Before we dive into this week’s update, I want to thank new subscribers for being here. Getting to know you means a lot, so please feel free to leave a comment.

Also, thank you to all who provided such kind words of support for the release this past week of my first published memoir, Cracked, Not Broken: A Rebel Mother’s Immigrant Story. If you missed it the Substack note, you can find it here. I’ve been working on the ebook (English and Spanish), which is up next.

Now back to our regular updates.

Force - verb: to compel, constrain, or oblige

Fidelity - noun: devotion* to duties, obligations, etc; faithfulness.

(I think of devotion and fidelity as interchangeable.)

On a cold January night in 1975, Keith Jarrett arrived in Cologne exhausted and in chronic back pain, only to find the concert hall had provided the wrong piano—an inferior rehearsal instrument, out of tune, with malfunctioning pedals. He initially refused to play, then relented, walked onstage wearing a back brace, and improvised the entire concert.

The Köln Concert became the best-selling solo piano album of all time.! The producer later reflected that the limitations of that piano may have shaped the performance itself—because Jarrett couldn’t rely on it, he had to find another way in.

But how?

In a 1984 DownBeat interview, Jarrett described how he prepared for improvisation differently than for classical performance. For a concerto, he practiced intensively. For improvising, the preparation was almost the reverse—he would stay away from the piano so that when he sat down, it felt new. Miraculously, no preconceptions, no forcing. He would just show up to whatever was there.

He talked about surrender, about connecting to something larger than himself, and that if he didn’t, nothing would happen. That idea is where it’s at for me.

It’s a kind of relationship where the ritual of returning to something without trying to control it allows a creative state that feels more fluid, at least for me. It doesn’t ask me to be perfect or come up with a strategy or even consistency in the way we’ve been taught. It asks me to show up and pay attention.

Strip away the top of the line Bösendorfer, the digitally-enhanced streaming mp3, the AI tools, and high megapixel cameras. Trade them all in for a broken piano, a scratchy LP, your own awkward sentences without Chatgpt’s help, and an old 35mm SLR and what do you get? The difference between force and fidelity. Authentic connection with its uncomfortable and sometimes painful path. Something more honest, maybe. Also more uncomfortable.

That space, for me, is the difference between force and fidelity.

But I don’t think it’s as simple as rejecting discipline altogether. Not everything structured severs connection. Some of it can support it, if it’s embraced the right way.

In my last newsletter, I wrote about perfection—about making peace with it instead of letting it define me. Publishing my book brought that into focus again. Visibility, accountability, putting something so personal out into the world—it can feel scary. The old pattern says: push harder, be more disciplined, track everything, make it happen.

And I understand why that feels natural. I was trained that way. But what I’ve learned over time is that when discipline becomes rigid—when it starts to feel like force—it pulls me out of the very thing I’m trying to access. My body tightens and my flow narrows. Force has worked for me in the past. But it came with burnout, stress, and a kind of depletion that lingered.

Say the words “discipline” or “force” out loud and you can almost feel it. That constriction.

So now I’m trying something else—not necessarily without discipline—but with a different relationship to it. It’s one that’s softer and with a nervous system more regulated (definitely challenging these days!) It’s less about control, more about support.

It’s not easy to counterculture this narrative. The western productivity world today is built on adrenaline and cortisol, which is unsustainable in the true harnessing of creative energy. But my system doesn’t respond well to that anymore. It wants something steadier. More spacious.

When I stop trying to force myself toward a specific outcome, I notice something shift. There’s more room, honesty and less performance.

I can admit: maybe I’m not where I thought I’d be. And maybe that’s okay. Maybe I can even love not being where I wanted to be.

And if I stay right there, something opens. Not just in my work, but in how I relate to people because I want the people in my life to feel like they don’t have to show up in a costume. That kind of space—where you can be seen as you are—feels rare. It feels sacred.

So I come back to what works now and it’s the small things: Rituals, redefinitions, and more importantly, getting grounded before I try to scale anything. Teaching my body that it’s safe to be here, to create from here is the practice right now. Learning to show up consistently from a more centered place and letting that be enough.

Can I get into the state each morning where I’m actually available to create?

That’s my daily question.

Fidelity instead of force allows me to be still accountable, but not gripping so tightly as before. In the state of fidelity, I find my grounding.

Some photos of late that resonated:

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1 : the quality or state of being perfect: such as

a : freedom from fault or defect : FLAWLESSNESS

b : MATURITY

Another light bulb moment! This one regarding my lifelong trepidation about long-term projects when I thought that perfectionism was standing in the way. For years, I treated my inner critic and perfectionist self as an enemy to defeat— a character flaw to overcome. I’ve written many times about these two forces that keep me from being free, creatively.

And , whether he knows it or not, helped bridge me over to my lightbulb moment, actually, when he published Mother and Child about the documentary photographer, W. Eugene Smith. Smith, arguably one of the greatest photojournalists who ever lived, had a reputation for an impossible insistence on painstaking perfectionism.

Martha Beck describes two parts of us:

• The social self — the voice shaped by rules, approval, and fear of rejection

• The essential self — our authentic, creative nature

The inner critic usually comes from the social self, asking: Am I good enough? What will people think?

The essential self cares about something else: authenticity, growth, and expressing what feels true. Creating from that place is what Beck calls integrity.

Eugene Smith fought with editors, disappeared into darkrooms for days, blew deadlines, walked away from contracts, and nearly destroyed his career more than once. In other words, he innately followed this path that Beck calls integrity.

Most of these instances came about because he refused to release an image before it matched the truth he had witnessed. Life magazine made him famous and ultimately couldn’t control him but his perfectionism wasn’t a flaw, it was his whole modus operandi. It was part of him.

Recently I wrote about fog and flat light and learning to be willing to work with what’s already there. This week I want to stay in that territory but go a little deeper — into what it means to work with perfectionism rather than constantly negotiate a ceasefire with it, and what Eugene Smith’s life might teach us about that.

For years I have thought that this kind of driven, conflicted relationship with my own work was something to fix. I took it as a sign that I hadn’t yet made it as a photographer.

What I am finding are two truths for me;

1. Perfectionism isn’t actually a problem, but proof that I care deeply enough to keep going and;

2. Perfectionist tendencies are actually a natural part of my workflow!

My feelings about perfectionism for years wasn’t about my vision. It was about the final product. Up until last week these were my thoughts:

You are terrible with details. You can’t ever be trusted with them or your work will be riddled with errors.

So, I’d start a lot of projects that never saw the light of day because I was convinced I didn’t have what it took to finish them. This is not a self-flagellation per se, but I really truly thought that I just “can’t do details”.

But, a lightbulb went on for me when I got my book proof back this week.

When I first started writing my book six years ago, I had no intentions of publishing it. I was just doing what came naturally for me; writing my feelings about my mother’s passing. I had secured the help of two editors because my constant judgment about myself was about the details—the final product. I went through serious anxiety and procrastination about putting out that final product.

When the proof copy came back this week, I began going through the text with a fine-tooth comb. My pace slowed dramatically and I began finding errors that my both of my editors didn’t find. These weren’t just typographical in nature, but the overall flow of a paragraph or chapter. Check out the entire pad of post it notes stuck on the pages of my proof copy:

Do you know what I found out? I am in fact, NOT terrible with details. I just cannot and do not want to deal with them during the creation phase— and if that means looking at something out of place, incomplete or imperfect for weeks, that’s ok to me!

I started looking back on every piece of work from my published songs to small work projects and realized that it’s actually a pattern of mine to want free reign during the creative process—completely away from details. Once the initial creative spurts are over, I can really get pretty good at finding how to put a pretty bow on the final package.

I still cannot believe I had not seen this sooner in my life. It seems silly that all my angst these years has been wasted over something that comes naturally for me.

I realized how I can start working WITH this rather than against it. I harken back now to ’s post about Eugene Smith, who was already in his fifties when he heard about the poisoning of Minamata and alerted the world to that tragedy. His perfectionism at Minamata wasn’t just about the images — it was about what he believed they could do in the world.

He gave himself to the project completely, was beaten by company employees for it, and kept going. The same moral drive that made him impossible to work with made him impossible to stop. I get that completely and want to let that drive lead me.

He also spent a month immersed in a small village in rural Spain. He immersed himself in his projects to such an extent that his editors often feared him ever concluding them. “I fought such as the hysteria of deadline being applied to the pyramids,” Smith said. I get how that feeling of immersing oneself in with dire importance can consume someone during a project.

Then there was when Smith was commissioned to produce a photographic profile of Pittsburgh. The project was supposed to take a month and produce 100 images. It ended up being more than two years and 13,000 photographic negatives later. Smith had gone completely off-script in the field, immersed himself totally in pure creative chaos. Creative chaos is something I find myself in naturally without angst.

He and his darkroom assistant, James Karales made dozens of work prints for each negative, testing and experimenting until Smith was satisfied, before making a final master print. This process alone lasted three years. He referred to it as, “synthesis of the whole.”

Karales, who went on to make one of the most iconic images of the civil rights movement thanks to Smith’s influence, said: "Gene didn't do what you'd call a script. A script didn't mean anything to him, not when he was shooting or when he was printing. He wanted to see the whole thing, and see what areas needed to be worked on as he was going along."

That synthesis of the whole, the desire to go off script entirely and come back to the details later, is something I relate to completely. This is the pattern I saw in myself this week and I realized it’s how I approach everything— sometimes even the tiniest projects. I want total creative freedom first and zero refinements or details. The obsessive refinement comes after.

It turns out I’ve been afraid all this time of completing projects because I thought it was irresponsible to do without those details, assuming I was unable to deal with them. In fact, it’s the timing of details, not the details themselves. And trusting myself to make sure they were actually done is something I can do.

When I saw part B of the official definition of perfectionism, the word, “maturity” finally made sense to me.

You’ve heard that perfectionism is the nemesis of creativity because it often undermines the very thing it claims to support: excellent creative work. I am arguing that this is not the case for everybody.

Even if it looks haphazard or destructive, perfectionism could be just a means to an end. I am happy to have recognized this in myself but more importantly, learned now to name it, work with this drive consciously and—most importantly—trust myself with the final outcome. It may not be perfect to the world, but it needs to be perfect for me.

Next month, I can show the world that outcome by way of my first book. For now, I’ll leave you with some creative chaos from a long-term project I’m starting.

Today is the anniversary of my mother’s birthday. She’s been gone since 2018, but for the past six years, I’ve been working on something I didn’t know how to talk about much while I was in it—a memoir about her life.

But who was I to write a book? I’ve never written one before. There was a story here though, that I had to tell about the woman who left Colombia secretly in 1955 with no English, no connections, and no safety net—and she built a life anyway. I felt compelled to write this immigrant’s story. I also needed to work through the grief.

If you’ve been reading here for a while, you’ve seen pieces of this project surface in my writing. There were mentions of it here and there and this is where all of that was leading. It is not a photobook, per se. (However, I am planning a much more extensive photo-only book at some point). It’s a memoir with some photos in a 9x6 paperback and ebook format.

One of the hardest parts of this process was choosing which photographs to include. I had hundreds—faded black-and-white images from her early years in Colombia, Polaroids from the '70s, medium-format shots I took of her hands working in the salon, candid moments in her kitchen. And then there were all her writings.

Each one held a story, a memory, a detail I wanted to preserve. But a memoir isn't an archive. A memoir needs restraint. It's a narrative. So I had to let most of them go, keeping only the ones that moved the story forward, that captured something essential about who she was. It felt like a second loss—deciding which moments made it into the book and which stayed in the boxes.

More than that though, it’s has been an emotional excavation! Sifting through all the letters she and my father wrote to each other, all the recordings, and photos. It was a life I wish I had asked more questions about.

This book changed me, as I wrote about in interview in her January newsletter.

Writing this book has brought incredible resolve for me—both in my perspective about my parents, my brothers, and my standing in the family—so much so that I wondered if it needed to be published. It was that complete for me.

The book, Cracked, Not Broken: A Rebel Mother’s Immigrant Story, will be available in late April—but today I wanted to announce it on her birthday, which feels right.

For now, there’s a page where you can learn more, watch a short video, and be notified when it publishes: crackednotbroken.com

To all my readers who’ve been following along—through the silence, the process, the occasional cryptic references to “the book project”—thank you for your patience and support. It’s been a long road, and I’m glad to finally share it with you.

And here’s to the women who refuse to disappear!

Cracked, Not Broken

Thank you for all the lovely birthday wishes last week. The flan is long gone but I’m still celebrating for the rest of the month!

First, I want to update you on a little housekeeping.

In an effort to simplify everywhere I can and in preparation for this year’s creative projects, I have consolidated all of 2025 and 2026 newsletters into three basic areas:

Essays

Image Notebook

Lens 2 Lens

The themes formerly known as Light-Bulb Moments, Unframed, etc. still remain but under the larger Essays umbrella, for example. I hope this makes me easier to navigate. However, I’m not quite finished organizing so pardon the mess for a few weeks.

There's a tension between wanting to have arrived as an artist versus the strange relief of accepting you never fully do.

I had something else planned for today’s Image Notebook update but "When Tool Becomes a Companion by by Shital Morjaria of really inspired me! So, I’m going in another direction.

Shital’s core insight is that the camera shifted for her from a means to an end to a companion and a grounding presence. My newsletter, The Additional f-Stop, is explicitly about identity and creative unfolding, so every word spoke to me — I too am on a similar path.

Last year, for the first time in my 25+ years as a photographer, I began asking myself: what do my photos reveal about who I am becoming? My f-stop metaphor feels perfect here — every stop of light between last year and this year represents a new layer of self-awareness.

I considered changing my tagline last year — “an artist in perpetual training” — but the phrase is essentially the arc Shital describes: the humbling, ongoing surrender to the process over any perfect outcome.

In Shital’s journey I also see what it means to stay a student of my own practice, and how important it is to remain humble in that acknowledgment. Letting go and observing is not just about photography. It’s about the inner landscape of us as human beings — how we see our standing in the world and how we respond to change.

My relationship to the camera has changed. I’ve moved from a larger, full-frame as my daily to a micro four thirds with tiny lenses. I’m shooting film more, reaching for my Nikon FE or Olympus OM-2N when I find a theme I want to explore slowly. I leave much more unphotographed than I once would have hurried to grab. And most importantly, I experiment now with different genres.

Shital frames resilience as what keeps her going through the stagnant phases. I wonder whether for me it's resilience, or something more like permission. Permission to not be finished growing. And with growth comes change: shifts in identity, letting go of how I see my talents (gifts, not possessions) and how I see the work ahead (inspired, not driven).

Well past the pressure of early creative ambition, a spaciousness that comes with experience begins to shine. It’s less about me, mine, yours in the creative space — and more about how I can remain a conduit for creative energy, staying open in perpetuity.

Below are images I would normally never share because they feel like experiments. I deliberately waited to catch shadows cast around my home. There is nothing glamorous here — this isn’t travel photography or a curated scene. It’s my everyday light. I’m finding something worth sharing in the ordinary, which speaks directly to staying curious as an artist.

I shot these on my recuperated Nikon FE, which had failed me last year. The camera seems fine — and the photographer had not yet seen these scanned images until after writing this piece. It all kind of came together.

I’d love to know your comments!

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This is Unframed.

“Don’t beat the eggs when you’re angry… let the sugar melt undisturbed… patience is a virtue. Let it cool.”

Friday, Feb. 13. Another birthday. Another trip around the sun. I’m getting a little dizzy, dammit. It’s a number, they say but to be honest, the numbers bother me sometimes. So do the grey hairs that sprout around my temples, like the unwelcome germ on a newly purchased head of garlic from the grocery that’s sitting on my counter today. Truth be told, it’s not just around the temples, but that’s why I hold onto Murray, my dependable Aussie hairstylist.

When I get nervous about the number, I remember that I feel quite young, actually, and so incredibly grateful to be in good health and have a loving family. I should celebrate that, right? I hesitate sometimes knowing there are others who are not so lucky.

Today, I plan to do the same thing I do every year; exercise, photograph, share a meal with those I love —and eat from the flan I made last night—the same recipe my mother made for me yearly on this day. Of course there was cake, but there was also always flan. Every year. Rain or shine.

Flan is a Latin American baked custard dessert with a layer of caramel on top, similar to the French version, crème caramel. For me, flan on my birthday is pure, self-indulgent joy!

I saw a grief counselor once who told me to grieve fully but no more than 20 minutes at a time, then make a conscious effort to transition to a more active, cognitive state like going for a walk, cleaning, or making tea to engage the prefrontal cortex, the part of the brain responsible for planning and rational thinking. I apply this now to every difficult emotion—both for me but also for those who suffer because they need us to connect with our happiness.

There are voices that would have me skip the flan—the resentful, the puritanical, the disgruntled. But I've fed that wolf long enough.1. Today I choose differently.

My act of resistance yesterday took place in the kitchen. It meant reaching for that same midcentury green and lavender speckled bowl for the mixture—the one that lived vivaciously in Mom’s kitchen, washed over time and again with her own resistance. It meant gingerly holding tightly onto that same vintage pyrex baking dish with the lid—perfect for storing the flan in the refrigerator—carrying it like a small infant from the cupboard to the counter. (Please, may I never break it).

This resistance means engaging in a yearly culinary ritual that brings peaceful nostalgia—little bits of wisdom passed down by Mom. I crack an egg and I hear her warn me—

“Don’t beat the eggs when you’re angry. It will ruin the dish.”

I picture her hand over my hand, ready to stop me as I was about to agitate the pan of sugar—

”No, let it melt undisturbed.”

I can still see Mom showing me how to insert the knife into the flan while it’s in the oven— to make sure that knife comes out clean, otherwise, it’s not ready…

“Patience is a virtue. Let it cool.”

I knew the last step was to flip the custard out of its crib of dark, golden melted sugar onto a plate. The first year after Mom died, I tried to recreate the steps and didn’t listen to the sound of her voice in my head. I flipped it too early and I literally cried when it broke! I also used the wrong kind of sugar the second year and had to start over twice.

I now remember how I marveled at her steady hands. When the dessert came out of the oven and cooled, she would take a plate, cover the baking dish with it, and flip the two dishes over in one tenth of a second, so that none of the caramel would ever stand a chance of spilling from the sides… and I would watch the melted sugar ooze all over the custard. I couldn’t wait to eat a piece!

I learned the kitchen phrase “baño maria” 30 years before I learned the English translation, “double boiler”. The power that family, food and language have to bond is a mysterious art form in and of itself.

That’s why it’s no wonder then that when the world’s light grows dim, I turn to the kitchen and turn on the good memories….And of course, I also turn to photography, music, and nature. In fact, this morning, I found this image of the ocean in my catalogue and it reminds me of something.

I’m reminded that though a wave appears separate — it has shape, motion— a wave cannot exist independent of the ocean. It is the ocean, temporarily expressing itself in form. Such are we as human beings on this planet. We experience ourselves as separate individuals and yet how we choose each next move can have a ripple effect on everyone else.

Isolation, as comfortable or safe as it may feel, is a painful misunderstanding of reality. To keep happiness (or pain) to ourselves is isolation. If we experience a world of threat, violence and scarcity, it is the collective that helps shift and change the lens, and in time, the world shifts. But it takes as many of us as possible feeding the right wolf.

I believe we don’t merely interpret the world — we construct a version of it. Exhaustion comes not from creating…but from focusing too intently on the wave.

Creating from remembering rather than from fear can enable us to be as powerful as the wave expressing itself as the ocean.

This post is dedicated to all February babies everywhere— and to Aloka the Buddhist dog for completing the 200 mile trek to the capitol steps!

And it is now time to celebrate…and eat my flan. Have a good weekend and I will too!

Nature is an amazing teacher. Last month I began exploring how the earth creates resistance under pressure and then repairs itself. Soon, I saw parallels to my creative life—a light bulb moment.

Take erosion, for example. Along certain coastlines, land doesn’t disappear all at once. It thins, loosens, and collapses in small, delicate ways. Nothing dramatic is noticed until the shoreline itself is unrecognizable. Land and structures have been lost to the sea in this way, which demonstrates how gradual processes affect the shoreline with little drama. (The Channel Coastal Observatory is an interesting site that monitors these types changes along the UK coastline using mapping and aerial photography.)

Inevitably though, nature recomposes itself and begins to serve a different purpose for us.

I think creative resistance works the same way—not the sudden, acute block I’ve mentioned in my previous newsletters or the weekend procrastination to make use of time. I am referring to something insidious and more structural: a slow erosion of desire to create anything at all.

For me, it shows up as a deep reluctance followed by mindless YouTube videos and some missed deadlines. If it’s really bad, there are abandoned drafts, cancelled plans, and a fearful sense that finishing something would cost me heavily. I’m not blocked, per se, but compressed. More about compression later….

The Weight of Small Forces

Waves aren’t terribly dramatic individually. A single wave does little, but constant force over decades eats away cliffs and shorelines until they collapse. This type of coastal erosion is relentless, incremental, and eventually catastrophic.

I recognize this type of result in my creative life. It’s the place where ideas still appear, but none of them want to stay and play with me.

My memoir is finally (almost) ready for print, but it took me weeks to get back to it—since before the holidays. I left my editor’s final corrections sitting untouched in an envelope because the thought of getting on it again felt inexplicably dreadful. I later learned it was representing another cycle of expectation and the self-imposed demand to be consistent.

The most corrosive pressure is often internal: deadlines I never released myself from, standards I adopted before finding my voice, and the moral obligation to follow through perfectly. Early on, I internalized these as virtues. None are wrong alone, but nature shows that even gentle forces, applied continuously, change the terrain.

None of these are wrong on their own, but nature teaches us that even gentle forces, applied continuously, change the terrain.

Chronic Compression

The effects of overgrazed land demonstrates this well. The soil, stressed beyond recovery stops responding. Roots weaken and the soil degrades. Eventually, even rain can’t help because there’s nothing left to hold it.

I volunteered as block captain in my neighborhood because it felt natural. I took on nonprofit photography work for years because I loved it. I agreed to finish projects I no longer felt connected to. Each “yes” felt small, manageable, even generous at times, but I didn’t account for accumulation. The weight of others’ expectations, self-imposed deadlines, or caregiving’s tender asymmetry took its toll.

For a while, I noticed a longing for recognition somewhere, somehow. Surges of irritation, or dissatisfaction with connections rose in me. About a year after my youngest brother died, something finally snapped. It wasn’t one moment but an accumulation of all moments, all the years. Any hint of the old pattern of being overextended in a quiet, dark sea became violently unwelcome. I finally said:

I know these waters. I’ve been here before. And I will not do this again.

It turns out that resistance can be quite intelligent! Withdrawal is often the first act of repair. The stress of winter evolves into dormancy, prevents overgrowth, preserves energy. What looks like shutdown is actually maintenance mode. Trees don’t apologize for losing their leaves. They don’t question whether they’re being lazy or undisciplined. They respond to conditions. It’s the system protecting itself.

So, my fear of completion wasn’t about doubting the work. Instead, it’s more about dreading what follows—that finishing one thing means immediately beginning the next.

Resistance, in this light, isn’t self-sabotage. It is my nervous system saying:

I need different conditions before I can continue.

How Nature Repairs

Only certain seeds germinate with heat; after intense fires, they proliferate. Ash enriches soil; biodiversity returns. Channelized rivers, when freed, redistribute sediment; floodplains and wetlands regenerate. Nature doesn’t heal by trying harder—it heals by changing conditions: releasing pressure, allowing time, and letting multiple forces coexist.

So, nature doesn’t heal by producing more, by trying harder or meeting deadlines. It heals by changing conditions: Pressure is released or redistributed. Time is allowed for slow processes. Diversity returns. No one, single force dominates.

’m still learning what this looks like in creativity. But I’m beginning to ask new questions: What does a real “yes” feel like in the body? What would letting roles end without justification mean?

A friend put it beautifully: “I want to only create space for my emotional ‘equals,’ because anything less is draining.” Equal here doesn’t mean quid pro quo, but reciprocity. Bees and flowers demonstrate it: flowers provide nectar, bees transfer pollen, enabling reproduction. It’s clear to me now that reciprocal exchange happens in nature and in human life. (There are plenty of other examples of the reciprocal exchanges in nature and of course, there’s the way we as humans can reciprocate with nature).

Recovery

At the end of last year, I finished writing my memoir about my mother and felt unexpectedly complete—not because the book was done, but because something in me had settled. The relational work was finished, whether or not a word was published.

In January, I asked: Do I want to publish this book? Am I scared? Do I feel I should? “Should” carries old pressure, and I didn’t want to repeat that. I decided to go ahead.

Am I behind schedule? Yes, but I’m trusting that recovery begins the moment pressure stops, not when my deadlines are met. I’m hoping to recognize that moment sooner now.

Note: Since writing this post, my final manuscript is on the way to my editor. There’s no going back now! :)

This winter arrived quietly, and then stayed. At some point in December, I realized it had pulled up a chair beside me and wasn’t in any hurry to leave.

It is starkly colder here though. We’re expecting a “winter storm”, which a friend aptly called, “waiting for Godot.” Quite fitting for the way we southerners brace ourselves for Armageddon-like predictions about winter weather.

I am on my porch, watching my breath hang in the air and I realize how I should open this newsletter: With a confession.

Old man winter and I are having an affair. He’s a scraggly old buzzard, a little stingy, and very fond of keeping me to himself. But this year, I don’t mind. He’s been generous in his own peculiar way.

Since December marks an anniversary of loss for me, I tend to lower my expectations a bit out of fragility. I don’t push as hard and I let myself go. He seems to like it.

For example, he gave me permission to slow down on my deadline for the memoir. March now is looking like May and that’s okay. Relaxing my self-imposed demands is getting easier.

He also coaxed me to dust off one of my treasured books and immerse myself in it. This book has pulled me out of more than one creative funk over the years, and every time I come back to it, it somehow meets me exactly where I am.

The Artist’s Way by Julia Cameron is the book in question. At this point, it feels less like a book about “creative unblocking” and more like a quiet, slightly nosy companion. It’s the kind that sits down next to you, asks a few good questions, and doesn’t seem to care if your coffee gets cold.

Ok, another confession: I have read The Artist’s Way several times, but I have never made it to the end! I consistently stall somewhere around chapter eight—usually right around the moment when the practices are working well—and I decide that finishing the book is no longer necessary. I simply wander off, improved.

I’ve noticed something curious about how I leave this book unfinished, treating my inability to finish it as a failure. Instead, it’s begun to feel like a pattern of some quieter, more intuitive part of me. It taps me on the shoulder and says, That’s enough for now. You can put this down.

What does keep resurfacing, though—both in the book and in my photography—is the theme of leaving things unfinished.

For instance, I still sometimes catch myself thinking it’s “too late” to share my work. That I missed the correct window or that creative legitimacy is governed by some narrow and invisible timeline that I apparently did not receive a copy of.

I also notice how carefully I pause before sharing images—trying, very earnestly, not to confuse my ego’s desire for recognition with a more honest impulse to share because the work simply wants to be seen.

And yes, if I’m being honest, there’s still a lingering fear of being judged as a little silly for taking my own form of self-expression seriously. (The horror.)

Looking back, I can see how automatically I used to measure my creative worth. These days, things feel more grounded—even if not exactly tidy.

I’m focusing less on outcomes and more on protecting my inner photographer’s vision. I’m defining “good enough” from the inside first, before outside opinions enter the frame. And instead of trying to silence my internal censor, I’m learning to work with it—letting it help me decide what’s actually worth my time and energy.

Lately I find myself wondering if making art without a clearly defined outcome isn’t a lack of direction. It’s a form of trust. One that asks me to stay connected to the creative current itself, rather than forcing it toward a predetermined result.

Honestly? It’s been especially helpful in winter—when the light is scarce, I shoot and develop more film, and the work turns inward instead. This feels like a season for listening, noticing, and letting things sit unfinished without rushing to resolve them.

Does any of this feel familiar?

Over the holidays, I created almost nothing. I devoted long stretches of time to being with family, and when the house finally quieted, I allowed myself the unfamiliar luxury of what I can only describe as productive nothingness.

This pause was not accidental, nor was it indulgent. It was a continuation of an agreement I made with myself in October, when I began opening toward new directions in my life and loosening my allegiance to urgency.

For years, one of my most persistent habits of mind has been the belief that good work must be completed on schedule—that progress is measured by finish lines reached, projects delivered, and proof provided.

Yet from late October through December, I deliberately stepped back from one or two projects and granted them more time than I had originally allowed. I wanted to know what it would feel like to extend time rather than compress it, and whether a different relationship to my work might emerge in the absence of pressure.

What I discovered was subtle but dramatically beneficial for me.

Long ago, I accepted that I am not a one-project person. My creative life has always moved in tandem: photography, writing, and music—all jealous lovers, each requiring a portion of my attention, each willing to remain patient so long as I return consistently.

Completing projects across all three, however, has often felt maddening, as though devotion itself were being measured against an artificial sense of order.

There was something quietly transformative about laying my manuscript on my desk and tucking my camera into a drawer in order to sing Christmas songs with my family—instead of the songs that I had worked on in my studio.

One or two nights, I would wander back to my desk with a glass of eggnog in hand, laughter spilling through the house behind me, simply to glance at the unfinished sections of my work. Rather than inducing pressure, these fragments felt strangely happy—more intimate, even, than their finished counterparts. They had not closed themselves off to me.

Unfinished work, I began to realize, holds a different kind of intimacy than finished work. It still allows for proximity. It still permits doubt, curiosity, and return.

During this period, I continued to write in my journal—because nothingness, I’ve learned, does not exclude writing in my journal. What follows are a few excerpts from those pages, offered as witnesses. Each entry corresponds to a Substack post it informed behind the scenes. Alongside, there’s a photograph from that same day that did not find its way into the published write up.

I share them here as a gesture of inspiration—for the unfinished parts of the creative process, and perhaps for the unfinished parts of ourselves. Here’s a toast to the unfinished — and letting it percolate!

Excerpt 1

Monday, October 27, 2025.

It’s Monday and we’re awaiting the arrival of the city’s first day of rain in weeks. The reckoning of Hurricane Melissa’s potential destruction on the Caribbean is the end of our drought here. An unjust reckoning, it seems.

That is Mother Nature though, complying with her twin self, dramatically acting out on her proclivities for simultaneous destruction and correction. Reckoning for her is indiscriminate. Like the government. And like me sometimes!

The heavy downpour on these pavements and the sound of the rain thudding against the grass just outside my front porch… all of it sounds like applause. Nature witnesses to herself, which is what I vow to do next year.

The Audience Comes Later - November 1

Excerpt 2

Tuesday, November 11

What is the highest value in your life? Freedom, obviously. If freedom is the opposite of bondage then why do we keep trying to bind ourselves to ideas, self-induced deadlines, people with plans for us that don’t align with our hearts?

It’s an evolutionary issue. Birds caged for too long become unwilling to fly when the door comes off the cage.

You enjoy your aloneness more than ever. You have made it your home and fortress. Let’s fly.

Photos in a Minor Key - November 15

Excerpt 3

Monday, December 8

I do remember my innocence perhaps more than others. I hold onto it tightly—romancing it, I suppose. Nostalgia is the anthem of limerence, even as we romance our ideas, our little worlds. But is there any true harm in that? Is there harm in striving to live through innocent hearts? The mistake is believing that innocence means no mistakes are made but my version of innocence includes forgiveness.

There are those I love who fear that total vulnerability, opting instead to sink in cold, murky waters. There’s tragedy of leaving those waters for me because the pain is not mine. And I cannot clip my wings as a salve for their scars; it does not heal them, but it costs me the sky.

Photos from a Minor Key: Fusion in B Minor

Excerpt 4

Tuesday, December 23

One sentence from December’s journal rings most true: “Human armor gets created through hardship. Humans must shape shift to break that armor and feel freedom.“

Learning how to dance with both light and darkness is part of shape shifting.

Better said: “I don’t think this season is meant to be an escape from the darkness. I think it’s meant to remind us that even in the darkest times, light and joy still exist.” - From Much Joy and Peace by . Yes!

Excerpt 5

Saturday, December 27

Mamita linda, (my dear Mom), I won’t ever forget this date you left us. I’m adjusting to a new way of being now, of thinking and believing.

I’m realizing how much time I’ve given in life to fixing and finishing, rather than savoring. You knew how to do the savoring well. What would life be like for me if I did too? It’s never too late to try.

I doubted if I could publish your memoir by the anniversary of your birthdate in 2026, but I’m not attached to that idea anymore. I’m trying to savor these last few steps. And in the doing of it all, my grief these years has evolved into an act of creation with so many smiles!

Last year I paused all social media. As part of preparation for my 2026 book publishing, I decided to go back through some of those accounts to do a clean up, trying to tighten up my presence. I found myself reflecting on how I navigated my identity on these platforms a decade ago, how it felt to shut it all down last year, and why I bother with it at all.

On Instagram for example, the holy grail seems to be the ability to produce a photograph that goes “viral"; unexpectedly breaking through the mundane by getting thousands of views, hundreds of likes, and dozens of comments. The suggestion is that this is something a photographer should aspire to to be successful.

For many, though, virality happens only once—a “social media one-hit wonder.” I haven’t missed that pressure at all…I haven’t missed frantically paddling through a sea of photos, crafting announcements about the important moments of my work in an effort to be noticed. It’s like shouting into a train station just as a roaring train pulls in while everyone is moving and no one is hearing.

During my last active year on Instagram I was known by my company name, Casa Dresden. One of my images featured on a street photography group ended up with roughly 20× the usual metrics on one of my photos. The same photo on my own profile reached only 68 likes, a mere fraction.

I continued producing hundreds of photographs, each receiving modest engagement, essentially disappearing into a jungle of digital noise. The algorithmic nature of visibility (occasional one-hit wonders) seemed a promising way to catapult my work, but most of my creative output remained under‑noticed.

The need to be seen is human. External cues that confirm our visibility are powerful hooks with a crooked angle. They pull us up and out, like fish yanked from water. There’s a sudden rush of aliveness but we’re still gasping for oxygen. I stopped taking the bait when I decided to leave social media.

Fast forward to today. Due to my intense disdain for marketing/advertising after years of work in the field have left me a bit jaded by it, I rarely look at metrics now. I’ve also come a very long way since I abandoned Instagram. I don’t need it per se, but do use it as a business card, of sorts, which feels acceptable to my inner judge. Anyway, not every user is misguided and eventually each user will find their way to their own truth, so I leave my card at their door.

In sum, I am grateful for the platform because of what it taught me about reshaping the presentation of my work to the world. And more importantly, how it showed me where I prefer to focus my time now in lieu of death scrolling.

Over time, I rewired my sense of visibility: it’s not about me being seen, but the energy I generate—the force behind my desire and the work it moves through. Taking my ego and sense of identity completely out of it as much as possible, I don’t own what I create. I’m just doing what my muse tells me to do.

If something I create were to go “viral” today, I strive to remove myself from the outcome. Not easy, I know, but feeling the rush of creation itself, I can focus on gratitude for the mirror of my own energy. The quieter practice of everyday photography becomes a no-brainer since it’s an opportunity for generating that rush for myself.

Many times I’ve asked myself: what about the silence? What happens if I keep creating and… crickets? That’s where refocusing on what matters comes in.

Take my music, for example. I rehearse vocals almost daily, often recording myself to catch the places I need to improve. I write songs that never get published, play keys and guitar on demos, and most recently, sing backup vocals for other musicians—my name appears only in the credits. Yet, in a way, music is way more powerful of a connection for me than photography.

For photography, I try to remember that it has become a daily, solitary practice—built for the long haul—for pleasure first, for understanding myself second. And of course, for working through thoughts, beliefs and emotions. If others notice something extraordinary in the process then beautiful! Again, I have my muse to thank.

I want to continue to build trust that the steady act of creating will eventually get reflected back to me, but only if I’m fulfilling my own desire first, not chasing virality….After all, we know what happens to one-hit wonders.

Can you believe we’re almost at the end of this strange, slippery 2025? I blinked and November arrived like a sudden guest standing in my kitchen an hour before the party starts—except with the way this year has been going, it feels more like the sudden appearance of a virus.

And if I have to hear the word “unprecedented” one more time, I may have to start drinking heavily. (And I’m not even a drinker.) Yet here we are. Somehow it’s been one of the most transformational years of my life—messy in places, clarifying in others—and I know I’m not alone in that.

Earlier in the year when I recommitted myself to meditation, it was to manage stress in a way I knew worked but it was also with the idea that it might help me with my creativity. Over the course of weeks though, I felt a bit frustrated because I wanted meditation to be some lightning bolt to arrive and tell me what’s next.

When that didn’t happen, circumstances lined up like little soldiers to escort me to another way. Last week I finally got away and spent real time with family and the water. I journaled more than I have in ages. One afternoon, I sat down and started naming the shifts that have changed my life this year. The one that stood out? Slowing down.

I didn’t slow down in any kind of intentional “new season, new me” way. It was more like my body and brain quietly staged a coup and refused to keep moving at the pace I’d been demanding. So I paused. In everything—especially with the camera.

That was not easy. I’m sure for some of you, slowing down is part of your creativity but it wasn’t for me. I’ve been rushing everything my whole life! I often heard and felt the alarms in my head, trying to get it all done in “time”. But time for what? Nothing but a lot of self-imposed deadlines to make myself feel better about my direction.

So, I thought, well… if I’m really plagued with so many obligations, why not try to be present with each one? Maybe I can cultivate this as a meditation itself? And that wasn’t easy either but slowly, I started to feel the engagement and the frenzy taper off. When I allowed myself to stop rushing, the world became a little less complicated.

There were setbacks. One night I heard my fourth-grade teacher, Sister Mary Ellen, chastising me in my head: “Haste makes waste!” She was a stern nun who terrified me, and I was always annoyed by her being right. It seems I finally listened. Slowing down gifted me more than I expected.

So here is this small list of what I noticed that changed in my creativity when I made that decision:

1. Light behaves differently when you’re not chasing it.

I remember feeling frustrated at the end of a day of shooting if I couldn’t find some interesting light. This year, I stopped chasing the perfect light, the perfect hour, the perfect whatever. Light is always there if I just stop desperately looking for it like a lonely person cruising the bars. I chose to stay open and just see what happened.

Sometimes, I shot nothing. I allowed that. Other times, what I found was light in soft places— wrapped around a tree, shining on an object unexpectedly or bursting through a cloud suddenly after a rain storm.

Light really surprised me this year. It became something I could wait for instead of something I had to control. Funny enough, light showed up a lot for me last week at the beach.

2. People look more like themselves when you’re not preoccupied.

Slowing down meant I noticed the micro-expressions, the in-between movements, the way strangers hold themselves when they think no one’s watching. These weren’t portraits. They were glimpses that felt honest.

3. Nature stopped whispering and started talking.

I’m often inspired by ’s notes series, “What I’ve Seen Today.” In similar fashion, I began to see and hear things previously unnoticed because I stopped behaving like I’m chronically late for a date. I’d see an insect I almost stepped on, the wind chimes outside my window, a bird’s call. These details started to strangely ground me.

4. Multitasking and rehearsing the next shot stopped.

There’s spaciousness in not planning the next ten frames or juggling three or four other distractions. A softness in not optimizing everything or coming home with only one satisfying photo. I knew that the urgency I felt wasn’t actually coming from outside—it was coming from inside. I just didn’t know how to reign it in. I’m having some success now.

And then there was one image.

It was the one image that kept popping up in my mind and in my catalog. It’s not the most compelling. It’s not the sharpest one. It’s definitely not the most technically impressive.

Yet it had this “Je ne sais quoi” that kept asking me to look at it again and again. I never knew how to categorize it or what to do with it. Maybe it was the particular kind of light - dappled and shaped. Or maybe it was the quiet moment a subject that meant something more to me than to most. Maybe it was the way slowing down let me see the scene fully before I photographed it.

Whatever the reason, it kept following me around. It tugged on me like a small child tugs on their mother’s skirt. It was a small confirmation that I don’t need to make more images, just truer ones.

So what does this photo mean to me? This is chopped wood from my mother’s 40 year-old dogwood tree. Six months after she died, the new owner began renovations on her home.

One day I drove by and that day he had happened to cut down her old tree. I was appalled, of course! Mom loved her plants and trees. It felt like someone tearing up her one of her pictures!

So, I stopped the car and threw all the dogwood stumps into my vehicle. My intent was to respectfully burn them one at a time in my chimney, but it’s been six years since I picked them up, they still sit in my backyard. Just as you see them.

A tiny closing thought

The most meaningful images aren’t the ones I plan or chase. They’re the ones that arrive quietly. If I’m not paying attention, I’ll miss them. I just have to slow down enough to let them find me.

I’m pretty happy that I’m at a place in my life that I can slow down successfully. Slowing down isn’t a creative luxury. It is the whole point of being.

Please consider sharing this with someone new who might appreciate it. Thanks.

Share The Additional f-Stop

As I write this, it’s my last night of a long-overdue holiday. I had a different piece planned for this week, but I decided to push it forward because I’m not quite finished basking in this perfect November weather along the coast of Anna Maria Island, and I wanted to share a few images.

But first, a little story about this place: Anna Maria’s shoreline literally shifts every year. The island is a living creature, almost. It’s restless, reshaping itself with storms, tides, and human preservation. Yet for years, Anna Maria and its neighboring towns and barrier islands had been mysteriously spared from the hurricanes that sweep through Florida each season. Storms approached and then seemed to turn away—until 2024 and Hurricane Milton.

Milton brought major destruction, wiping out historic piers with severe damage. Strong winds and storm surge flooded homes, scattered debris, downed utilities, and tore at the island’s fragile infrastructure. Recovery has been slow, with rebuilding still underway months later.

There’s an old legend behind that original lucky streak that was broken. Some say the native Tocobagans who once lived around Tampa Bay built ceremonial mounds intended to shield this coast from disastrous weather. The story goes that a particular clearing was sacred ground, a site of protection rituals no one was ever meant to build upon…until someone did and this broke the blessing.

Historians call it a fable dressed as memory. But sitting at the water’s edge today, I began to understand the desire behind it: the need to imagine something older and wiser guarding what feels fragile and treasured.

I’ve had my own storms these past few years: the loss of my nuclear family, the shifting tides in my work, the long, cathartic process of writing a memoir about my mother that is now entering its final design phase. As the book moves forward, I find myself reshaping my own perspective too. I’m reforming the beliefs I once thought immovable.

Beliefs I inherited about safety, certainty, about how a life holds together and who I say I am has been eroding and reshaping itself with each loss.

There’s something strangely liberating about this moment of awareness. You stop seeing yourself as the painting you’ve stood before for decades, every nuanced memorized and instead, you let it drift away in its own vessel.

I’m building new beliefs now—sometimes unsure if they’ll hold, but for the first time, willing to see everything differently.

An island protected by a story…a person trying to rebuild understanding after loss. Sometimes what saves us isn’t proof, but the belief that protection is still possible, even when we stand among the debris.

Here, at the sunset of this time of year, I invite you to sit with me by the water…

[This suggested tune while you browse supports musicians directly]

This season has had its impact on my level of introspection, but more on that later. This week, I want to share quick newsletter updates before diving into today’s reflection on rebellion in art and life. Think of this as a “2026 Manifesto”:

1. Updates continue on weekends, plus one Lens2Lens update once a month.

   In addition to my regular weekend updates, I publish one Lens2Lens conversation along with companion short piece mid-month on Wednesdays. The Lens 2 Lens calendar is set through March of 2026 and always looking for new conversations if you’re interested.

2. Zero paywall, just open doors. I choose to keep this newsletter free. I do ask that you continue to share, which is a great gift you can provide to me.

3. No AI assistance. I know some Substack authors love AI. I don’t mind reading, but I literally just can’t use it to write. I enjoy the process too much.

4. No filters—I’m done with the old scripts in my head that push me to see how I should see rather than what is. In 2026 you’ll see more of where I am, warts and all.

5. Continued collaboration. Community has a pretty clear definition and I’m all about the scenius—creative ecologies of artists and thinkers exchanging and evolving ideas. Invite me and I’ll probably accept.

And now, onto what happens when we stop following the rules—of genre, expectation, or self-definition.

Navigating Feelings Instead of Streets

Another year has passed of having stepped away from street photography as my main focus and guess what? I have survived! I’ve written before about my long, complicated love for the genre — how much I adore it, yet how taxing it can be on the soul. Street photography is a jealous muse, but I can’t be tethered.

Letting go of rigid definitions this year has been incredibly freeing. I no longer shoot on autopilot, chasing random, candid scenes. I enjoy feeling my way through the frame now. And I want to follow that instinct instead of impulse.

In 2020 I found new feelings in nature, embracing photo walks and making a practice of more meditative observations instead of solo races between crowded streets.

Then, a shift in 2023 made me question what I truly wanted from photography. I was reminded that what I truly longed for was to merge my images with my writing again, and to share them within the context of a creative community. About a year later, I found exactly that here on Substack.

In my off and on rebellion against who I thought I was as a photographer for the last five years, my heart took control of my pen and the camera instead. That internal rebellion was a powerful storm that swept away what no longer works and left fertile ground for what does.

I made mention of the fruits of this labor in one of my first newsletter updates of 2025, If You Knew How Powerful Your Thoughts Were. In this piece, I shared the stories of women who were true rebels at a time when it was unheard of for women to have a voice. I wanted a part two on that topic.

What is rebellion? Making art in and of itself is a rebellion, a challenge to the status quo. There’s a spark that ignites every time an idea is formed or we ask, “what if...?” It says, “I’m not comfortable anymore with the way things are and there is something that can be done about it.” Then comes the change of habit or new venture.

That’s why I pay so much attention to my thoughts—like an artist treats a canvas—observing them, laying them out, shading them, and occasionally stepping back to see the whole picture. This is how shifts occur more organically and in align with my true nature. The whole damn process stokes me like a fire!

So, as an homage to that fire, here is part two highlighting more rebel female artists. Three creators—Joni Mitchell, Frida Kahlo, and Cindy Sherman—have spent their lives doing exactly that: navigating the unseen landscape of self in alignment with the force of their true selves.

If any of this resonates, hit reply and tell me what rebellion looks like in your own creative practice. I’d like to feature a few of your stories next month.

Joni Mitchell – Sound as Topography

“Oh I am a lonely painter. I live in a box of paints. I’m frightened by the devil. And I’m drawn to those ones that ain’t afraid.” - Blue

If you think Joni Mitchell is just a folk singer, think again. She refused to let an industry built on formulas tell her how a woman should sound or behave. While record executives urged her to keep writing pretty ballads like Both Sides Now, she walked out of Los Angeles studios into the unknown. With her, she took over 50 of her original open guitar tunings, several jazz collaborations, and lyrics that baffled critics and inspired countless other singer-songwriters. Her 1979 album Mingus alienated those fans who wanted the folk goddess back, but she didn’t budge.

Her rebellion wasn’t loud, but intellectual and internal. She used dissonance, shifting rhythm, and lyrical ambiguity to defy the traditional identification of female vulnerability. Every guitar tuning change became a small revolution—her way of saying, “I will not be packaged and sold.”

When you hear her voice, you’re hearing a map drawn in defiance of commercial geography. Ultimately, Joni performed the ultimate act of rebellion by turning completely away from the music scene and back to her first love: visual arts. Today she is touted as one of the biggest influences on modern female singer-songwriters in history.

Cindy Sherman – A Visual Provocateur Who Turned the Camera on Patriarchy

“I am not interested in the self; I am interested in the idea of the self as a construction.” — Cindy Sherman, 1979

Cindy Sherman entered the art world at a time when male photographers dictated how women should appear—composed, consumable, silent. She shattered that dynamic by performing the archetypes herself. In Untitled Film Stills, she transformed herself into fictional characters and photographed them. She becomes the ingénue, the housewife, the runaway and each pose defied their definitions. The rebellion lies in her refusal to let viewers enjoy the image without questioning why they recognize it.

Her work infuriated critics who wanted to label her a feminist icon or a trickster and she rejected both of those labels. Instead, she insisted that identity itself is a costume. By taking control of the lens, she reversed the centuries-old power dynamic between male observer and female subject. In doing so, she took the very idea of “woman” as a static frame and turned it inside out.

Frida Kahlo – A Pain‑Powered Rebel Who Redefined Female Identity

“I paint my own reality. The only thing I’m obliged to do is to stay true to myself.” — Frida Kahlo

In Mexico in the 1930s, an audience in the art world expected women artists to be muses, not creators. Frida Kahlo painted herself as both. After a devastating bus accident, she turned her physical pain into a form of artistic protest. She rejected the masculine murals that dominated Mexican art at the time. Instead of gods and laborers, she painted her broken spine, her miscarriages, her tears, and her rage.

Each canvas was an act of rebellion against norms of machismo, of nationalism and of her own invisibility. She painted indigenous symbolism when country demanded conformity. She also made bisexuality visible during an era when it was dangerous to do so. Friday’s art demanded that the body—especially the female body—be seen as political territory. Her rebellion wasn’t only personal, it was revolutionary because of its refusal to beautify suffering or diminish contradictions.

Each of these women used art as a kind of map to draw in rebellion against the tidy borders others imposed. That’s what I’ve been learning, too: to trade the safety of categories (“street photographer,” “memoirist,” “daughter”) for the raw, uncertain terrain of simply becoming a better version of myself, unfolding every day.

When I stopped photographing what I thought people wanted to see and started photographing what I felt, I began to understand what rebellion really looks like—it’s not loud or performative. It’s a quiet decision to stay true to the messy geography within.

Lens 2 Lens Topic: Comparisons

When you look at others’ work, do you notice what stirs your own creativity—or what you think is missing in yours? It’s a question that’s close to my heart.

Creativity is infinite, and ideas often grow between us, but what happens when we spend more time gleaning from others than creating a vision for ourselves?

David of and I recently chatted about how easy it is to get lost in what everyone else is making. While it’s a sign that creativity keeps expanding, it can blur the line between inspiration and comparison. And what’s that common saying? “Comparison is the quiet thief of joy.”

Our conversation reminded me of a time when that truth really settled in for me—during the pandemic, when street photography could no longer be my focus. That pause opened a space to explore new shapes, forms, and ways of seeing. No longer with my street group by my side, it helped me to hone in more closely on the concept of artistic vision on a totally different terrain.

I hope you enjoy my conversation with David. And if you’re open to a slow, contemplative kind of conversation about photography (or any other art form) for the Lens 2 Lens section, I’d love to hear from you.

READ THE CONVERSATION

The Dream

It was almost time for the alarm to sound—my peak time for dreaming. I found myself wandering an open market where everything appeared in monochrome. Vendors milled about, trinkets glistened on tables, and everything, including people, clothes, and the sky was a stark white outlined in black.

To my left stood a full-length mirror glistening in the sun. I lifted my camera to take a shot, but the reflection wasn’t me. Instead, a figure appeared. It was someone I hadn’t seen in over 30 years.

She stood frozen, dressed in a monochrome sweater and jeans, glaring with the same doe-like eyes that once cut me to the core. Those eyes, once daggers, now pierced the glass with youthful innocence. I turned to face her, but nothing…the street behind me was empty.

Why would I dream about someone I haven’t seen or barely thought of in three decades?! I woke up and the dream lay heavy on me like a woolen blanket, whispering, ‘Just say no to work. Stay and dissect this.’ A minute later, I heard the sound of my usual white noise alarm.

On Never Quite Belonging

As the morning moved on, the dream lingered like a puzzle I needed to solve. Serendipitously, Substack nudged me toward the final piece of ’s seven-part essay series Neither Here Nor There. Fraser’s series explores how growing up between cultures breeds both loneliness and a unique creative edge.

Many of us know that quiet ache of never quite belonging—whether between cities, jobs, or friendships. For me, that feeling surfaced early, waxing and waning like the moon. Each return to the States after time abroad brought reverse culture shock and the sense that I didn’t fully belong anywhere.

That undercurrent shaped me quietly, enough to whisper adaptation strategies but never loudly enough to demand attention. Melancholy and romanticism seeped into my creative work, becoming the soil where self-expression took root.

The girl in the dream reminded me of that younger self who was lost between cultures, her self-esteem a tiny acorn seeking ground. Back then, I saw myself through the eyes of someone more talented and confident, which bred unnecessary drama and self-doubt. As Fraser writes:

Living on the periphery sharpens the gaze, deepens the act of observation, and allows us to make meaning out of fragments. We learn to read a room, a culture, a cue. We develop deep wells of empathy and the technical skills to transform observation into art. But we can also feel rootless, adrift, perpetually explaining ourselves to others—and to ourselves.

Otherness, she suggests, becomes a creative gift. It teaches empathy, observation, and the art of making sense from fragments, even as it leaves us feeling rootless.

That paradox shaped my creative identity from the tension between wanting to belong and the need to create from the margins.

Navigating Fragments

Wanting to be seen and understood is universal. Disapproval, especially when young, wounds deeply. Following the heart—in relationships or art—always felt like both obligation and risk: the obligation being that there was never another option, the risk being exposure to misunderstanding or indifference.

But giving in to that fear only breeds dependence on the audience and blocks the inner current that fuels authentic work. The creative dilemma is always the same: retreat into safety or walk the vulnerable path toward expression.

The dream connected the dots. The reflection wasn’t that girl I haven’t seen in over 30 years. The reflection was the part of me that recently wrote, Architectures of Healing, the self sensing a reconstruction in progress. My work, I understood, has been cobbling together meaning from fractures and uncertainties all along.

Rather than chasing a single, “authentic” voice, I’ve learned to navigate through fragments—the gaps between certainties, the tension of never fitting neatly anywhere. And it is all a gift! The camera, the pen, and the song are my ways of stitching scattered experiences into coherence, all the while, serving as my lifeline.

Perhaps the dream was reminding me: That project left incomplete, the person who never looked at my images, my aggressive deadlines? Those are just constructs built from hopes, dreams, fears and expectations. The substance behind my work has been built from an accumulation beauty and pain in an effort to feed me life. And the end result is that there is a living, breathing singular voice. It’s a voice that isn’t meant for everyone, but that’s okay.

The Real Audience

The primary dialogue is between me and the work and the work isn’t for anyone else to judge until it insists on being seen. Creative work often requires shelter—time for a piece to find its place in the heart before meeting the world. Letting my work simmer is ok because casting a net too early or out of a sense of urgency hands over a sacred part of my process. The audience can tell me if they’re moved by my work, but they can’t gauge if the timing was correct or where the work belongs in my framework.

The work is the first audience; the rest follows—and that, perhaps, is the only reflection that truly matters.

What fragment of your own past is waiting in the mirror of your work? You may discover a new thread for your art.

A few film photographs of nature’s mirror:

In the news of late, we hear references to the early days of the U.S. White House’s existence, where a modest wooden residence once stood and where today, it is supplanted by a grand neoclassical edifice. All over the world, surges of resources and prestige have exercised the power to rewrite a landscape in a single generation. Such is the case with the Recoleta of Buenos Aires.

In the early eighteenth century a modest community of Franciscan monks settled on a quiet hill just beyond the limits of Buenos Aires, Argentina giving the area its name, Recoleta. For decades the neighborhood lingered peacefully, on the edge of obscurity and on the fringes of the city.

In 1871, a brutal yellow‑fever epidemic swept through the low‑lying districts. Buenos Aires’ wealthiest families fled seeking higher, healthier ground. They arrived in Recoleta en masse, and almost overnight the hill transformed. French architecture and imported stone comprised a budding landscape alongside the monks’ humble cloisters. And the fledgling suburb earned the nickname “Little Paris.”

That sudden influx of aristocracy filled the monks’ old burial ground with elaborate mausoleums, marble vaults, and sculpted statues, birthing the famed Recoleta Cemetery. It became the final resting place for Buenos Aires’ elite—among them the iconic Eva Perón, turning the cemetery into a sprawling outdoor museum of grief and grandeur.

Tragedy that spurred an exodus, a flood of wealth that reshaped a hill, and an enduring legacy etched in stone, marble, and memory—that’s the summary of how Recoleta began.

I came home with several rolls of film from this trip, but used only the black and white for the Recoleta cemetery. I’ll never forget the dramatic majesty of every surprising corner, its labyrinth of statues and vaults and the large community of cats!

The history of the Recoleta cemetery has taken a seat in the backstage theater of my mind ever since my visit to Buenos Aires—and I’ve struggled with how to give the cemetery its due…until this week.

When I reviewed the film images, it didn’t take long to realize that they represent a map of the inner terrain I’ve traversed over time. In the Recoleta I saw broken glass to dusty, forgotten enclosures and scattered objects left for what seems like decades behind a chained up tomb. In my own life, I've seen elements of challenges, grief, or despair followed by elation and endurance.

But isn’t that life for us all? A quiet hill and a modest resting place are the starting points of any turning point—calm, ordinary routines that feel safe… until an unexpected outbreak of upheaval forces us to confront a harsher reality, at which point we must find ways to grieve, regroup and rebirth.

Just as the White House was rebuilt from a humble cabin into a symbol of national ambition, and as Recoleta was reshaped from monastic solitude into a “Little Paris” of marble and memory, I too can reconstruct myself at any point in time. The epidemic that drove the wealthy uphill mirrors the crises that pushes me toward higher ground. The practices—mindfulness, writing, art—are what I invite to redesign the interior of my own life.

The cemetery, a collective archive of loss, reminds me that grief gains shape when I name it, memorialize it, and eventually turn it into a shared space of meaning. In that parallel lies a quiet instruction: when trauma strikes, seek the higher ground, enlist new architects, and build a personal “cemetery” of remembrance. In doing so, the rubble of loss can become, like Recoleta’s marble vaults, a lasting testament to resilience.

While AI can render photos of this cemetery in seconds, my film shots took years to bring to light, reminding me of my own capacity to rebuild, to re-architect, and to endure, even over time.

Kodak Tri-X 400, Olympus OM 2N

While wandering through the aisles of my neighborhood camera shop, a massive bin of negatives and prints caught my eye—towering stacks of white envelopes, some coated in a thin layer of dust.

“People just drop film off and never come back for it?” I asked the manager, half-laughing, half-confused.

He grimaced, then gave a small shrug. “Yes,” he said quietly.

I looked again at the pile—the weight of the bin, the dust gathering in the corners. In that moment, I thought: discarding the negative feels almost sacrilegious.

While I sifted through the lens filters and available Nikon lenses, I thought about my basement darkroom. How I love the slow choreography: Hanging strips to dry, laying them on the light box, choosing which image to enlarge. Jazz hums from my old boom box, the air carries the sharp scent of chemicals, and the red safelight bathes it all in a soft, mysterious glow.

While scanning is a chore, the ritual is the reward. Even when I don’t do it often, those tactile steps ground me. And the negative is the golden chalice.

I was ready to leave but there was a young girl who had come in a few minutes earlier and I wanted her to leave first so I could continue my conversation with the manager. She lingered though. She asked dozens of questions about their Kodak disposable cameras, laughed loudly like a tropical bird, and smelled strongly of pachouli. Was she one of the “ones” who leaves her negatives? When she walked out, I made my way back to the counter with my one 46mm lens cap.

“So they never pick up the negatives?” I asked again. “Why?”

“Most pay for developing, prints, and scans,” he said. “But once they get their scans by e-mail, that’s it. We have to keep the negatives and prints for years though.”

On the way home I thought, why does the negative matter to me so much? I wondered if I am just clinging to nostalgia?

What I realized is that it’s not really about the film. The issue is tied to vision itself. The negative, much like vision, holds a delicate truth about the self: what we choose to keep, what we let go, and how we define ourselves as creators.

In my first Lens-to-Lens conversation entitled, Beyond the Photographic Style, and I explored “vision” as a replacement for the concept of “style.” That word “vision” lingered long after the discussion ended. What does it really mean to me? My visit to the camera store started my quest for an answer.

Vision, for me, isn’t just a mental picture of what’s ahead—it’s the fragile belief I hold about myself as a creator. When that belief wavers, it seeps into everything: my work, my relationships, the shortcuts I chase, even how I treat a negative.

For much of my life, vision lived somewhere behind a curtain in my mind. Whenever I tried to call myself an artist, a cold wave of impostor syndrome washed over me, and I’d retreat behind the excuse that the work wasn’t good enough.

Years of exhibitions, missed deadlines, aging vocal cords, and endless essay revisions eventually proved otherwise. They showed me that what I was doing was enough…for me. That the gap between who I thought I was and who I was becoming was closing.

Because, after all, who I am is how I lead my life.
Who I am is how I lead my life.
Who I am is how I lead my life.

I have to repeat that mantra to myself now that I’ve learned it.

Because when I stopped treating personal growth as extra credit—and began valuing it alongside creative growth—did the frustration finally melt away.

In my earlier years, my vision was clouded with doubt—believing I wasn’t good enough. Then it shifted to competition—not measuring up to others. At times it became despair—why bother at all? Eventually, it circled back to faith.

The Inner Dialogue

Sometimes my mind would spin with thoughts like:

“That photographer’s feed outshines mine.”
“I need more followers.”
“I should reword that paragraph—make it more compelling.”
“My former bandmate’s track just blew up overnight… I’m wasting time.”

Beneath those thoughts live quieter beliefs:

If I had more followers, I’d finally feel good enough.
If I twist my words just right, people will understand me.
If I don’t work fast enough, I’ll fail.

To balance them out, I remind myself:

“Good enough” is a practice from within.
Scarcity comes from looking outward.
Authenticity draws the right audience.
Aim for productive, strategic urgency—not wild urgency (there’s a difference).

Those thoughts of chasing likes, followers, or virality promise instant validation—but they leave the deeper, slower work untouched, like a pile of forgotten negatives in a camera shop.

So, what is vision, really? Over time I’ve realized it isn’t a fixed destination—it’s a series of stories that shift with my inner landscape.

Think of a weekend hike: you pick a spot, you pack, you walk, you pause to breathe. You might stray off the trail, but you always know how you want to feel along the way.

With creative vision, I rarely know the exact path ahead. But I know how I want to feel along the way—so I make a plan and allow for change.

Faith in myself as a creative (or artist, depending on the day) is the audacity to believe something can emerge from nothing: that a photograph might spark a series, a night at the piano could become a song, or that something I write might move someone else.

The struggle to keep faith never fully disappears—but faith itself grows stronger with each season’s work.

These days I often ask: what is my vision today? If I locked myself to one narrow path, I’d lose perspective. My goals would either feel too near or too far.

The Artist’s Eyesight

Lastly, I’d like to frame this awareness around hyperopia and myopia:

Hyperopia (farsightedness): Seeing only the distant horizon—envy, perfectionism, endless longing.
Myopia (nearsightedness): Fixating on the immediate—burnout, narrowed imagination.

Both distort the artist’s eye. The cure isn’t a prescription but a recalibration—allowing space to rest, wander, and let vision expand and contract like breath.

Dr. Juliette’s prescription:

1. Continue to make friends with my well-qualified inner voice.

2. Continue to settle the scores I have with that voice. It tells me the degree of my farsightedness or nearsightedness—and how to correct my vision.

3. Identify one small ritual that holds me back. Then give it space. That act becomes an invitation to clarity. And with clarity comes improved vision.
   
   If what I see—near or far—no longer brings joy, if I feel tight, small, rushed, boastful, or frenzied, it’s time to pause and listen for that quiet inner doctor who knows when to hand me new lenses.

Photos taken after I left the camera shop:

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Once a year, there’s a salsa festival not far from where I live. I usually go for the street photography. Dusk offers its stream of golden light—Rembrandt tones on food vendors, flares off food trucks, and the wild, chaotic, shiny trinkets for sale.

But this year, I got more than a decisive moment. I found a metaphor for the last few weeks of my life.

I began, as always, by scanning for compositions. My OM-3 in hand, I tuned in for street mode. Just as I found my rhythm, the PA crackled with the emcee’s booming voice. We all gathered around the stage. I switched lenses.

“Is anyone here Cuban?” A third of the crowd roared, fists high. Then the dancers appeared. Smiles were contagious. We all gathered tightly together. I took a few shots of the dancers in their Havana-themed dresses.

But then, I lowered the camera. Soon I was swaying to the congas, body remembering what the mind had forgotten…

The emcee returned: “Who here knows how to salsa?” Those who didn’t were about to learn! The emcee and the dancers broke it down—the basic steps, a twirl, and then, the camina.

In salsa, camina means walk. But it isn’t just walking. (The leader and follower alternate movement, with the leader moving forward or across the follower, leading to rotations.)

When the crowd began to dance, the emcee said, “If you are at a party with Latinos and there’s no dancing, there was never a party.” The crowd roared again. He was right.

I’m watching the instructor teach these moves and the crowd stumble over each other trying to mimic the steps. Yes, I’m chuckling a little. And I’m also remembering a part of who I am—not as a creative person, but as a person without my tools.

I put my camera in the bag.

A successful camina means: Feel the rhythm, let the music carry you forward with grace. When the congas settle into their tumbao, when the bass locks in, the groove itself says: camina. Step in. Trust it. Keep moving.

So we moved. A lot. (Note to self: wear better shoes next year.) I realized—it had been a long time since I’d done this with my body, but I had been doing it with my mind.

If there’s one trait I never want to lose, it’s this: knowing how to move, when to move, how often to move—even when the world feels still and heavy. That instinct is my Latin inheritance where movement is survival. From the moment you can stand, you’re taught to dance so you can purge everything that stands in your way. Music is heartbeat to that release. You move before you know how to think. And sorrow and joy find their voice in the same turn of the body.

Dance, for us, is never about perfection. It’s about shaking loose whatever clings—fear, grief, worry—and letting rhythm carry it away. You step, you spin, you laugh, you sweat—and what once felt immovable begins to flow.

My art is the same. Photography, writing, music—all of it calls me back to movement. To create is to refuse stagnation. To lift the camera is to say: I am still here. I am still alive. I am still moving.

Latin culture taught me beauty is not the absence of pain—it is what rises from it. A salsa danced in mourning. A cumbia at the edge of uncertainty. A mariachi ballad played louder than despair. Dance is not denial. It is transformation.

I carry that inheritance through my lens: to embrace, to release, to let the image—like the body in motion—turn everything around.

It keeps me alive to the possibility that—even in darkness—movement is always waiting. Sometimes that movement means reaching for the camera. And sometimes, like tonight, it means putting it away—and letting myself dance.

After the event, when we finally stumbled into the Irish pub—sweaty, sore, somewhere between a pretzel and a beer—I remembered a comment from a subscriber on a recent post: “How does creating art that helps us forget the darkness actually contribute to beating the darkness?”

I thought of that question, of the answer I had tried to give, and then I smiled. Because I knew—I had danced enough tonight to write this piece, and maybe, hopefully, to shine a little light in the dark.

A recent article about film‑vs‑digital caught my attention. It stirred the impulse to examine that tug‑of‑war and its tendency for what I call, “trend trapping”. I don’t normally veer towards opinion pieces, but today I feel inclined to offer my point-of-view and some possible alternative approaches to consider.

Note: Not everyone feels strongly about film vs. digital—many photographers simply aren’t interested in anything but the tool they use without judgment or pretense. This post isn’t aimed at those who are relaxed in their approach; it’s for anyone who feels stuck, torn between mediums or maybe even unable to recognize the tight, tense feeling that comes from staunchly gripping the same belief for 15 years. No matter where you stand, thanks for taking some moments to read this.

30 years of film vs. digital

Artists rarely argue about charcoal versus watercolor. No need—each medium speaks its own visual language within artistic circles. Film and digital though, have been chronically pitted against each other for a thirty‑year‑long side‑by‑side debate.

At the height of digital dominance, most photographers had long sold off their last set of darkroom tongs or packs of Ilford paper. Yet around 2015, the cinematic world’s craving for the texture of older motion picture stock sparked a film photography revival. A wildfire of young enthusiasts waving the flag of nostalgia began scooping up film SLRs and point-and-shoots on eBay in a ten-year-long crescendo. Today, that passion carries a kind of cultural hierarchy: film = pure, digital = disposable.

That divide quickly ushered in some gatekeeping—analog purists dismissing digital, and digital die-hards feeling nauseous at the thought of going back to film.

The article that sparked this post gushed over film with the longing of a schoolgirl crush, claiming that “each step roots you in the moment in a way a mirrorless burst never can.”

Yet less than an hour later, I heard the opposite: a YouTube creator, mid-livestream, declaring flatly that “film is dead” and he’s “never going back.”

History repeats itself

Think of the 1970s vinyl‑vs‑cassette war, the early‑2000s hand‑drawn‑vs‑vector debate, or today’s AI‑generated art controversy. Each time a new medium arrives, the old one is cast as the “real” one.

When Kodak closed its Rochester plant in 2006, many declared, “film is dead”. However, we saw Ektachrome revived in 2017 and Instax explode in 2018. The cycle of “new = bad, old = good” keeps coming back.

Nostalgia-driven branding began sprinkling the word, “analogue” as a nostalgic, cultural badge for any continuous, tactile medium that stands in contrast to today’s discrete, digital technologies.

Trend-trapping and superior-thinking

Show a Fujifilm loyalist or full frame snob a stunning set of street photos taken on a Micro-Four-Thirds camera. Ask if they’d consider switching—chances are, they’ll scoff. Show a film photography novice the wonder of a digital photographic set with consistent results at one-third of the cost and none of the waiting. Chances are, they’ll insist it lacks soul.

When we are “trend-trapping”, we chase what’s “in”. We cling too tightly to a single medium or style, rejecting all else. In doing this, we risk being trapped—swapping genuine drive because of an identity crisis, insecurity, lack of experience, the lure of external validation or other vulnerabilities we don’t want to examine.

When we are confident about photography we don’t care to shun other mediums. We practice respecting another artist’s choice of medium and see each medium as a different language. We could choose film when we want tactile patience, digital when we need instant feedback. The decision might then serve the story or emotion, not the hype.

Willingness is the seed of creative growth

I started with film photography (it was not called “analogue” in the 90s), then to digital then back again to film. Now, the two live comfortably with each other in my camera cabinet, side by side.

In a POV Magazine interview, Sebastião Salgado, who just passed away this year is quoted on not just the reason for his choice of switching from film to digital, but his fascinating process in obtaining the results he wanted.

“After what happened in New York in 2001, airport security started to change, and in a month it became hell. I remember once, after working in Guatemala, I lost 52 rolls of film because of the X‑rays at the airport. So I changed to digital…”

“…when I make my final selection, we produce a negative from the digital archive in a quality that is better than when I photographed directly with a negative camera. From this archive we introduce the grain from the Tri‑X film that I have worked with my whole life, and they produce for me a 4 × 5‑inch negative, then we go to the enlarger and we print again.”

Salgado had a practical reason for adopting a digital workflow (protecting his work from X‑ray damage). Yet he had an artistic strategy for preserving the characteristic Tri‑X grain by re‑applying it to the digital negative before printing.

Although I don’t personally know a lot photographers who shoot both digital and film, I do find those who have expressed to me disdain for the other medium.

Yet when we adorn one medium with titles such as, “more emotional”, “more real”, or somehow superior, we create a binary subculture no different from right-wing versus liberal. In doing so, we dismiss half the remarkable possibilities the other medium offers. Adaptation, modification, and change are natural—and necessary—for growth. If we treat the tool as dogma rather than as a means to an end, and we miss out on techniques and experiments that another format might make effortless.

A painter who insists that oil is the only “real” medium, dismissing acrylics as cheap or inferior might never discover the layering techniques and fast-drying possibilities acrylics open up. On the flip side, an acrylic-only painter might never experience the depth and richness oil can bring. In either case, clinging to one medium as the “truth” means ignoring half the palette of creative potential.

Likewise, a digital-only photographer might miss the tactile rhythm and patience that film demands, where every frame is meaningful. Meanwhile, a film-only photographer might overlook the freedom digital offers to experiment endlessly with exposure, color, or composition without added cost. In both cases, treating one medium as superior closes the door on creative possibilities the other makes accessible.

Clinging to one medium, camera brand or any artistic tool as a status symbol—or dismissing the other as inferior—creates blind spots. Time and experience taught me to stop identifying myself as “a street photographer who shoots from the hip with a RicohGR in one hand and a film camera in the other.” Today, I identify myself as a person who loves to practice the art of photography and other artistic expressions. When I’m asked to define myself further, I can, but often that doesn’t represent me well.

On being PolyCamerous

I’ve decided on a new word: PolyCamerous.

PolyCamerous: (noun) a photographic approach characterized by having intimate, emotional relations with multiple types of cameras simultaneously—regardless of the medium—with the informed, open consent of one’s own healthy ego and liberated mindset.

The sweet spot for me, is to treat each as a distinct tool in the same toolbox. I pick the one whose strengths align with the story I want to tell or emotions I want to convey. Then I move on to the next when the narrative calls for a different set of capabilities.

This is just my approach but it has expanded both my visual vocabulary and my creative mindset. I often carry both a digital and film camera and each situation asks me to use one or both for different reasons.

Some final, alternative thoughts (for alternative lifestyles)

1. Tool‑agnostic learning accelerates skill acquisition.

   When you treat film and digital as interchangeable resources, you pick the one that best solves the problem at hand (e.g., dynamic range, grain texture, instant feedback). Same thing will apply to all artistic mediums.

   
   Snobbery forces you into a single‑tool workflow, limiting exposure to alternative techniques and viewpoints.

2. Creative stagnation follows doctrinal rigidity.

   A “film‑purist” may avoid experimenting with post‑processing, masking the chance to explore color grading, composite workflows, or rapid iteration.

   
   A “digital‑purist” may ignore the meditative discipline that film imposes, losing the habit of pre‑visualizing each shot and learning to trust light.

3. Adaptability suffers.

   In working with clients, some often request specific deliverables (e.g., high‑resolution RAW files, large‑format prints, archival negatives). A photographer who refuses to cross the film/digital divide may decline work or deliver sub‑optimal results, hampering career growth, missing out on ways to more authentic expression.

Great work isn’t born from the newest film stock or the flashiest full frame lens. It’s born from the moment that catches us off‑guard and demands a record. Flexibility, willingness to experiment, and a problem‑first mindset are what push us forward. Snobbery keeps us stuck in a comfort zone.

When we stop paying credence to what comes from the external and listen to that quiet pull—light, texture, feeling—we let the authentic creator shine through—the one that has a partnership with the creative source we all belong to.

Consider a hybrid, tool‑agnostic approach as a possible path to continued artistic and technical development. And whether loading a fresh roll of film or snapping a JPEG, let the choice be guided by the story we want to tell, not by what is trending or what our egos tell us we should do.

And seriously, let’s STOP the film‑vs‑digital comparisons.

Bob Newhart’s “Stop it” skit:

Reminder: Lens 2 Lens, my collaborative discussion section, is open to anyone, regardless of your preferred genre or level of experience. Right now, I have really interesting conversations going and openings for publication are filled until March of next year, but it’s never too early to start a conversation. Just message me if you want to connect.

First of all, a warm welcome to all the new subscribers! It means a great deal that you chose to follow me here on Substack. Thank you. My regular newsletter is mostly published on Saturdays, but from time to time if I am inspired to do so, I’ll release an extra one mid-week.

My Lens 2 Lens section is also published once a month, mid-week. Reminder: Lens 2 Lens is open to anyone, regardless of your preferred genre or level of experience. Right now, I have really interesting conversations going and openings for publication are filled until March of next year, but it’s never too early to start a conversation. Just message me if you want to connect.

Give Me Optimism Or Give Me Death!

Last year, I was at an event with two friends when the conversation turned to a dark piece of writing by a well-known author. One friend praised it; the other frowned. “I didn’t like it at all,” he said. “Strange for her to write something so morbid. She must be going through a depression or something.”

That moment came back to me recently. It was no coincidence I had just published, Creativity in a Dark Word. I started wondering: why do we so often assume that if someone says, does or creates something dark, they must be dark themselves? It’s as if we’ve been trained to believe art is always autobiographical—that a gloomy story or unsettling photograph must be a direct reflection of the person who made it.

I wondered too, if that’s a particularly American lens. We love our optimism, our Little Miss Mary Sunshine outlooks, and maybe that makes us uneasy with the idea that an artist can step into the shadows without living there.

But the truth is, creating isn’t usually about wallowing in darkness—it’s about working through it.

Art as a Vessel

For many of us as writers, photographers, musicians and the like, our work becomes a container. It evolves into a way of externalizing the heaviness we all feel at times. By placing it on a page, a canvas, or through a lens, we give those emotions shape and distance. We make them containable. For me, that process is a release. It keeps the storm from spilling over into everyday life.

Consider Edgar Allan Poe. Most remember him as the master of the macabre, yet people who knew him well often described him as kind, gentle, even playful. The Raven wasn’t proof of an irreparably broken man—it was an exploration of grief that may have helped him live with more balance.

In this way, going dark is often the opposite of despair. It’s catharsis! A healthy act of separation, where the work shoulders the weight so the artist doesn’t have to.

True Freedom

So the next time you are questioned about a moody photograph or grim piece of work and you’re clear about your own feelings, resist the impulse to answer “what’s wrong with you?” Chances are, nothing is wrong.

What is being revealed may not be depression, sadness or darkness, but actual freedom. You may be an artist who’s found a way to let the darkness live somewhere other than inside them. And that’s a gift!

Afternoons by the Tracks

Laughter in the face of cruelty feels like a displaced insurrection. At first glance, it’s like a slap in the face. Yet Roberto Benigni’s Life is Beautiful refused to obey rules that obliged, heavy and reverent response. Instead, it used humor as a weapon against the forces that aim to strip people of their humanity.

If you haven’t seen Benigni’s film, you must. Guido, the film’s stoically cheerful hero, has a buoyant energy he later uses to protect his child from the unimaginable. When he and his family are deported to a concentration camp, that same humor becomes a survival strategy. He masks the horrors around him into a fictitious, elaborate game with rules, points, and a grand prize — all so that his young son sees only a game, not a nightmare.

Guido not only protects his child’s innocence but also refuses to surrender to the dehumanizing logic of the camp. His humor, outlandish as it may seem in such a place, becomes a language of hope.

So what does this have to do with creativity?

What I was listening to while writing this…

As someone living in the United States at the moment, I can tell you that conversations of late between my colleagues, friends and family have been marked with discouragement and frustration. It’s been challenging for most I know to conjure up hope, much less any sense of creative play.

To be honest, I don’t know how I’ve been able to do it, aside from just a sense of sheer determination to never lose one of the most important things in my life: my creative drive.

This morning out of nowhere though, I thought of Benigni’s film. I thought of the approach that invites a conversation about the ethics of storytelling juxtaposed the shadow of historical trauma. I made a deal with myself.

If I cannot change the horror of the story, I can live through the story from my best self. In doing this, I don’t discount what is happening, but I reframe what I’m experiencing in a way that encourages and fuels energy—energy towards those I love and the actions that bring me joy. I choose love over fear. I think that’s what Guido did in the movie.

To seek love of life—even if I cannot do it as often as I like—is to refuse to obey rules that oblige an expected, heavy and reverent response. Instead, I can use my creativity as a weapon against the forces that aim to strip people of their humanity.

Life is Beautiful doesn’t explicitly show suffering. It trusts the audience to feel the weight of events without needing every horror shown in full. It reframes the story in a child-like way because it is filtered through the eyes of a child. It’s dreamy and selective. Beauty and horror coexist in the merging images.

Life is Beautiful is not a denial of pain. It is an acknowledgment that joy can live alongside it. Even in the most desperate circumstances, the creative act can be an act of courage. Childhood can be a safe hiding place, storytelling can be a moral choice, and memory can blur the lines between survival and a myth.

Life can be beautiful by holding onto humanity when everything else is stripped away.

History is not just a record of what happened, but of how it is remembered and retold. It’s shaped by human perspective, emotion, and the instinct to find meaning amid chaos. What I focus on today is how I choose to remember and retell my experience.

(This piece is dedicated to my creative cohort and her beloved, Ben).

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