker is on me. I won't be so naive again.

Coming back to where I belong, and where my heart is, and where I should have stayed, is coming home.

I am a wedding photographer. I run that business.

And it's not because it's a job, or because of the money, or because of some corporate supply.

It's because it is home. It's because it's not just a job. It's a lifestyle. It's a philosophical connection to the event. Two people getting married is the story. It's the day, it's the building of memories, it's the definition of who we are and who we want to be, in a moment. It's time passing, and it losing people, loved ones, and looking back as we move forward. It's about our children, it's about who our friends are, and it's about how love is vital and indescribable. It's about photography, and everything that that can mean when it's good, and when it's real and authentic. This is what I mean when I say it's a privilege to photograph your wedding. What seems frivolous turns out to be what it means to be alive, standing next to the person you've chosen to experience it all with, hopeful, and optimistic.

That's what I do.

That's home.