Are You Living The Memory or Capturing It?

I'm on vacation this week at a destination wedding in the Caribbean. (Hard life, I know.) Yesterday, we went to the wedding and I was taking photos to scrapbook. Well, I was suddenly conscious of how much my photography has changed. I was annoyed with background clutter. I wanted close ups of faces. But, I was trying to be very respectful of the professional photographers and the ceremony and stay out of the way. It was extremely frustrating! During the ceremony, I found myself more focused on the angle of the sun and why the bridesmaid was always in the way of my photo, than the ceremony itself.

I was so pleased to have captured this photo:

of the bride and groom and the wedding guests throwing "wish" stones into the ocean. Of couse, it means that I didn't throw my stone in with everyone else. Rather, I snapped the photo and then threw it. This led me to wonder...

Am I living my memories or simply capturing them?

I've never felt this weird about it before. I didn't take many photographs after that. I was too upset by the possibility that I had become so obsessed with scrapbooking events, I had lost the concept of living them! Twenty-four hours later, I'm significantly calmer. But, sitting in my hotel room and looking at the all things I should be photographing in order to scrapbook them (the view, bits and pieces of this room, etc.) I find myself, once again, questioning what I'm doing.

Have I gotten to the point where I can't do something without memoralizing it?

I guess it's kind of related to another question I keep asking myself: Does every page have to be publishable? Or internet okay?

I do sometimes find myself censoring journaling because I don't want certain things to be up for "public consumption" on the internet or in a magazine. I get rid of photos because they're not "perfect." I stay away from some of my more messy and crazy natural instincts in design because they're less publishable. I have made some art journals and smaller scrapbooks that are just for me, but that kind of stuff is rare for me these days.

Don't get me wrong. I love and adore scrapbooking and I don't plan to stop any time soon! I'm simply knawing on some big questions that are floating around my brain.

I'd love to hear your opinion.