Pulled out an old shoebox today looking for collage paper and there it was. A photo of my brother's hands. He's holding up a fish he caught, grinning off-frame. I don't remember taking it. Must be twenty-five years old.

I've been trying to figure out how to tear it without wrecking it. Which is stupid because I tear paper every day. But his knuckles, you know. The way his thumb bent.

I ended up taping it to the studio wall instead. Just staring at it while my coffee went cold.

Did a lot of crying in my early twenties about how nothing lasts. Now I'm in my forties making art out of the pieces of things that didn't. Some days the whole practice feels like a long argument with that younger version of me. She thought you had to hold on tight. Turns out you just have to pay attention.