This post serves as my notes to the photography blog post at Bryan Farley Photography for the Craig Pitti Memorial held at San Marin High School on Sunday, November 5, 2017.
On the other post, I wrote about "A Season to Remember" and holding onto the next season. I may have used those phrases, because the memorial was held the day before the basketball season started and I found a link to a previous story titled "A Season to Remember." There might be an alternative explanation. The day before I published my pictures and words, I bought a new book "The Art of Misdiagnosis." On the first page of the prologue, the author mentions the "Seasons of Grieving." I don't know if I read the prologue in the bookstore or if this is just one of those coincidences. (The book's subtitle is "surviving my mother's suicide," so I guess it's not completely coincidental that the book mentions grief. )
Shock is part of the first season of grieving. I used the word shocked originally to describe the 2011 community's reaction to the championship season, but I changed the word to "stunned." Shocked might have been more accurate, but that word tends to shock people.
Many people wore Pitti Army t-shirts to the memorial. The phrase "Built to Last" was written on the shirts and bracelets. I wish I had asked if Pitti used Jim Collins and Jerry Porras' books in the classroom and/or in the gym. Collins teaches business and leadership to adults, but I think his lessons apply to high school students and teams.
Educators and business people often mistrust each other, and with good reason. I don't usually think that business leaders understand K-12 education, but Collins might have a chance. Of course, the slogan on the shirt might have been about something completely different, but this is still worth reading.
I haven't decided if the gym looked different six and half years later. (The front door to the gymnasium looked "built to last" with some of the same chipped pain marks. Some of the people looked older. The emotions were different.
In a Summer 2016 Adviser Update article, I wrote about the 2011 season. I mentioned how I captured moments and that I thought it was important for student journalists to be able to save the important memories for a future date. I had imagined that a yearbook program might want to prepare a yearbook for the 10 year reunion (or some future collection.) I was still imagining how high school students could manage an archive. Now that digital photography exists, there are new options. Students could retain their copyright and still grant the yearbook program some rights.
I didn't imagine that the yearbook would want to store photos for a memorial service when their 40 year old coach died.
Even though I had seen Coach Pitti since I left San Marin, I had not seen many of the other staff people. I photographed a rainy football game in Napa, but most people didn't make the trip.
I felt mixed emotions seeing old friends. At first I was excited to see familiar faces who had usually been happy in my pictures and then I remembered that we were at a memorial service. I was grateful to reconnect, but I wanted someone to tell me that we were really there for me to take more happy pictures. I guess I was stunned.
I had a chance to talk to the father of the twins. He was the assistant coach in 2010-2011 and his daughters appeared in many of the images that year. This year he has taken over the coaching job. His two twin daughters are my daughter's age.
At the end of the memorial, Craig Pitti's father spoke. He urged everyone to learn CPR and first aid. Saving a life is the most important thing that we can do. His comment reminded me of a meeting at San Marin when an educator opposed some potential legislation. The legislation was intended to save lives, but the educator did not want to do it. While I actually would have voted with the other educator, I cringed when the person said, "we have more important things to do than that." I still remember thinking, "What do we have to do that is more important than saving a student's life?"
