It's Okay

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During this time away from daily picture-taking, I’ve reflected on what this hobby has meant to me. Without exaggeration, photography has been a saving grace. When I couldn’t make sense of my feelings, when I felt alone or uncertain, this work was my faithful companion. My way of figuring things out. My way of being known and belonging.

I have come a long way. I don’t feel the old drive to create as though my life depended on it. My approach to work is more relaxed and I have a tool box full of other ways to grow and learn and live a beautiful life.

It’s okay to lose interest in photography.

I’ve been editing and sequencing photographs, many of them film pictures, into a photo book called Second Wind. A limited edition 1/1. I can’t wait to hold it in my hands. My Christmas gift to myself.

Field Notes

There is so much to say and yet so little at the same time. Without meaning to I took a little break from picture-taking. Carrying the camera, taking photographs, posting in this journal . . . it just didn’t seem pressing. And this time, unlike during other dry spells, I didn’t feel guilty or worried or afraid. I felt free. Allowing for the ebb and flow of creativity is healing. It’s another kind of self-care.

Rest restores us.

This Week I Fell In Love With

If you don’t already subscribe to The Sometimes Newsletter from Ella Frances Sanders, I encourage you, friend-to-friend, please take a look. I’ve lost track of how many artists she has introduced me to—by way of her section, This Week I Fell In Love With—photographers, painters, poets, writers. And what I love most of all is that the links she shares are things to read and love, not things to buy or consume.

We walked the rows of the apple orchard again. We said, Let’s go apple picking!, but we weren’t there to pick apples, not really. We were there to see slowly, with time stretching out. To exercise our senses. Not forcefully but gently. Walking the rows—cameo, pink lady, fuji, gala, jonathan gold, granny smith, golden coster, stayman—we stopped to taste and smell. The path was hilly and the walking left us winded. It was a goldilocks kind of day, just right in every way.