My best friend and I have known, and loved each other, since we were 11 years old, despite a universe of differences. We are passionately on opposite ends of the political spectrum; I am the introvert to her extrovert; she is all doer, while I am constantly wondering what the hell I am even doing; she lives in East Texas, and I make my home in Austin. She works full-time; I am a stay-at-home mama, and spend much of my time dabbling in various creative pursuits. Her husband is a contemporary Christian singer. Mine? A tattooer.
We do, however, agree on a few important things: our lifelong support and devotion toward each other, and to the three respective daughters that we have both consciously chosen to raise very differently from the ways in which we were both raised.
And, so, a couple of times each year, I pack up my daughters, and we make the long trek to the piney woods to visit. Our two eldest daughters, sadly, have moved on to the sophisticated world of holing themselves up in stuffy rooms and staring at their phones. But, our collective youngest four have no such worldly concerns. They still revel in the freedom of the outdoors; they run and jump, and cackle and sing, and burp and fart brazenly. They cover themselves in mud, and with makeup. They ride every manner of wheeled thing, catch every frog and every crawfish. Together, they harness enough innocence to remember to believe in fairies, and to decide that they will one day find them in the forest, if only they sprinkle enough sugar throughout. My dearest friend and I of course drink wine and gossip; and watch our young daughters with glittering eyes for all that we have missed, and all that we are blessedly able to give them; and we hope they never, ever, ever, never change. There is nothing we want more than for them to live their adult lives with the same courage, sense of adventure, and utter lack of subservience that they display on their visits with each other. With our hearts, with our hands, we pass down the lifelong sisterly support system that their mothers have clung to for most of our lifetime.
The goodbyes are always hard, because they have not yet had to learn what is truly hard. But, alas, we must drive home to our beloved city and get back to our regularly scheduled life of craft projects, and museum frequenting; while my best friend's daughters enjoy Friday night football games, and raising goats to sell at the county fair. And we all eagerly make plans to do it all again, very soon, and for always.
It is a small story, a tiny life-slice, without the gravity of heartache, or any of the beauty of real sorrow. But, the magic in these moments is palpable; this sisterhood, essential. This is their inheritance. This is their camp. They shall be each other's tribe.
All photos are candid, unstaged, and unposed.
