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Did You Catch My Cameo in the Documentary, The Way I See It?

This Just In: I’m Famous

Justin Cox
3 min readOct 17, 2020
Photo Credit: President Barack Obama talks on the phone with Cuba President Raúl Castro in the Oval Office, Sept. 18, 2015. (Official White House Photo by Pete Souza on Flickr) The use of this photo in no way reflects approval or endorsement of Pete Souza, President Obama, the First Family, or the White House.

When I got a text saying, “Did you know you’re famous?,” I figured sarcasm was in order. I responded with, “What did I do now?” The reply was not what I expected at all.

“You named Pete Souza’s book.”

Come again?

Pete Souza is a photojournalist who served as the official White House photographer for Presidents Ronald Reagan and Barak Obama. When Obama left office, Souza became an expert at trolling the current administration on Instagram with timely photos from the Obama White House. Over the weekend, MSNBC aired a documentary on Souza’s work, titled The Way I See It.

Toward the beginning of the documentary, there’s an exchange with Souza and his wife, Patti Lease. The two are talking about Souza’s first Instagram post. President Obama is sitting on the desk in the Oval Office with large red drapes in the background. Those drapes were promptly replaced with gold ones when Trump took office. The caption Souza posted read, “I like these drapes better than the new ones. Don’t you think?”

The documentary cuts to a talk Souza is giving to in an auditorium. The Instagram post is displayed on the screen. Addressing the crowd, Souza says, “There was even a comment on that very first post from somebody that said, ‘Pete is dropping shade with a comment on drapes.’”

That somebody was me! Out of the 1,200 comments on the Instagram post, my nine words left an impression on Pete Souza. The screen scrolls through a few comments and displays mine for the audience. The MSNBC producers even added the blue “verified” checkmark next to my name, which I think is hilarious. But then things get even wilder.

Television capture by John Shughart.

Continuing with the crowd, Souza says, “And I have to admit, I had no idea what ‘dropping…

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Justin Cox
Justin Cox

Written by Justin Cox

I help writers and nonprofits grow. Editor of The Writing Cooperative. Contact at JustinCox.com

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