Happy New Year!!!

Yes, it’s been a while since my last post. I’m still here! The stories I could share…where do we even begin?

Let’s start with this post. This post isn’t about New Year’s Resolutions, or “New Year, New Me.” This post is a clumsy first step. I’ve been stuck…stuck in ways that I never imagined for myself. Until recently, I could always un-stuck myself, but this time was different. Finally, I’m “writing it down, and writing it out,” here with you, because writing is the one thing that ALWAYS works for me. You’re reading this now because I’m finally un-stucking myself.

I want to create again! I’m ready to create again! I NEED to create again! This first-step post is also to tell you that I’m going to start another photography project soon. Before I can start something new, I owe you an explanation as to what happened with the first project and what I’ve been up to the past 4 years. I’d like to keep this first-step post short, so I’ll summarize for now.

I successfully completed the 1,111 day photo project, but clearly, there are a few hundred photos/subjects that remain unpublished. The fact that I didn’t publish the entire project has been a dark little cloud looming overhead, but the truth is…nobody really cares about that except me. (And the people & subjects who’ve DM’d me just to make sure that I’m still alive. Thank you for that. And I’m sorry for ghosting. )

The short answer is that my life flipped in July of 2016. My mom had complications from a back surgery, and I found myself commuting from Portland to Klamath Falls every weekend to look in on her. I maintained that schedule for over a year - driving the 10 hour round trip when weather permitted, and taking the train during winter. (which could often be over 14+ hours, round trip.) It became clear that my mom needed me, and that I could no longer sustain that schedule, so I had leave my job, of over 20 years, in Portland and move back to my hometown of Klamath Falls.

I never wanted to move back to my hometown, but my mom needed me. Job opportunities are limited in Klamath Falls. I can be quite the lemonade-maker, and life had provided an abundance of lemons, so I thought I could make the best of it by making the investment to create my own opportunity - I became a hemp farmer! I met one of my business partners because he was a random subject in the 1,111 day photo project! Meeting him, combined with my mom’s failed back surgery, changed the trajectory of my entire life.

As far as the first photo project, I simply ran out of time. I was successful in taking a photo every single day for 1,111 days…but between the crazy year I spent commuting + working full time + shooting for Vortex Music Magazine, and then starting a new farming venture, I simply ran out of gas. There just wasn’t enough time in the day, and I was physically depleted. When I started farming, I was so tired that some days I didn’t even have the energy left at the end of the day to clean the manure off my boots!!! I stopped blogging and publishing the photos and never made the time to go back and publish them. It is as simple and as complicated as that.

There’s just so much I want to share with you about my experience farming hemp, but that’ll come later. Someday. Maybe. It was a lot of lesson-learning the hard way. Here’s the part where I got stuck. I didn’t do a grow in 2020. I didn’t completely make the decision not to grow until shortly before COVID hit. My soul was crushed. My soul is still crushed. I won’t grow in 2021, and most likely, I won’t ever grow again. I’m also mourning loss…losses in so many different forms.

Remember when the COVID shelter-in-place/“lockdowns” first started? It seemed like we would only be home-confined for a few weeks, maybe a month or two at the most, and then we’d be able to “flatten the curve,” right? I intended to use that “downtime,” which came at such a terrible price, to take care of all of our business, finally catch up and blog/publish all of the remaining photos from the first project, and then I would find a job and figure out what to do with the rest of my life. BUT - I got paralyzed! I’ve been paralyzed for months. I don’t know what the hell happened!?! I’ve been working since I was a teenager. I love to work! The busier I am, the better I am! Bring it on!!! I want to do it all!! But something happened…or didn’t happen. I found myself unable to do anything. Instead of cutting myself some slack by recognizing the constraints of COVID, understanding the limited job market, surviving the current state of our country and planet, and allowing myself space to grieve, process, and heal from what I’ve experienced the past four years, I came down hard on myself. I need to start writing and photographing again because it will help me fix the other parts of my life that are out of alignment. Activity breeds activity.

NOTE: I absolutely understand the severity and dire circumstances of COVID. Please do not misunderstand my desire to make personal progress for me being a science-denying, “open the country” type person. My heart is broken for humanity.

It was messy, but a dear friend helped me realize last week that I had basically hit bottom. I had lost my optimism, lost my positivity, lost my ability to see my way out of difficult situations, I was lying to myself and making things worse, and it was time for that to end. Here we are. First step.

My next project doesn’t yet have a name and I haven’t yet determined my objective with it. The next project won’t be a daily photo challenge, but it will be a similar format, but with different questions. The next project starts with this post…the post letting you know that I’m sorry I didn’t publish the entirety of the first project, but it’s time to start something new.

These are difficult, painful, uncertain times. I recognize that. I respect that. I mourn for our country, our world, our planet, and for humanity. Even though we’re living with all of this heaviness, I’ve also realized that it’s time that I take this first step to reenter the world and start living again. (safely, socially distanced, and masked, of course.)

So, hello! I’m back!

If you’re suffering during these times, please don’t remain silent and don’t suffer alone. Seek help and support from friends, family, or professionals. Please just take the first step.