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He studies his coffee for a minute, his large hands engulfing his cup, before he looks at me again. “And what’s your water?”
My head tilts to the side in confusion. “What do you mean?”
“Well, based on this conversation, it originally sounded like hiking was your love, the thing you’ve been avoiding. But somehow I don’t feel like that’s true.”
“Oh,” I say, shaking my head firmly. “No, definitely not hiking. It’s art.”
“Really?”
I nod. “Yeah. I got my degree in photography with a focus in mixed media, so…taking photos and paint and oil and pretty much anything and combining them all together to create something completely unique.”
“Wow, that sounds amazing.”
“It’s really fun, and there is just…so much you can do with it. For a long time, my goal was to create pieces that sell in galleries, have a dedicated studio space to create things that inspire me.”
I wanted to be a household name, maybe even be the kind of photographer that would be showcased in the gallery next door to the bookstore. That’s where I originally got my inspiration from. I used to stare at the pieces hanging in the window for long minutes any time I was downtown, envisioning mine in their place, trying to manifest for myself the kind of success that gets you into a position where galleries carry your work.
But…life doesn’t always go to plan.
“Then I had Junie,” I continue. “And I don’t regret it for a second, I just want to make sure I’m super clear about that. She is…the best thing to ever happen to me. She absolutely changed my life in the best ways, has made me a better person.”
“But?”
I want to laugh at how easily he saw that there was something else, something I didn’t say.
“But…” I add, “choosing my daughter meant I had to let go of a part of myself. The part of me that was willing to take the big risks to become that creator, to make a name for myself. So maybe…maybethat’smy water. Taking risks. It’s not about the photography, necessarily, it’s about throwing myself into it with all my passion and energy. Now, I give those things to my daughter instead. I can’t afford to take big risks, because who knows how that will impact her life in the long run.”
We’re silent for a few minutes, and I wonder if I might have beentoohonest,toovulnerable about the realities of what it’s like to be a single mom, the sacrifices you have to make.
But when Reid speaks again, he surprises me.
“So…get in the water.”
I laugh. “What?”
He leans forward, a brightness in his eyes that draws me in.
“There has to besomethingyou can do. Something small, something simple. You don’t have to riskeverythingin order to risksomething, right?”
I want to shake my head, almost by default, want to shut down his words before they take hold, take root.
“I mean, I don’t get into the water to swim in competitions anymore. I haven’t in years. But I jumped back in and it felt magical, made me feel more like me than I’ve felt in quite a while. Maybe it’s the same for you. Maybe you need to take a tiny risk with art in some way—painting, photography, whatever—something just slightly out of your comfort zone, to feel like yourself again.”
I mull over his words, trying to sort them into the space in my head where I categorize things based on priority. Junie is in the top box, because she’s the most important. Everything else is kind of scattered beneath that, taking precedence only in the moment when it feels urgent.
But maybe that’s the problem. Maybe I need to be more intentional about how I prioritize the things in my life that aren’t about Junie, the things that are just…me.
“I actually think…you might be right,” I finally say as we’re getting up a while later and stepping out onto Main Street. “Maybe I do just need to try something small. I have literally no idea what that might look like. But…thanks, Reid. Seriously.”
He nods, that same brightness in his eyes that was there earlier coming back as he watches me. “Any time, Busy. Any time.”
The next few days pass in a blink. Briar and I are hustling around getting final things ready for the store opening on the Fourth, setting out all the cute decorations and printing off the signage to go up around town. Now that all the shelves and books are in their permanent positions, I hop up on a ladder to add some last-minute paint flourishes to the walls to really make the forest vibe pop.
All the while, the stuff Reid said at Ugly Mug on Sunday is percolating in the back of my mind, ideas for how I might get myself back into the creative space I love and miss so much. When I got pregnant with Junie, I knew my whole life was going to change, but I didn’t realize how much of myself I’d be giving up in order to put her first. Gone are the days when I could lie in bed all morning, thinking about the projects I was working on, imagining all the different things that would go into bringing the picture in my mind to life.
Now, I’m lucky to have the time tolookat art, let alone create it myself. My brother Bishop’s fiancée is an artist, too—she does ceramics—and I’m pretty sure snooping through her social media posts has become my own personal masochism. I could onlywishto have the kind of time she has to pursue the passions that fill my heart.
When I finally graduated—a full year after the cohort I began with my freshman year—I knew that was it, knew I’d need to set my camera on the shelf and admire it from afar, maybe pick itup here or there to take pictures of our family. I knew I wouldn’t have the time to do anything larger than that.
