Life as a Documentarian
I thought I was trying to keep things. I think I was learning how to let them go.
I used to think documentation was about preservation, but lately I think it has been teaching me how to recognize the beginning of something new. And sometimes, photographs alone are not enough. I collect handwritten notes, shoot video, record voice memos, and journal. I keep ticket stubs and receipts, press flowers between pages, and bookmark songs that soundtrack a moment. More than anything, I am on a constant search for people who inspire me. I look for muses everywhere I go.
When the new year began after I graduated college, I started journaling every day. What began as a daily ritual slowly became a way of witnessing change while it was happening.
Growing up as a documentarian has taught me that eventually and always, something will shift. I feel it first like the skip of a heartbeat. Quick, and impossible to ignore. But there are always reasons to stay. A favorite beach. Nails in the walls. Important things on the calendar. And when the thought of leaving arrives, it feels unbearable.
So I grip tighter.
Before every major transition, there is often a strange in-between period where my roots grow to the edges of their container. A knowing begins to form long before movement does.
Eventually, change surfaces.
Not because what I built was wrong, but because there is more.
I’ve felt this sensation before: the ache of loving a moment while simultaneously understanding it cannot last. A tiny garage crowded with surf trophies and party lights. The sound of flip flops against old carpet. Loving people in slow motion because some part of me already knows I will someday miss them.
When goodbyes become unavoidable, I instinctively cling harder. I photograph everything. I try to preserve the feeling before it disappears.
But every ending seems to create space for the next little life to find you.
In December of 2023, before any of the change had fully arrived, I wrote this in my journal:
“My comfort zone will be packed into cardboard boxes… My cameras will protect my comfort. My backpacks will hold only the weight of what I need and the unknown will lead me to exactly where I need to be.”
At the time, I thought I was writing about escape.
Now I think I was writing about trust, and the adventure of becoming.
