How come the cousin relationship doesn’t get much attention? It’s pretty great and unique actually. You’re friends in that you don’t share parents but family in that you share grandparents. I mean, it’s basically best of both worlds, right?
There’s five years between me and each of these two sisters (my cousins) so we span the millennial generation gamut. I actually stared slack-jawed at the term “geriatric millennial” to describe us elder millennials, otherwise known as xennials (which is a way more flattering way to describe us) in the headline of an article this week. ANYWAY. Cassie is 5 years older than Rachel and 5 years younger than me. I’m 10 years older than Rach. We grew up in the same city so we’ve always been very close.
I’ve shot these women together a few times in the past. It’s always so much fun. Until last week, our last shoot together had been about a decade ago and took place in a commercial kitchen. One of us was 18, one was 23, another was 28. And now we’re 28, 33, and 38. It’s easy to see how they’ve grown and how my style has evolved over the last decade.
I told them I wanted to recreate this shoot with them when we’re in our 60s/70s, which is basically tomorrow at the rate time is passing so...
“In truth a family is what you make it. It is made strong, not by number of heads counted at the dinner table, but by the rituals you help family members create, by the memories you share, by the commitment of time, caring, and love you show to one another, and by the hopes for the future you have as individuals and as a unit.”
Just Stay
Can you just stay?
Your hair smells like cantaloupe
And strawberry candy
Tart and succulent pound cake
With apricot sauce
Your skin is soft and weathered
Terra-formed
It was cut from the same fabric
As my own,
Our mother’s and grandmother’s
Her mother’s mother’s mother’s
The bearers of fruit
Cantaloupe and strawberries
The ripest pomegranates
Billie Holiday’s singing
I’ll be seeing you
While I’m looking at the moon
And asking
Can you just stay?
For a few days longer?
You are a map and each freckle is
is every place we’ve been apart
In my dreams we are covered
In feathers
and chastity
and heart
And we are so strong together
that this place can never break us.
—R. Tillett
