The Already Broken Cup

I keep thinking about that walk with Mae, the one where she connected the cycle of nature to her Grandpa Dean so naturally.

There was something in her certainty that stayed with me. Not just the sweetness of it, but the truth of it.

Everything changes. Our bodies, our abilities, the people we love. Even the photos we take will eventually fade or get lost in some future move.

There’s a story about the Buddhist teacher Thich Nhat Hanh and his favorite tea cup. He said he loved it deeply because he knew it was already broken. One day it would slip from his hands or shatter in the dishwasher. Knowing this didn’t make him sad. It made him treasure every moment he got to hold it.

That’s the paradox: when we accept that everything is temporary, we can finally see it clearly.

Mae’s artwork from when she was two? Most of it is already gone. Those drawings she and my dad made together? I can’t even find them now.

But something about them drawing together remains.

When I watch Mae create now, I see the same fearless joy my dad brought to everything he made. When I choose to follow her lead instead of directing every moment, I’m doing what he showed me. I’m passing along his way of being in the world.

The best parts of the people we love don’t disappear when they’re gone. They show up in how we see the world, how we love other people, how we move through our days.

My dad’s whole artistic philosophy was about the process, not the product. Creating because you love doing it, not fixating on the result.

I think about this every time I pick up my camera. When I’m caught up in whether the lighting is perfect, whether the kids are doing what I envisioned, whether things are lining up with some image I had in mind, when I’m jumping ahead to the result, I don’t do my best work. I’m too busy trying to control something that’s already unfolding.

But when I let go of the outcome I’m clinging to, when I just see what’s actually happening and adapt to it, the photos are always better. More honest. More alive.

It’s the same with parenting. When I’m treating Mae like a project, worrying about outcomes, trying to mold her into some ideal I have in mind, I miss what’s actually happening. I’m not present with who she is. I’m anxious about who she’ll become.

But when I can let go of that and just be with the process of her unfolding, when I follow her lead the way my dad followed hers with those drawings, that’s when I actually see her. That’s when the love is most present.

This is what my dad taught me: the joy isn’t in the result. It’s in being fully present with what’s happening right now.

I used to approach memories like artifacts to preserve. Photographs to treasure, moments to replay, times I wished I could return to.

But maybe the value isn’t in longing for what’s gone. Maybe it’s about recognizing that what made those moments beautiful, the love that was there, didn’t disappear with time. It’s still here.

Here’s what I’ve learned: we can’t hold onto the past. But we can pay attention to what’s here right now.

This is actually what a photograph is for. Not to capture something so we can cling to it, but to help us see what’s already present. To recognize the love that’s happening before life rushes us past it.

When I create portraits, I’m not trying to stop time or preserve something that would otherwise be lost. Love doesn’t need preserving. It’s already here, woven into how you look at your child, how your parent holds your baby, how siblings move through the world together.

What the photograph does is reflect it back to you. It says: Look. This is happening. This matters. Pay attention.

It’s a reminder that everything is temporary, which makes this moment, right now, precious.

Not in a sad way. In a “this is worth slowing down for” way.

I think about what I want Mae to remember about me someday. Not specific conversations or particular days, but the feeling of being seen, being delighted in, being given space to make her own discoveries.

And I think about what the photos I create for families are really for: not to make them sad about what’s gone, but to help them recognize what’s here. To see the love that’s present in this moment, before it shifts into its next form.

Everything changes. That’s exactly why we should see it clearly while it’s here.