10 on 10 August

"Nothing changes and nothing changes and then a month is gone and then a year" - me, last month.

Until everything changes.

And that Everything has made this post very hard to write because I can't believe how different life is now. Some things manage to stay the same. But our lives were turned upside down this month, and we are not the same.

Same quiet mornings. 

Same quiet hours spent drawing.

And a party that I went to -

that I was in no state to attend 

while stressing over my own daughter 

and mourning the loss of a friend's.

That I did my best to sit through 

(but I didn't manage to take even a phone picture) 

and then thankfully had to leave for a shoot. 

I can escape in photography.

Unless I'm in a parking lot on I-5.

And then I just sit there.

But it's better than being in a room full of people who don't share your grief.

 

And I spent the afternoon refilling my heart with these two beautiful souls, whose wedding I have the privilege of capturing in October.

And then this.

This picture hurts me because Bella is cuddling the first tomato of the season. 

And she can't eat it yet. 

And she is being so so understanding of that and snuggling it instead.

So Lia does the same.

 

 Time for Bella's dinner check.

 

A few days of needles adds up

and the holes and bruises are small

and dotting her little body

and Bella doesn't complain.

(But I do, I can't help it.)

Still, some things stay the same.

 

Or improve. 

She can run again. 

She hasn't run in months.

She didn't run last month. 

Or bike.

And we didn't know why.

 

So there's joy in the simple things.

And my night ends watching the sun set at a cafe with friends 

(a gathering occasioned by unbearable grief)

but we are together 

and for the moment that is enough 

and we find our smiles. 

Life goes on as usual this month, but nothing is the same.