Just before Christmas, I got a call that I didn’t realize I badly needed. My longtime friend, Diallo, stepped into a new position as Chief Operating Officer at Life Remodeled, a nonprofit that is revitalizing neighborhoods in Detroit and needed some headshots.

I’m sad to admit I hadn’t seen the guy in years – because he is the real deal. He was born and raised in Detroit, where the goal for most ambitious young people was to get out. But even after he got his degree and followed his career down to Houston, something made him come back. As we were shooting, I asked him what drew him back. He said it was a convicting moment on northbound I-75 when he watched the landscape change from relative prosperity to the desperate poverty of South Detroit.

That haunting has never gone away for him. And it fuels his passion to be the one running into the flames when most sane people are running away – letting go of certainty and comfort to help those still trapped.

I met him over ten years ago when he was working with a church planting network; but we lost touch a bit when he started taking his own advice and planted one of his own in the city.

It began as a community built around something everyone can agree upon: Table Tennis. The man brought people together, built relationships and moved them toward mutual and community flourishing by hosting Ping Pong tournaments.

Funny thing is, the enthusiasts who gathered joked that Diallo had no game whatsoever. That got straightened out with some lessons and coaching, but it made my job as a photographer a little tougher. The “weight on the back foot” habit that he learned from his coach is the exact opposite of what I ask for as I make a three-dimensional figure look its best on my two-dimensional camera sensor.

He’s now leading a team that has taken an underutilized building in the Detroit Public School system and made it into a hub of non-profit enterprise that provides job training, youth programs and community resources that reaches thousands and does it in a financially sustainable way.

It was just so life-giving to see my friend again – and we agreed we’d never let it go that long again. There’s a double date foodie adventure in Detroit on our horizon!