I’ve been looking though the photographs I took of Mike when he was at his group home. I used to visit fairly often with my parents in the 1990s. We would often take walks through the nearby park. I always had my camera with me. Mike is my older brother. For many years I took photographs of him, trying to figure him out. Mike is very low functioning, nonverbal and autistic.

If you saw Mike, the first thing you might notice would be his eyes. Today, in his geriatric group home, one of them has a thick, bluish film. When he was younger and his eyes were clear, one eye gazed in a different direction from the other.

Once in a while I would capture a moment when Mike was looking right at me. Those were rare moments. I was lucky to have captured some of them in the 1/60 of a second it took for the shutter to click.

Here is one of those moments:

Mike and Dad
Photo

Here is my rendition of that walk that we took on leap year day, 1992:

Mike and Dad
9″x12″ 60# Ivory Drawing Paper

Dad is in the background. He wanted, more than anything, to communicate with Mike.