2019 came upon me this year without warning. I mean, yes, I KNEW it was coming, obviously. My calendar ended abruptly on December 31st, and I figured the world would keep turning past that date. But, due to events that occupied my life at the end of fall 2018, my normal end-of-year activities had absolutely no flow. And that’s really how it works for my business--there is an ebb and flow to it, depending upon time of year. Summer and fall, clear up to Christmas is my time in the rapids, with work happening on all fronts. Winter and spring bring more placid waters, time to float, to adjust, to tweak. It’s been that way for me since I started in creative business 20 or so years ago. This year was different.
The meat of the matter was this: on November 3rd I received a text from my oldest sister, Jill. It said something to the effect that her husband, Randy, had experienced a bad bicycling accident, and, although he had been in many biking accidents over the years (as mountain biking was his love), this time, she was very worried. Jill is a nurse. It takes a lot to worry her. So, ever the empathizer, I began to worry as well, about Randy, but also about Jill and their daughter, Devon. And the fast-moving-but-manageable river of my life transformed itself into a barrel ride over Niagara Falls. This ride was most intense during the following 43 days of Randy’s time in the hospital, but I think it continues even now.
I continued my autumn work during this time, speaking often with Jill, reading her many expressive Facebook updates, and we all just hoped for the best. I visited Randy and felt the seriousness of his accident viscerally, like a sickening punch to the gut.
On December 12th, after a two-step forward and one-step back dance that began with his horrible, skull-shattering accident in St. Joseph, Mo, continued through hospitalization in Kansas City, and then at Madonna in Lincoln, Randy Tracy suffered a huge, unrecoverable brain bleed. He died surrounded by all of us in a small room in a Lincoln hospital on December 15th. He was 53. He would have given you the shirt off his back--that’s the kind of man he was. So he donated his organs. My sister, Jill, and her daughter, Devon, are the quiet heroes of this piece. They have demonstrated a sense of calm within the storm that I find amazing and enviable. So many tiny miracles happened during his brief life after the accident, even though the BIG miracle, the one we all really wanted, didn’t come. My sister is writing about this experience--her experience--and I am going to leave it to her to tell that story in its entirety. When we drove home that night in December in the hour after he died, I marveled at the stars in the sky, marveled that the world was now lessened, and marveled that the architecture in Jill’s life, and Devon’s life, had been horribly, irrevocably rearranged. My feelings of loss were nothing compared to theirs.However, the only reality we have to experience is our own. And suffice it to say, MY reality has forever been altered.
Shockabuku is a “swift, spiritual kick to the head that alters your reality forever”. It’s spelled different ways on Google search, but it all means the same thing. I saw it referenced in a movie a long time ago, and I’ve been the beneficiary of several such kicks over the years. Randy’s death is my latest experience. And that’s exactly what it feels like--a kick to the head that makes you see EVERYTHING differently. I am seeing things MUCH differently now. That is a gift from this experience, directly from Randy, and it is one that I will be forever grateful for.
In the weeks after, during the Christmas holidays, I processed. I tried to squeeze every lesson I could out of what my family had just been through. What did I learn? Could I make my mind more open to the teachings of a dying man in a hospital bed? I talked to my sister over the phone for hours, and her words helped my brain make sense. I hope I was able to help her as well. I am still in this process, by the way, and I hope it continues to color my world as long as I live, because it is making me a better human. This portion of the story could continue--there are so many details I omitted, simply because Randy was an exceptional human--giving, loving, caring, humble, funny (the adjectives could go on and on). The days he was hospitalized were full of good news and bad news, ups and downs, and most of all, hope, right up the very end. Jill is telling that story. My job is to relate to you what I have learned, and how I am going to apply that in my life and in my business. In that way, for me, Randy will live on.
So, here is what I know about a renewal in my creative and business life, courtesy Randy Tracy and his wife and daughter. Everything I do in my business, and in my personal life is going to be an expression of MEANING. I want to do things that are meaningful to me and my customers. I want all my Sessions to be more sensitive to the needs of my subjects, with an awareness that we are capturing precious moments that will absolutely never come again. That is my overarching theme. Below is a list of goals/services I am incorporating to address the humble reality of our impermanence. I’ll do more extensive write-ups on each of these as the offerings themselves begin, but for now, here goes.
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| "The Sky Between Us"--an illustration of Randy and Devon based upon a photo I took 24 years ago. |
Art. More art. I have major art goals. Illustrated Tails Pet Portraits are my first foray into bring more art into my business. They can be seen at www.anillustratedlife.homesteadcloud.com. I love animals. I love art. I want to bring value into pet owner’s lives, and I want them to have a work of art based upon their animals. Illustrations of people will be added to the product line in the very near future. I also teach art classes in our Studio. Art is therapeutic, brain-building, relaxing, and fulfilling. I want MORE of it in my life.
Candid Family Sessions. When I take photos of a family, I am acutely aware that all of those people in that family are fragile. Family portraits are, thus, IMMENSELY important--maybe the most important kind of work that I do. There is an invisible energy in a family, and it is my job to capture that--not just posed people sitting in a studio. I want to capture the LOVE between people. Someday, those people won’t be there anymore. But the images WILL be.
Memory Art. What does THIS mean? Well, when Randy had his brain bleed, we were fortunate to have time to spend with him before he died--48 hours or so. He was unresponsive, but his physical presence was very much there. We took the time to squish his hands and fingers down into clay. We made 30 or more thumbprints and fingerprints, and one large handprint. I then baked them and finished them with paint that highlights each thumbprint ridge. Each one is an original piece of art that truly represents a part of Randy. They are substantial and tactile, and no two are the same. They feel and look very organic. These are precious things. Randy will never BE again. But we have his prints. I have since done clay imprints of my husband’s fingers, because YOU NEVER KNOW. I am going to do myself, and my children as well. I will be offering Thumbprint Sessions at the Studio this spring, so you can bring your family in, have some lovely portraits made, AND do some clay fingerprints as well. Every Session will have this as an option, including Baby Sessions and Senior Portrait Sessions. I would even go to a hospital or nursing home to do this for you and your family. This, to me, is important work.
End-Of-Life Images. Another thing we did was take very sensitive, beautiful photographs of Randy and Jill during his last few days with us. These photos are FOR Jill, which is why I haven’t published them until today. She told me to publish just this morning, because she believes that this work is profoundly important. I didn’t take these images for Facebook likes. I took them so she would have a record of what her husband’s feet and toes looked like. How it looked when she held his hand, and patted his head. This is part of the story of their life together, and I find it interesting that we rush to take pictures of babies as soon as they come into the world, but, we ignore the other end of the spectrum. Maybe death is so very scary to us that we just don’t think about doing things like this when they MUST be done. I think our exit is just as poignant and precious as our arrival. Is this a service I would do for people? YES. I will make it known that this is something that we do. Is it something I’m going to advertise big and bad all over the place? NO. But this is critical to do, whether you hire someone to do it for you, or you do it yourself. Personally, I find these images tragically beautiful, and I am honored and humbled to be able to offer them to Jill and Devon.
Lifecasting. This is when delicate, detailed plaster casts are made of entwined hands, of a baby’s tiny hand wrapped around mommy’s finger, or even a beautiful art piece is made of a pregnant belly. Life sculpture might be a better description. It is messy, yes, but the results are so beautiful.We are going to offer this service in our Studio this year. I wish we were able to accomplish this for Randy. Photos coming as soon as I get samples!
Image Restoration and Bookmaking. Old photos are very precious records of our families’ pasts, but they often don’t age well. Photo restoration is a service that is so satisfying to me. Taking a torn, folded, aged photograph and repairing it is about the closest thing to time travel that there is. Making a keepsake Book of these old photographs to tell the story of your history is something that we currently do, and I would like to do more of. History in your hands, my friends.
Storyteller Sessions--these are Sessions--usually for a family--that involve not only still photography, but also video footage to truly capture the energy and words of members of that family. You will end up with a finished film of Grandma talking about her childhood, or your parents dancing with one another, or--really ANYTHING you want to record. These are professional pieces of cinema of irreplaceable people. This video short below is just a small sample of a finished piece. We shot it last year, and it features Ernie at 100 years old--he is a pilot and a musician, father, grandfather, great-grandfather, and MANY more amazing things.
All Sessions--Babies, Seniors, Families, Mommy-To-Be, Pets--ALL SESSIONS--will be intentional times of fun! We understand that not everyone loves to have their images made. We know this. Kids get grumpy, and then the adults get grumpy. Or maybe you don’t feel like you look your best. But we will sail through it. I will set the tone as a positive person, and not only is it my job to create terrific, meaningful images, but it is also to lift you and your family up while we are doing it. Life is too short to do things that are not fun. And we will do our absolute best to make sure that the time you spend with us not only produces precious images and memories, but that we have fun while we are doing it.
That is our list of intentional goals for the coming year, and for the years beyond. I am still learning, though, so I reserve the right to add to this list in the future.
There are so many more things I could say about my experiences over the past four months. If anyone wants to have a conversation about what has happened, please feel free to reach out. All of us are the walking wounded, you know. We are all experiencing loss all of the time. Lifting each other up is the only way we can all move through the world and remain sane.
I’m going to close this rather long entry with one of Randy’s trademark sayings. He was a nurse-anesthetist, and he took care of many people going through life-changing surgeries who were no doubt scared. He comforted them with his caring ways and his immense heart. “Feel the love!” he would say. And I do, more than ever these days. Because it is here, all around us, expressed in the good things we do for one another. That is what we all must do. There is no other way.
Feel the love.
