09/05/2026
Most days I spend working with “people who aren’t afraid to be seen”. However, I have found that it is the one thing I hate doing… being seen. So I’d like to open up a bit about where my head is.
I started this year with great unexpected loss.
At the beginning of January, many others and I lost a friend I admired greatly in our small photography community. Coping with this loss took a massive toll on my mental health. As someone who ran in similar circles, at a similar age with a similar job, it not only devastated me that my friend was gone but also with the realization of how close death sat to me every day.
After this life took a turn towards a steady decline, leveling out here and there and even looking up again at times, until this past week.
(First I should express that if you know me you know I had one goal in life and that was to meet Dolly Parton)
On Tuesday last week, I got a call from my mom that my idol had passed and my dreams in life would in fact never come true. No worries, I thought. I can manage. I will meet her in death one day.
The next day (Wednesday) I was provided with even worse news that is irrelevant to this story and still ongoing (however it is relevant to note in the exponential decline of the week).
On Thursday that same week, I got another call from my mother that my grandfather had a heart attack and was in the hospital. He later passed unexpectedly that night. To say I am devastated would not accurately describe the out-of-body fever-dream feeling that I have spent this past week living in.
I did not get to see him before he passed.
In May of 2025, I asked Nic to take photos for me. I felt slightly reluctant in my request because while I may also be a photographer, I am also a cheap ass and hate spending money.
Fast forward to January of 2026 and I am unbelievably grateful that I got to play a part in their art and I would spend 1000X that to do it again.
This past week my mom has been going through and sending me photos of me and my grandfather when I was younger. In the hospital that night I also took a very morbid but slightly comical photo of all of us having pizza in the room with him hours after his passing
Every photographer spouts AdSense taglines about “memories that last a lifetime” and “frozen moments”. I have always agreed on a surface level (obviously, I’m a photographer) but this week I got it to a degree beyond marketing, branding, and professional photography. These photos have genuinely become all that I have left of these people I loved. So I implore both you and me (as someone who is a cheap ass and hates being in front of a camera) to take the photos. Take them on your phone, hire someone, record videos, get a cheap film camera, just take the photos. Because it is not a matter of if they will be all you have of someone but when will they be all you have left and I am so grateful that, even reluctantly, I did.
