I first met Barbara Belknap in a college film history class, and years later we reconnected while we were both going through major changes in our lives. Over time, we became close friends, helping each other navigate divorce, family challenges, the pandemic, and all the unexpected turns life can take.

When I first shared these photographs with Barbara nearly ten years ago, she encouraged me to turn them into a book. The images came easily. The words did not.

In early 2026, I began writing more honestly about the last decade of my life—my divorce after twenty-five years of marriage, my daughter’s cancer treatment, and the uncertainty that followed both. What started as reflection slowly became this book.

But it still wasn’t right. Barbara read what I had written and helped me see the work more clearly. She encouraged me to move away from explanation and closer to what the photographs were really holding—space, light, resilience, and hope. As an artist herself, she understood what I was trying to say, even when I couldn’t fully get there on my own.

Her guidance helped shape this book into something more honest, more open, and more aligned with what I had hoped it could become.

I met Bruce Mace at my first full-time job after moving to San Francisco in 1986. Through Bruce, I met Rob Mesarchik, and the three of us spent years riding bikes, exploring the Bay Area, and building the kind of friendships that only grow stronger with time.