I have a private IG account where I post most of my B&W nature photography along with corresponding thoughts, ideas, poetry. Occasionally I share irreverent humor (because, hey, laughter is medicine), but usually it’s of the deeper variety. There have been seasons where I have made it a public account and many seasons when I have left it open. However, a few months ago I finally decided to keep it closed. Generally, it has been a small space for those sacred few_usually those I deeply trust or those who I believed needed to be there. In those seasons it has been open, I did so with the intention that those who needed to find it, would do just that_find it. It was made as a place for me to learn to share my heart again after an excruciating time, in 2008, when I experienced profound loss. Consequently, I have poured out my heart in that space. I’ve poured out my struggles, my past, my questions, my doubts_doubts about faith and God and the many ways we have misinterpreted, through skewed lens, holy things. I’ve celebrated my victories and have mourned my losses_with honesty & vulnerability. Yet, I know it’s time to launch out into a larger space, not only as a photographer, but as a writer of words. That’s the purpose for this Blog. It’s a starting space, a birthing place.
I love what Hemingway said, in regards to the process of writing, “All you do is sit down at the typewriter and bleed,” I believe he was talking about the sacrifice of those words living beyond the place where you birthed them. I also think he was speaking tongue in cheek because the sentence which preceded this one is, “There’s nothing to writing.” Yup, he was right. There’s nothing to writing, except, when you sit down, you’re going to learn to bleed. From the inner wrestling to the harsh critic, you’ll bleed. BUT if you want your words to live beyond you, to have otherworldly substance, you’ll have to dig deep and rip your heart open. Yes, for it to have that special something, you’re going to learn to let it flow FROM that place. Friends, it’s the kind of blood that trickles down your cheek pushing against the angst of time_the time we’ve known in the past, the time we know in the ever “now,” and the time we long for in the future. The trickle becomes an ebb, then the ebb becomes the flow. The crimson red morphs into translucent shades of blue. It’s an inspired river from which prophets have told the story of Time_time past, time present, time future. That’s what I have known, and that’s what I call the healing flow.
In all of that, I want to say, if you found me in the corner of an obscure B&W Instagram account and find that it’s closed now, know that you can find me here_in this space, sitting beside this river. Maybe not this exact river, a river found near Lake McDonald in Montana’s Glacier National Park, but in a river nonetheless. Find me here holding a camera in hand and a field book with pen in my pocket. Find me having conversations with nature and God. Find me with my doubts and find me with my faith. Find me with my fears and find me with all grace. Find me in the rise and find me in the fall. Find me in the holy and the wholly mundane. Find me in the sacred and find me with a joke swimming in my head (Is it okay for me to be a little silly). But seriously, find me. Find me in the River. It’s in the river where I learned to play again_so I hope you do come find me. And in all the finding, I hope we all can truly find each other. See each other, Visit each other. Learn to play with each other. One thing though, if you do find me here, promise not to splash me in the face. I hate being splashed in the face.
Well, I know it’s time to go. I also know, you and I were never meant to be alone, so if you feel alone, reach out_authentically, honestly. Someone will reach back. Maybe not the people we think, but the people we need.
In Bleeding Love, Your friend
P.S. When you show up at the River, leave the fake behind. Bring the realness. Fake (plastic) floats. It doesn’t go very deep and that’s not what this River is meant to be. Okay, friends, see you there.
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