A CLOSER LOOK: FAR AWAY

Hey guys! This week has been a combination of flying and dragging by. I got to wondering what I did over the weekend, and you know, for the life of me, I somehow couldn't get my days straight. You know the feeling?

Figured it's time to get back on track, so here is another addition to the "Closer Look" series.

Do you remember her? If not (or if you might be new), here's the background story.

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Ah, yes. She used to be the lonely soul in the colorless library, drowning in the sea of crinkled paper and the musty smell of weathered books, chipping away at the final section of her thesis of nearly two years.

Where is she now? you wonder. She is no longer in a colorless world, for certainty. Her life has been an adventure since the day we left off with her. She's travelled to beautiful parts of the world with her love, started a new chapter of her life in the city of Spanish roots, felt insecure at times, on top of the world at other times, and everything else in between.

If you were to run into her walking down the street on a sunny day or peek into the iron-lined floor to ceiling window of her office, you would probably see that look in her eye. Is she in a trance? you ask. She most likely is, if that's what you call it. She always gets caught in the depth of her memories containing the smallest details that make up the biggest things, like the symmetry of the doors and windows on beautifully simple architecture or the pattern of light in the transparent sea of blues and greens.

She's much more of an explorer than she used to be, and she hurriedly attempts to capture her fleeting ideas with her camera and pen on paper. She loves the idea of housing her humble camera in a beautiful Italian-made leather bag, but at the moment, she just can't seem to justify spending that amount of money on a case. Likewise, she loves the idea of capturing her thoughts inside of a beautifully-made dark leather journal, filling it with nearly unintelligible scribbled handwriting and quick dabs of paint that form small, pretty pieces of art.

Her quickly sketched ideas for current projects are taped up on the wall above her desk, and a square piece of white paper with one of the most meaningful quotes told to her by her father is in clear view of her workspace. In her own scrawled handwriting, it reads,"You are strong, smart, and beautiful. You are successful, and you have the power to change your path. You can do anything you want." That's a saying worth believing in, isn't it?

Thankfully, she isn't far away any longer. No, she is very much in the present, looking forward to a bright future.