farewell my beloved brunette, i embrace your knees

My brother & Dad, The Two Towers, Opening Day, 2002

My dad and I saw every LOTR movie together 2 or 3 times in the theater. When I found out the first Hobbit movie was going to open December 14th, on the anniversary of my dad’s death, I cried.

I’m on the worst day of my period, my dad died four years ago, there is a new Tolkien movie in theaters. The 14th is somehow always momentous. 1 year ago I got a jury summons on this day, 2 years ago I went to Disney World, 3 years ago a Christmas party where the band played my parents song, 4 years ago I said goodbye to my dad for the last time, except I didn’t, I said “see you tomorrow”.  It is always the worst day of the year. Somehow it is the day I let myself fully realize again that I can’t just… see him, anymore. I saw my dad more than most of my family the year before he died, he was the only person who ever just… stopped by. He didn’t stop by for a couple of months before he got sick because he had gotten in with a bad crowd. Like a teenager. In a nebulous way its their fault he died when he did, but I guess it was coming, anyway. Or maybe not? I don’t think it was my dad’s fault he was so impressionable. I would rather think of his sweet excitement about going to see LOTR movies in the theater, over and over. How impressed he was, not how impressionable. How very very wonderful he thought wonderful things were. That’s who he really was. 

  Today my dad would have been 57. Per usual I arranged my queue so that my reblogs would be devoted to him.

This is the 4th birthday he hasn’t had. I somehow didn’t think it would be, but it is easier. The past week has been weird. I have been digitally archiving old photos and home video, seen my dad move and heard his voice for the first time since December 14, 2008. I have been immersed in the past but I haven’t cried, just felt comforted by his jolly laugh, his dad-ness. 

 This picture of my grandparents and my dad makes my heart hurt. 

December 2008

The day I took this photo was overwhelming. The week, the month, overwhelming.  Shaun took me out a lot because sitting still was, yeah, overwhelming. He’d just drive me somewhere pretty and I would walk around and take photos. It was exactly what I needed, though I don’t recall asking for it. I felt so alive and creative and broken after my dad died. I had to keep moving.

lastfilmheshot:

Holga 120

I made this tumblr to post the last rolls of film my dad shot. I have about a dozen rolls undeveloped.

I have no idea who this guy is.

(dad)

(September 12, 2008)

Sometimes I feel like I hit some sort of photographic peak right before my dad died. I think about everything quite differently now. The actual truth is probably that time changes people, things, perceptions, and styles, too. In three years I may lament that I was better in 2011 and it probably won’t be true, just a little bit different and a little bit the same.

I used to lament my lack of defined style. I know what my style is. I found it after this, when my dad was dying. I realized that I want to capture moments, emotions, expressions and the impressions left by every little thing that makes an impact on my life, I want to keep these things in a language that I can read, I want a tangible collection of a life lived to the fullest.