I take street portraits sometimes. Not professionally, just something I do when I’m out and someone catches my eye—interesting faces, good energy, that kind of thing. I always ask first. Most people say yes, and we chat a little while I get the shot.
She was sitting near the back of this cozy pub, laughing with a couple of friends, wearing a black dress that looked like it was made for her. Her platinum hair and warm smile stood out in the low light, so I went over and asked if I could take her photo. She said, “Sure, but only if you make me look like a badass.” And then she gave me that pose.
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We got to talking afterward. I told her what I do and asked if she liked being photographed. She shrugged and said, “I used to hate pictures. I thought all people saw was the chair.”
I didn’t know how to respond to that. I just nodded and let her talk.
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She told me she was in an accident at 19. A driver fell asleep and veered into her lane. Her spine never healed right, and walking wasn’t on the table anymore. “For a long time, I thought that was the end of anything fun or flirty or bold,” she said. “Then I figured, screw it. I’m still me.”
I don’t know why, but her story struck me hard. Maybe it was the way she smiled through it, or the way she had made peace with something that could have easily destroyed anyone else. Or maybe it was the way she carried herself—proud, confident, unapologetic. The way she had turned something so painful into something that didn’t define her but made her stronger.
“Honestly, it’s like I’m living a different kind of life now,” she continued, sipping her drink casually as if what she was saying wasn’t as heavy as it felt. “But I’m still here. And that’s what matters, right?”
I didn’t know what to say. I just looked at her, admiring how she was putting the pieces of herself together in a way that was real. She wasn’t pretending to be okay, but she wasn’t letting her pain dictate who she could be either. I didn’t even know her name yet, and here she was, teaching me a lesson I didn’t even know I needed to learn.
“You seem like you’re in a good place now,” I finally said, trying to sound casual, though I was genuinely curious.
She laughed softly, her gaze drifting toward the window as if seeing a different version of herself in the reflection. “It’s a work in progress,” she admitted. “I have my good days, and I have my bad ones. But don’t we all?”
That hit me. We all have our struggles, our battles, our moments when we feel like we can’t move forward, like we’re stuck. And yet, there she was, living her life, taking each day as it came, not asking for sympathy but demanding respect. It was humbling.
Before I left, I took a few more shots of her. The way she held herself—every shot was a little more powerful, a little more filled with defiance. As I packed up my camera, I thanked her for letting me capture those moments.
“No problem,” she said, still smiling. “I like how you see me.”
I couldn’t help but laugh a little. “I’m not sure how much I see yet. I just met you.”
She gave me a knowing smile. “That’s the thing, though. Most people don’t really see people. They see the chair.”
I didn’t know exactly what she meant by that at the time. But I was about to find out.
A week later, I saw her again. I was walking to my car after a long day of shooting and editing when I spotted her sitting on a bench in the park, her platinum hair catching the late afternoon sunlight. She looked completely at ease, almost like she was waiting for something. Or someone.
This time, I wasn’t sure if I should approach her. After all, we’d only spoken briefly before. But as I hesitated, she looked up, saw me, and smiled.
“Hey, you,” she called out. “I didn’t think you’d come back.”
I smiled back and walked over. “I’m a man of my word,” I said, feeling a little awkward but also relieved. Something about her was just easy to talk to.
“I know you are,” she said, with a wink. “So, what brings you here?”
“I was thinking about that conversation we had last time,” I admitted. “About the chair. I’ve been thinking a lot about it, actually.”
She raised an eyebrow, intrigued. “Oh really? What’s been going through your head?”
“Honestly? I don’t know how to explain it. But I feel like people look at me the way they look at you. Like they don’t really see me, just the chair I’m sitting in. I don’t know… it’s hard to explain. Maybe it’s just me overthinking things.”
She chuckled, and for the first time, I noticed a hint of sadness in her eyes, though it was quickly masked by her usual confident smile.
“You know, when I said people see the chair, I meant that people tend to reduce others to their circumstances, their struggles, or their past. They don’t see the person who’s living through it all. They see the chair as something that limits them, something that makes them less.”
I nodded slowly. It was starting to make more sense now. She wasn’t just talking about physical limitations. She was talking about how people label others, how they project their judgments before even trying to understand the full picture. How they see what’s on the surface and assume that’s all there is to see.
“I get it,” I said quietly. “It’s not about the chair, is it? It’s about who you are despite it.”
Her eyes softened as she smiled. “Exactly. Everyone has a chair. It’s just a matter of whether you let it define you or not.”
I stood there for a moment, taking it all in. I’d been walking around thinking that my own life was somehow more complex, more difficult than others’, and that was why I couldn’t move forward. But in this brief exchange, she had shown me something I’d been blind to for years.
A few weeks passed, and life moved on. I continued with my photography, and as I worked, I began to think more about what she’d said. I looked at the people I was photographing differently—really looking at them, not just seeing the surface. I started asking questions that mattered. I started listening, not just talking. And what I found was incredible.
The more I paid attention, the more I realized that the people I encountered weren’t defined by their struggles, their history, or their circumstances. They were defined by what they chose to do with those things. They were defined by how they lived their lives in spite of everything life had thrown at them.
I thought about reaching out to her again, but I couldn’t bring myself to do it. She had taught me something, something I was still digesting. But as time went on, I began to notice a pattern in my own life. The more I saw people for who they truly were, the more connected I felt to the world around me. I had stopped seeing the chair, and instead, I had started seeing the person.
Then came the twist. One evening, I received an email from her. It was simple, just a few words, but it hit me like a ton of bricks.
“I heard you’re doing great work with your photos. Keep pushing forward, keep seeing people for who they are, not just what’s in front of them. And hey, don’t forget—there’s more to life than just the chair. Live it.”
And there it was—her message to me, but also, in a way, a message to herself.
She had been right all along. It wasn’t about the chair. It was about what you chose to do with what life gave you. She had shown me that, without even knowing it. Her story, her strength, her ability to move forward despite the odds—those were the things that mattered.
And it was in this small, almost unnoticed moment that I realized something even more profound. By choosing to see people for who they truly were, I had uncovered a new way of seeing myself, too. It wasn’t just the chair. It was everything I had been too afraid to see before.
Life doesn’t always go as planned. We all have our struggles, our chairs to sit in. But it’s up to us to decide how we’ll sit in them—and how we’ll live.
If you’ve learned something from this, share it with someone who might need to hear it today. Life is too short to only see what’s in front of us. Let’s start seeing the person behind the chair.
And don’t forget to like and share this post if you think it might make a difference in someone else’s life today.
