11/04/2021
Some days you wake up and the grief is closer than it was the day before. I woke up thinking how 24 years ago it was so easy to make you laugh - I just had to be me 😍🤣
I often think about this look on my mom’s face — complete adoration. Gosh, she loved me so fully it gave me the kind of confidence every kid should have.
And she used to look at me just like this when I played tennis. I couldn’t understand it - I was out practicing at 6am or doing boring s**t I didn’t want to do - and yet this is how she looked at me always. I knew how proud she was of me, but I didn’t understand it. I was #80 in Canada, #11 in BC and still I didn’t get it. I guess I could have been #1000 and it wouldn’t have mattered to her. But goddamn I wish I had pictures…
And then I had kids and I understood what she felt. I could be standing in the rain in the middle of the night (yes, been there, done that - this past week actually) and my kids could be kicking a ball against a wall and I still feel it. I can count on one hand how many of their games I’ve ever missed, because to watch them pursue their passion and dreams — it literally means everything to me.
And I feel insanely grateful that I get to capture these moments in photographs. I have so many of my kids 🤣 But somehow I’ve been lucky enough to take pictures for other athletes as well and goddamn does it bring me so much joy to support them this way.
So as I’m sitting here longing for a time and photograph where my mom existed, I’m also smiling with a full heart that I can give others a little bit of what my mom did for me without a camera. I see you. I’m rooting for you. I’m proud of you ❤️