2024, On Film

Somewhere along the line, I read from a photographer I admire (@rachaelalexandra.co) that she photographs her personal memories solely on film to keep some separation between her professional and personal work and protect her love for photography. It really resonated with me as an idea, and I adopted it this last year myself. And for all the reasons you’ve probably already read about why film feels special and intentional and present, I too have found myself with the same giddiness as a 7 year old on Christmas morning for every roll that came back from developing. I was inspired from the beginning to the end of this year to document my own life in a way I haven’t been doing in recent years. It has felt like an act of attention and appreciation and joy.

I tried to write a reflection on 2024 a few evenings ago, and I didn’t get very far, not yet anyway. But sequencing these few images together felt like the wordless processing my brain and heart needed most. Here’s to all we held and discovered — and the love we carry across the line of a new year.

Newfoundland | Entry 01

Written November 27th, 2021 | As I grow older, I notice the desire for closeness, safety, and stability only deepens. Still, I hope to never lose the part of me that calls for spontaneity, novelty, and mystery. I had let it fall dormant in the better part of the pandemic, after the hurt of loss and disappointments crowded my ability to dream, and I hadn’t seen my wide-eyed self for months. Driving off the ramp of the ferry in Port Aux Basques and into this expansive, open, and bleakly beautiful landscape that has never known me brought a full body exhale.

It’s not lost on me how the transitional periods over the last few years have been some of the most precious times of my life - the good and the painful ones too. Settling into a new chapter in Newfoundland has me more attentive and present to myself and my surroundings than I feel I have been in a while, and documenting these days has been second nature in a sense. After 959 solo miles by land & 108 nautical miles, I unpacked my bags in a little house by the sea just outside of St. John’s. Here’s to another beginning.

On Meeting A Stranger

With respect
And reverence
That the unknown
Between us
Might flower
Into discovery
And lead us
Beyond
The familiar field
Blind with the weed
Of weariness
And the old walls
Of habit.

From John O’Donohue’s “To Bless the Space Between Us”