Slices of Life

By: Jill Pertler

When my kids were babies, I took lots of photos – always hoping to get the one perfect shot. This was during the prehistoric, pre-digital age, when cameras required film and film required developing. You couldn’t take a million pictures and preview them on your screen. You had to send them away and pay to have them printed. One by one by one.

Back then, I couldn’t tell a megapixel from a winning lottery ticket, but I knew I’d be able to recognize the perfect shot when I saw it. Trouble was, after hundreds of developed photos, I still hadn’t seen it.

I burned through scores of...