Journal Entries

My friend Darrell gave me a book titled “The Color of Jazz: Album Cover Photographs by Pete Turner.� Turner is a professional photographer whose photos were used on album covers for jazz musicians during the 1950s and 1960s and 1970s. It’s one of those big coffee table books, but since I don’t know anyone who has a coffee table, I have to look at it on my lap.

One of my favorite photos in the book was used as the cover for Gabor Szabo’s 1973 album “Rambler.� It’s a picture of the lobby and elevator shafts inside the Houston Hyatt Regency Hotel. Once you know the source of the photo it’s easy to pick out the elevators and hotel room doors and balcony walkways, but at first glance it looks wild and abstract. Many of Turner’s photos in the book are like that – simple things that look alive and full of energy under his treatment.

I showed the picture to Cyndi and told her my memories of staying in that very same hotel back in the early 1990s. I admitted I never noticed Turner’s artful view when I stayed there. I do remember riding the elevator up to the top floor and looking over the balcony railing at the stunning 30-story atrium and the people sitting at tables in the Park Bar all the way down in the lobby. I did it, not for the view, so much as, to see if I was brave enough to look over the edge, not being very comfortable in high places and all. I remember the electric buzz I felt in my hamstrings and butt as I leaned over the railing; it wasn’t comfortable, and I didn’t stay long.

As I looked at the photo in the book, I wondered: what is it about artists? Why does one man see abstraction and color and beauty, while another man sees height and space and the door to his own room? How did Pete Turner see what I didn’t see?

Part of the answer is that God gave Mr. Turner different eyes than He gave me. He made Pete Turner an artist, with an artist’s heart and an artist’s vision. For some reason God didn’t distribute His artist gifts among very many people.

Another reason Pete Turner saw what I didn’t see was because of his commitment to his craft. Most of us, had we been fortunate to see the same artful scene Turner saw, might’ve snapped a photo or two, and walked away. This particular photo was back in the days of film photography when we were stingy about taking pictures since we had to pay for film and pay for developing. Most of us wouldn’t spend the money for multiple shots of the same image.

But a professional like Turner might shoot ten rolls of film at the same scene, changing lenses and focus and filters, changing shutter speeds and aperture openings, before developing hundreds of images, looking for the one perfect photo. To be successful requires not only an artist’s heart and eyes, but the discipline and patience to stay with a single project until it finally succeeds.

And I guess another reason for Mr. Turner’s difference would be his lifelong experience of shooting beautiful photos. Seeing beauty is a learned and practiced skill, and the more you’ve seen it, the more you’ll see it.

The reason I’m writing about this is because Darrell gave the book to me last Thursday morning at our men’s book study class, where we have just started our reading of Philip Yancey’s new book on prayer. Normally I wouldn’t make a connection between a jazz album cover from 1973 and my own prayer life, but because the book reminds me of our class, I can’t separate the two.

Prayer is such a hard part of Christian life – not hard to do – hard to understand, hard to believe in, hard to defend. I think prayer comes easier to some people than to others in the same way art comes easier. Maybe some people have a praying heart and praying eyes that make it a natural part of their life. I know God wants all of us to pray often, but some seem born to it.

There is also a discipline to prayer … a commitment. People who are strong in prayer have learned the discipline and patience to stay with it and keep praying even when they can’t see results. Faith is a learned and practiced skill; the more times you see God at work through prayer, the more you’ll notice in the future. God helps people who pray see the effects of prayer in ways others can’t.