It's 2020, but We're Living in COVID-19 // Photo Diary Entry no. 2
Do you recall all the change at warp speed that March and April brought us? I’m happy to go on record saying that that was absolute
B-A-N-A-N-A-S.
Yet four weeks ago (amidst that whiplash), I found out just one mile there away from me there was a literal angel reacting to that change in a profoundly gorgeous way.
Here’s the fun thing about creatives: they just do stuff. They hardly ask for permission, aren’t afraid to give, are very curious, and their choice to stay the course rarely has anything to do with acceptance, criticism, or— worst of all— indifference received from the world.
My introduction to Piper was from an Instagram post she shared.
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It’s barely 2020 and, truthfully, Piper nor I may not see another wedding until 2021. Her business associates stopped operations that morning and Piper’s knee-jerk reaction to loss and hardship was to give a little more?
Instinctively that day I charged my camera batteries. A week later I took a shower. And then I went out for a walk around Fremont.
Piper emerged from a dramatically lit walkway about a football field away from me on the sidewalk and we enthusiastically yelled to one another our introductions. Casual. We acknowledged how weird that was as I began photographing while Piper was kind enough to continue chatting with a stranger from the internet.
I was like, hello, you constructed an art installation to brighten the spirts of your neighborhood? That’s incredible! How the heck were you able to do that while handling such big loss?
From working in the wedding industry, I have to create, install and design everything on a time crunch. It’s a ton of chaos and pressure right before the wedding starts and, in a way I feel like that experience has made the current state of the world feel almost familiar to me. I feel a sense of heavy calmness, almost like I know this chaos is necessary in order for everything to come together at the end; just like a wedding.
Brilliantly talented and super grounded. Check.
She told me dozens of people had stopped her while she was arranging flowers on that fence just to thank her; one person stopped their car to say how much they needed to see something beautiful.
She and I went back and forth about how our specific fields had strangely primed us for impact. I was ready to go there with her, because I’ve been extra reflective these days as I’m searching for my what next? The only thing Baby Deanna ever wrote in a diary was, “CAUGHT YOU, MOM!” Yet, somehow, these days I am regularly keeping a journal? When I told Piper she shared her very similar experience with getting crafty in the quiet.
I’ve definitely been way more creative during this time in ways I haven’t since I was a kid— journaling, painting... I even brought out all my shells that I’ve collected since childhood and admired each one and organized them on my coffee table. This strange time is opening up this creativity in all of us that, I hope, stays after normal life returns. I feel like an appreciation for creativity and art is so, so, so prevalent right now. I never write or journal, I have a hard time with that for some reason, but I started quarantine dairies to just write down my feelings day to day during this knowing I’ll want to reflect back in the future and be able to tell my kids.
I kept clicking the shutter and we kept talking. We had to acknowledge how scary it is to not be working right now. We don’t know how sobering the consequences of that will be just yet, but we’re trying not to focus on that either. We talked about managing the day to day and how powerful that practice can be.
Overall I worry about finances and making money the most. It’s crazy how overnight small businesses just lost everything. Not to get political, but it definitely makes you think deeply about the kind of government and country you live in and what kind of help you’d expect from them. I know my business will always be here and I’ll be back up and running when this is all over, but the heaviness of not knowing when that is is pretty daunting.
I don’t ever wear a ton of makeup but I always put on a little and it’s amazing how much that affects you; just your small daily tasks like that. I put on makeup and got ready this morning for our shoot and I was like, whoa this is normal life; this feels good, I feel good. I’d say one of the strangest parts of this time is not being able to hug, like meeting you today for the first time and not being able to hug or even handshake. I’m not really a hugger by nature but It is such human instinct to embrace in some way for a greeting and to consciously resist that has been wild.
• • •
This whole experience has been wild, for sure.
I am so grateful Piper took the time to chat with me and share a few of her personal lessons during this crazy time. While in the throes of uncertainty and stress, the thing that I just cannot unsee is how resilient humans are. Piper is. And I have faith that we are built to be too.
If you are looking for people and places to support I just couldn’t be more thrilled if you would follow, like, share posts by Piper, and/or take advantage of her beautiful services. Because we need so much more of her kinda brightness in the world.
Xx, Deanna