I realized the other day how very few pictures I have of both Hazel and me . . . I have roughly 4 ba

I realized the other day how very few pictures I have of both Hazel and me . . . I have roughly 4 badrillion photos of Hazel, but only about 6 of the two of us, and even fewer with Daddy in them. Like most moms, I assume, I’m always more eager to get pictures of Hazel (because, let’s be honest, showers and make-up are things of the past #momstrong), looking like the radiant Beastie she is, than I am of capturing MY image, when I feel purely beast. Due to multiple chronic illness issues, two-thirds of my hair fell out after Hazel was born, followed by a fierce case of adult acne. Add to that a hefty portion of sleep deprivation, and, well, no… I’m not aching to have my image documented. But a wise woman once told me – thank you, Sister Alyce – that I should be sure to get behind the lens as often as I can, because I will want these pictures, one day, despite how stinky and gray and covered in pimples I might be in them. She’s right of course, damn her.

And besides, if anything, my appearance is a more pure reflection of the me beneath the me; of how Hard I’m Showing Up for my child. It won’t always be this way. I won’t always be here, in this fragile, volatile space where love and desperation mingle and intertwine, two cords of the same rope with which I swing to new heights and occasionally want to hang myself …

So here’s to present over perfect.

Here’s to sacrifice and surrender and to inhabiting EVERY SINGLE MOMENT. Messy and painful and exquisite.

Because they are ours.

Because only we can invite and detain and extract them.

Here’s to bringing our nothing and our everything, to being unabashedly broken and relentlessly loved.

I can’t think of a better day for Love to win than that of Good Friday.

Happy Easter, beloveds.
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