6202020

Four months into living with my parents after the world shut down in 2020, it was time to go. I remember walking around the neighborhood with my mom, one of the only things that gave me structure in my life during that time, and her telling me that I had to go get my life back. I was struggling and I knew that I was sinking deeper the longer I stayed. Life was unknown, which is how it had always been, but I had mostly been able to put that thought away. Now, the pandemic put that worry at the forefront of every single conversation. As I write this, I’m struck by the selflessness of Motherhood. How a mom keeps showing up with what they think is best for their child, even if it’s hard and painful for them. Parenting seems like the ultimate religious experience. A faith that at the end of the day, their kid’s life will lean towards kindness, that your kid will make the right decision, bring the right people into their life, that they’ll call, and hold you in their heart as they grow into the world. Time after time I have been shown this love. So when my mom told me that it was time to go, she was right. Off into the unknown, unfolding world (much like the world before 2020) to find my place in it. A few days after I arrived in Anchorage, I drove out to one of my favorite spots. I walked over the train tracks, down a dirt path, and sat where the mud reached the land. I took this photo at 11:38PM. As the tide lapped in, I felt like I had my life back. No lightbulb, no dramatic spotlight of sunshine on me, just a gentle feeling that I was where I needed to be. Maybe my mom had told those mountains to hold me when she couldn’t. And all that has come to me since has been a gift.

what color was the memory?

I just found an old roll of film that I had shot back in 2018. For those who haven’t shot slide film, it’s quite finicky and needs to be carefully metered to achieve good exposure. Each time I load a roll of slide film I convince myself that this time I’ll nail it, but I never really do.

I wonder how memory and color play with one another, especially when using film photography as a tool of reflection. Slide film generally has cooler colors, and I think that changes my relationship to the memory. If I shoot a warmer film, like Kodak Gold or Portra, it seems to paint the past in a different color. Or Fuji, with a greener hue. It’s hard to objectively judge this idea because maybe the memory outweighs the photograph and the color is secondary. I remember reading that the etymology of photography comes from “painting with light.” Maybe the film is the brush, and the strokes do, in some subtle way, change reality’s past.

The memory of Summer

The memory of Summer in the city will always live with me. It’s easier now, in a mid-January cold-spell, to romanticize the heavy heat radiating off the pavement. In fact, on one of those dog days of August you may have caught me writing a love letter to Winter. Maybe I wish for the freedom of Summer, the weather aside, a period of time where the schedule has fallen away and infinite possibility has taken its place. This day, the day I captured these photographs, the Pope was in town. People had come from far away, taken off work, cut class, and joined in the streets. Everyone was a kid that day. Playing in the water fountains at city hall, dancing in the streets, waiting. Waiting to see one man who rode around in a funny little cart. Maybe he would shake your hand or bless your baby, maybe you just wanted to say you saw him. Whatever the reason, it was just one of those timeless days, where we remembered to be there.

Beauty in Landscape

January 8, 2019 - I don't share most of the photos I take. I wanted them to feel like they were part of something bigger. A couple months ago, I cut a video together with my favorite film photos I've taken over the past year.

The man speaking is the late John O'Donohue in an interview with Krista Tippett, two of my favorite thinkers.

If landscape has had a profound impact on you, I think you'll understand what John means.

a silent conversation with Tulsi

I sat in the jungle with Tulsi, face to face, even though we’ve never met. The light was low and beaming through her leaves, a rare positioning of the sun in a jungle. We must have been up on a mountain or the light may have been coming from another source. The underside of the canopy above was illuminated and I inhaled over my mug. My nose touched the warm water. I felt full in my head, knowing that this ceremony would likely break through me. I took my first sip and tears began to flow down my cheeks, water sealing my eyelashes. I felt the Tulsi flow down my throat and shelter my heart.

I asked how I could work with her, how I could be with her guidance and wisdom. The Question—such a human way in! I asked if I could enter her temple, and as I spoke the words, her vines began to wrap around me. We became one. I felt safe— I was being hugged by someone I knew but had never met. Something that was a part of me. Maybe my Grandmother’s Grandmother. Maybe more ancient. I again asked how to be with her and she filled my body with the knowing. “I’ve always been with you, learn to make time for me.” There was no pressure, no judgement as to whether or when I would return to her again. More tears flowed from me. How can such a patience exist? She told that if I wanted to understand what patience meant, I needed to learn from the plants. “We drop our seeds. We wait for the rain. We push through the soil, reaching towards sun. We wait for the leaves to bury us. The energy, the power, comes to us.” Seeking & waiting, I wondered how the two cohabitate. She doesn’t have her own clock or her own agenda. There is only one Mother Time that maintains the rhythm. It does not belong to any one thing, only to the unfolding of each emerging Now. Lack of patience is a way of saying “things happen on my plan, on my time.” Patience is an act of surrender. If you want to learn patience, release all that you think is yours.

7,244′ ft with Brian

I met Brian while camping in The Badlands, he was moving from Virginia to Colorado. Our friendship started over the Ravens hat he was wearing. We caravanned together into South Dakota, where we camped in Custer State Park. We hiked the tallest peak West of the Mississippi. No that can’t be right. Let me look. “Black Elk Peak is the highest natural point in the U.S. state of South Dakota and the Midwestern United States.” Close enough. Still pretty tall at 7,244′ ft (I’m clearly in a copy paste type of mood). It was some of my favorite few days on my drive to Alaska, hanging in the company of someone else who was also in transit.

The Ordinarily Beautiful Paintings of Dr. Berg-Levitansky

“I’ll do better, I really will,” Laila pleaded.

It wasn’t for a lack of trying, heck, they’d been going to couples therapy for a whole year (well, 10 months to be exact). A few weeks ago, Otto and Laila had sat in Dr. Berg-Levitansky’s office and discussed whether it was best for Otto to sleep outside for a while. Otto didn’t mind, there was an old-growth Elm in their backyard that he would often retreat to for naps. Plus, Laila was a blanket-hog anyways. Today, they were going to revisit the topic.

“Does that sound okay?” Dr. Berg-Levitansky asked the couple. Laila started to choke up, reaching for the box of tissues on the coffee table in front of the couch. “I just feel…” Laila said between sniffles, “It’s just not been the same since…” Otto noticed the painting above Dr. Berg-Levitansky’s head for the first time. He stared at the canvas. It depicted a lone tree, on top of a hill, with a gigantic moon behind the tree. It was acrylic—he knew this because his mom had been a painter. Laila’s continued to cry but Otto was in his own world. He squinted at the corner of the canvas and saw the psychiatrist’s signature. Otto realized that Dr. Berg-Levitansky had done this painting at one of those Paint & Sip nights, and he unsuccessfully attempted to hold in his laugh.

“What is so funny???” Laila said through her tears. Dr. Berg-Levitansky noticed that Otto was looking at the painting, did a quick glance over his shoulder, and with a beet-red face turned back to the couple.

“Sorry Dr. Berg-Levitansky, that sounds fine. I will sleep outside.”

That night, Otto sat up in the tree in the back yard. He looked down into the kitchen window, where Laila was making tea in her faded rose-pink robe. Oolong tea. It was always Oolong, even at night. He smiled as he remembered how they had met years ago at a coffee shop, where they had both ordered the same thing.

“Oolong! Careful it’s hot,” the barista shouted as they moved on to their next task. Both Otto and Laila had reached towards the cup, and in one of those awkward oh-no-sorry-go head moments they had locked eyes, and both chuckled. The memory of that day made him feel warm, like he was sitting in a giant mug of Oolong tea.

Otto laid down onto his back, being cradled by the large, curved branch of the tree. A few stars were shining through the leaves above and he took a deep breath. Otto thought about Dr. Berg-Levitansky’s painting in his office. Earlier he had laughed, not because it was bad necessarily, he had just been caught off guard. He admired that Dr. Berg-Levitansky had displayed a piece of his own art. Even if 25-40 other people in the class had painted the same thing, there was still a piece of himself in it. Otto thought about all of Dr. Berg-Levitansky’s clients who had sat on that same couch. Maybe Dr. Berg-Levitansky’s artistic vulnerability had helped encourage them to open up about their own lives.

Otto turned his head towards the house, where the lights were now out in the kitchen. He smiled, feeling back at home in the trees. He closed his eyes, and could have sworn that he could smell the pleasant sweetness of Oolong Tea.