Losing light and finding it again.
#016
In this week’s newsletter, I share how I’m feeling my way through a new project, reflect on a childhood memory, and recommend a book I think you should have on your shelves.
This week has been a busy one. As it comes to a close, I find myself reflecting on the busyness of life, the passage of time, and the creative process. I’m thinking about how easy it to get caught up in things and how times seems to be stuck on fast forward. I just want to slow down. The only way I can think to do that in a meaningful way is to be more intentional.
I've been telling myself (and believing myself) that I’m in a bit a of a creative funk. I think there’s some truth in there, but maybe I’ve been using it as an excuse to stay stuck with just being busy. I’ve been longing for a project to work on and, for any number of reasons, just haven’t. Until this week.
I rarely set out with a project in mind let alone a project title. I typically amass tons of images, then edit them into some form before a theme emerges, then hopefully a title. I also tend to share a lot of images as soon as I make them without giving them any time to breathe, to percolate. I also think social media conditions us to share and even over share (I’m certainly guilty).
So, I’m slowly beginning to work on a new project that gave me its title five and a half years ago and since then, I haven’t been able to shake it.
I talked to my wife about the title and about my need to work on a project, to really dig into something. I shared a piece of writing with her, the one that’s been living rent free in my head for over half a decade, where the title lies. She suggested I reach out to a mutual friend who was close with the now-passed-on author. I texted him and after a 30-minute call, it was clear to me that I was on the right track. I like how this is unfolding.
This week, I’ve also been thinking about an experience I had when I was probably 13 and my brother would’ve been 5. It was October and the leaves were in a full explosion of color. The air was crisp and we played outside all day. I’m sure I’d checked with my mom to make sure it was OK that we crossed the road and went up onto the mountain behind where we lived to explore. I’m sure she said to look out for my little brother. I’m sure I said I would.
We made our way up the rutted out dirt road, probably a mine road, to a spur of rocks and boulders interlocking into the hillside. We climbed and scurried until we’d reached an outcropping that provided a sliver of a view of the Tug River several hundred feet below us. We were explorers drunk on our freedom and fall air. We were frontiersman pushing through the wilderness on our way to new lands. And before we knew it, we were losing light. Suddenly, the realization of oncoming darkness sunk in and panic soon followed.
Near dark was on us in the way it can only be that time of year. Probably sensing my panic, my little brother started to cry. I was too scared to cry. Scared of getting lost, scared of not being my little brother’s hero, and certainly scared of facing my mom and the reality that I’d not, in fact, looked out for my little brother.
We found our way back to the dirt road, our pace quickening as gravity worked in our favor on the downhill slant toward home. I kept a quick pace, holding my brother’s hand tightly for his sake and mine, his tears probably caked with the dust we were kicking up. Finally, I heard my mom yelling for us and then, as if out of nowhere, she and my granddad emerged at the foot of the hill.
I don’t remember a lot of the details afterward or if I even got in trouble. I remember feeling like I let my brother down but also that I’d gotten us back home safely. I remember my granddad telling me that I had to be careful in the hills that time of year, that when the sun gets low it’s like somebody flicking a light switch off. And then it was dark.
Some years ago, I had the opportunity to provide a blurb for Tanya Amyx Berry’s For the Hog Killing, 1979. It’s an incredible body of work that I’m glad I got to know and am able to revisit from time to time. I recommend you check it out.
Thanks for reading my newsletter! If you find it worthwhile, please consider sharing it with someone and suggesting they subscribe. If you’re not a subscriber, consider subscribing. I will always make this newsletter free, but your support by being a paid subscriber sure helps! You can see more of my work at my website and follow me on Instagram.
Roger