snow: a photo essay

Winter is beautiful in a harsh sort of way.  It strips bare the colorful facade and reveals the bones underneath.  It slowly reveals the secret flaws.  It sends wind to rip across our cheeks, turning them red from the cold.  It brings tears to our eyes and we wipe them away over and over again.  Our toes grow cold but our heart is thawing, melting, revealing our hidden self.  The true heart is uncovered, just as an ancient city is by men.  Winter forces us to look at ourselves differently, in the view of harsh reality, untainted by our facades and masks.  The walls we built turn to ashes around us and we are vulnerable, exposed.  We spend the winter like this, with our heart open but when spring comes again we rebuild the walls until they turn to ashes again.

written by Tessa Brooke on November 5, 2012

How was your first snow day?

love, tessa brooke

TWENTY THIRTEEN

Twenty twelve is coming to a close, and honestly I can't say I'm sad.  I almost am eager to leave it behind, forget it forever.  But I know I can't do that.  Twenty twelve will be branded in my mind forever.  It will always be part of who I am.  But now it is time to let a new year change me.  Looking back at the year, I have come up with some aspirations for the new year, especially dealing with my photography and writing.  

Lately my photography has been so posed, so generic, composed mostly of self-portraits.  I don't see anything wrong with self-portraits; I mean, after all, the photographer of the family is hardly in photos anyways, but I realized that those pictures don't matter.  They look cool, and they get a lot of likes on Instagram (oh, my level of success. fail.) but in ten years they aren't going to matter.  This year I want to capture life.  I want to have pictures that capture a person's personality, a memory, or have a meaning to me.  Without that, I feel as if I am failing myself as a photographer.  This year I want to practice lifestyle photography in my own home, go out on photoshoots with my friends, and just capture my life as it comes.
When it comes to my writing, I've been doing a lot of poetic writing, much like the writing you would find here.  This year I'm going to be using a lot more of my writing here along with my pictures.  I might enter a writing contest, but who knows.  I just know that I don't ever want to stop writing again.  It's my safe place, and it helps me think.  It is how I cope with life sometimes, and other times it's how I rejoice in it.  I never want to lose that gift.
This year I am going to pursue what I love doing.  I'm going to serve with a new purpose.  I am going to write as I think of things and capture as the moment comes.  I'm going to capture life in a new way, and I'm not going to waste a second.  I have wasted far too much already.  This is what I want my twenty thirteen to look like.  This is my aspiration.
Here is a sample of the photography and writing I want for twenty thirteen.

My culture is obsessed with love stories.  We read about and watch them everyday, trying to ascertain our own story.  The want to love and be loved is programmed into us.  We can't escape it.  But it doesn't matter how hard we look for it if we aren't looking in the right place.  There's only one love story that truly matters, and it's not the one on the television.
november 2012

You're beautiful darling, lovely darling, always darling.

I watch you try so hard

make up

gossip

laughing when you're supposed to.

Try to fit in 

Make people like the fake you.

But what about the real you

Suffocating in the corner while the fake takes center stage?

What will it take to save that girl? 

What is the air she breathes?

What do I need to do to bring her back,

Revive her again?

August/September 2012

Suddenly I am struck with overwhelming wanderlust.  Faraway places call my name, beckoning me to explore their culture.  They invite me to capture them and the people in them with my lens.  How can I give into this wanderlust when I am stuck in this small town?

November 2012

We all doubt our purpose and question our faith, but only those with the courage to seek the truth will dispel their fears.

November 2012

Words fill my head like music fills the street of New Orleans, clamoring to be set free, to touch the world with their whisper.  I am unsure as I begin what will conspire, for words flow out from me, and I do not control them.  I need only pen and paper and the words I loosely hold will harden into shapes scrawled across the wrinkled pages I love.

November 2012

the tree story

My family bought a cabin on the Virginia Creeper Trail and for Black Friday we headed up there to ride the trail.  Afterwards we found a place that was selling trees for ten bucks and since this Christmas will definitely not be normal we decided to do something different.  

 we searched the hillside for the perfect tree and the kids ran up and down the hillside.

Even Jett got involved!

 when we found the perfect tree, Travis cut it down and Maggie and I held it in place and totally screamed as it fell down.

 And then the comedy act of dragging it down the mountain ensued.

 And that's the story of how we got ourselves some Christmas trees.

spilling thoughts

There's something scary and exciting about returning to something.  That feeling of wondering if you can do it or if you will just leave.  It's been months since I even looked at this page.  Since I've thought of words and pictures that would go together.  I ask myself if I am ready to return.  I think I am.  

 It is as if I am opening the door on all the thoughts, memories, and pictures I have stored up inside, letting them all spill out through my fingers.  It is something natural, something I never even realized I missed.  It is beautiful.

 I am sixteen now and I still don't know what to think of it.  It doesn't feel very different yet I can feel adult-hood closing in while childhood tries to take a stronger hold on me.  One day I will need to find a balance between them but for now I can stay as I am.  I feel excitement for the future but I do not wish to be there so soon.  I want to relish my time because I've learned how truly precious and fleeting life and time is.  I found a quote that perfectly illustrated what I have discovered.

Today I am older than I have ever been and younger than I will ever be again.

 Life does not know what the word pause means.  There is no such thing as a standstill, only short times of peacefulness between the chaos we all call our lives.  Those are the times when we stop and look around.  See the joy and the pain in other's eyes and forget about our own for a while.  When we gather together and laugh away the problems.  Peace is found in the smile of a friend, the laughter of a child, the silent watch of the stars, and the whisper of leaves as they make their slow descent to the earth below.  These are my times of peace and remembrance.

 These are the times when I thank God for what I have, had, and will have.  Those are the times when I feel inspiration and I feel comfortable with who I am.  Those are times I treasure.