August used to be a sore thumb on the list of months for me. That was long ago. Certainly, before I moved to the Pacific Northwest and began to indulge in the end of summer delights. The rivers fill with glacier water, and I nap under a baseball cap. My fingers, stained with dark red fruit juice. My dear friend came to visit me. They call this place 'another home'. This time of year, the golden spiders weave intricate webs and worlds. I like to imagine that I am walking around in a reality they spun. Stars in my eyes. Dizzy and drunk on the seasons.
My friend brought along their new partner and what a treasure it was to see them happy in love again. Love can wake even the most dormant joys up from sleep. I watched him take pictures of Hope throughout the handful of days we spent together. Laying on my brutish, neon green lounge chair, hair black as death, Hope sprawled out into a look of deep rest. Carlos took the picture. A muse, whether they know it or not. Some things are obvious to me.
We drove to Astoria for the day and stopped to take many polaroids. The pirate town was evocative. Of what? I can't put my finger on it yet. On the long drive back into the city, Hope rolled their window down and posed into the highway wind for Carlos' camera. A clean shot slides out of the mouth and so develops a black and white image of Hope, wind-blown and dreamy in their new deep aqua beret. Freshly twenty-four years old. Immortal feeling.
Since their visit, I have found myself drawn to pick up my film camera and capture the in-between moments more often. When creativity strikes me and I find myself inspired, my hands find a pen and paper and conjure up words before I've even begun to process what possessed me in the first place. Writing is such an automatic response for me. So much so that I found my inclination towards taking pictures to be, at first, atypical. A month or so later and I've filled nearly two rolls of film, of course, with Hope and Carlos in my heart's process.
Just yesterday, during a trip to LA, I shot some pictures of my friend Bee. She has always had a heavenly look to her. Almost as if she was not born of this Earth. Or if she were, she was the very first woman. We found this incredible tree in the middle of a nondescript park in the city. Scouting the perfect spot, we were awe-stricken by the most amazing tree. I can't quite translate what was so captivating about it. It wasn't necessarily its leaves or shape. Nor its branches or placement, but rather its energetic radiance. Just like Bee. I knew I wanted to take some photos of her there immediately.
My favorite thing to take photos of is a moment of transition. The moment just before someone says something wonderful and a room full of people laugh. Just before genius manifests. My friend Beaux, reaching over the bench to grab their drink. Jake in the kitchen chopping garlic before it sizzles in the pan. Someone on the street right before they get on the bus. I've never been fond of posing, of anything too manufactured or far from nature.
Show it to me like it really is or I'll close my eyes.
I am so desperately infatuated with the human ability to capture meaning. To hold it in my palms, despite their trembling at the sacred glory of it. What would anything be without us being able to have it flow through us and give it to art? What a blessing to give ourselves to art in the ways that we do. I don't make too many promises but what I feel I can promise myself and all of you now is that while I'm breathing, I willingly grant myself the birthright of being open to the mediums through which I can animate God's gentleness. Pinky swear.
