“The most important things are the hardest to say. They are the things you get ashamed of, because words diminish them -- words shrink things that seemed limitless when they were in your head to no more than living size when they're brought out. But it's more than that, isn't it? The most important things lie too close to wherever your secret heart is buried, like landmarks to a treasure your enemies would love to steal away."
Read Morejournal and writing
Weathering the Storm /
Originally, this video was going to be about me and the adversity I’ve withstood and how it’s completely changed me (mostly for the better) and how fortunate I feel to have endured it, to have transformed because of it, to have a greater appreciation for the moments of smooth sailing when I wasn’t weathering the storm.
Read MoreSuicide is War /
Suicide is war. And perhaps not with a foreign or nameless enemy but with oneself. It’s an internal struggle of incomparable breadth. You lose enough battles and you lose the war. Bloodshed abounds. My father was at war with himself for years, if not decades and ultimately, he lost but it was something he could not heave himself out of or walk peacefully away from, waving a white flag. He was slated to fight until the day he died. That was his fate and he handled it as gracefully as he knew how. I have never blamed him for leaving. As quickly as I learned he had died I had forgiven him. Leaving early and on his terms was a non-negotiable clause in the fine print of his life. Somewhere, deep down in the pit of my gut I had always known it.
Read MoreHow do I interpret life’s challenges? /
My father felt a pull away from this anguishing life to the battlefield and conclusively to someplace better and with trustfully less heartache. This goal became his duty and obligation and it was the only way he knew how to move forward. And I have suffered heavily, myself, as a result of this but I no longer hear the Why Me? record skipping in the back of my mind because on December 17th, 1998 I gained something valuable that many people never do: Boundless gratitude for my much deeper capacity for joy. It would only take nearly half my lifetime without him to realize it.
Read More272//365 /
Artists are some of the most hard-working and loving people I know, conquering the daily grind but guarding their heart enough to piecemeal their art. It's a balancing act of colossal fortitude and it isn't easy.
Read MoreHow do I discover and apply my gifts? /
I see beauty in ugly places and ugly in beautiful places. I see the abstract artful formations that a random assortment of words on a page can make and I can feel those words. I see light in dark and history in skin. I see the good and tenderness in people and I’m sensitive to the dishonest, black-hearted and manipulative (and do what I can to maintain a life without them). And I try so hard to depict these things that I see through the lens of a camera and through writing and yet I realize as humans, we all see things a little differently than anyone else, and through our own lens. That’s the incredible thing about art; whatever I create, it changes depending on the particular observer. I think that if I’m truly lucky enough to count these as gifts I can say without flinching that they’re all rooted in consciousness, in emotion and passion and an absolute awareness that we’re all delicate feeling beings.
Read MoreLove Never Fails /
I love shooting two people in love. I love catching all of the little moments in between the planned and posed and easy smiling shots; the more intimate, real and honest seconds that seemingly freeze and last for little eternities, and when you think and hope and pray that perhaps they forgot there's a camera there with a person behind it capturing these small instances before they slip away.
Read MoreLiberation and The Normal Wood Creates the Sea /
I've been wanting to shoot this woman naked for years. To quickly capture just a glimpse and solidify her beautiful art-plastered body in photographs for infinitude. Shanna's my tattoo artist and one hell of a chick and I've photographed her before but never was there such tenaciousness in the air.
Read MoreTo whom should I listen? /
WSMR is also home to Trinity Site, the location of the world’s first atomic explosion on July 16, 1945 - more specifically happening near the north end of the historic Jornada del Muerto which in English means “route of the dead man” which is quite appropriate, don’t you think? And what does it say about me that there’s something about that fact that I strongly relate to or identify with? I am a child of the nuclear age and I came to be at the heart of it all. I wear a pin on my camera strap with an image of an atom bomb explosion that says “Homesick” beneath it. I find myself somewhere in that morbid absurdity of the land I came up in.
Read More251//365 /
And I wanna sit outside in the dark except for the light of the distant moon with you and marvel at the perfectly ludicrous idea that men have traveled that far from home. We're both far from home and yet here we are - contently home.
Read MoreEver-Changing /
" I am a woman, an American, an Australian, an introvert, an animal advocate, passionate soul, a loyal friend, a giver, a writer, a wife, an ex-wife, a girlfriend, a dweller, a small-towner-living-in-a-big-city, a fish out of water, an artist, an ex-self-mutilator, an empathy-filled spirit for all suffering beings, a photographer, a granddaughter, a gardener, a creator, a destroyer, an observer, a seeker, a lover, a grudge-holder, a forgiver, a re-inventor, a decorator, a reader, an appreciator of all beautiful things, a regretter, a graphic designer, a survivor, an ever-evolving human being. I am resilient. I am called to identify with countless labels and descriptors. I am called to try my hand at numerous undertakings."
Read More250//365 /
I am my mother and father's only child and thus I am inherently the sole creation and survivor of their violent and combustible union. I am the only witness and I am the lonely product of a regrettable amalgamation.
Read MoreThat Very Redemption /
"Maybe the primary and most rational reasons we’ve found such contentment in each other is because, once finally emancipated from past strife and having gained the necessary perspective, we needed that very redemption to do so."
Read MoreBlindsided Me /
"I feel like I'm actually sharing my life with someone in ways I never have before. It's alien and engrossing and amazing and unbelievable. It's strange. It's wonderful. It's totally blindsided me."
Read More197//365 /
He asked me today if I'm happy. I said as long as I'm looking forward, not looking back. There's still so much hurt in his eyes and remorse in mine.
Read More188//365 /
We do a lot of sitting in silence these days, watching, touching, grazing, gazing into each other, being. Just being. We've spent so many years talking. So many long years. But we'd never touched each other's skin, felt the ways the shape of our faces changed in the palms of our hands when we smiled. Or laughed. Or kissed.
Read More185//365 /
After much deliberation (and finding the perfect spot to camp completely by ourselves in the mountains nestled right between two beautiful and fast flowing rivers) Mike and I have decided we're never coming home.
Read MoreStatic /
It's funny how profoundly your priorities can shift when absolutely necessary. It's not funny how easily your deepest passions can be bumped down the list. I should always make room and time for these things, even and especially if they're not lucrative.
Read MoreAbdication /
I think every woman has a dear friend who can't appreciate her own beauty. In fact, I think nearly every woman is a woman who can't appreciate her own beauty. How many women do you personally know like that? Even more important, how long have you been looking in the mirror and cursing what you see?
Read MoreWithout Constant Comparisons /
"Since voicing all of these things, saying them out loud to a friend, I feel like I'm seeing him and my life with him through clearer glasses. Or at least I'm trying to approach this life without constant comparisons to my last one."
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