While Flipping though my journal this morning I found a letter that I forgot to tear out from one of the street kids, Sebastian Snow. I wasn’t necessarily looking for the letter, just sort of browsing the pages of the past weeks, remembering the moments. Trying to understand how I am going to function correctly after I go home. I flipped to his page and reread the letter that had stabbed my heart so many times already.
The letter, to me, is a cry. The story of a 16 year old boy in and out of mental facilities and now living on the street under the Morrison bridge. In chains to meth since he was nine. Nine. That’s one less than ten, one more than eight. Nine.
The letter, to me, is a memory. The time when Christina and Jocelyn and I walked the water front to get some portraits of the street kids. The day I went out, dead set on changing the world, but had my world changed instead. The day I learned to love past the makeup and smell, the booze and dope. The day the little boy with the desperately blue eyes looked into my soul and I realized why Jesus loves us so much.
The day by the water front was special to me because I saw a need. Even though I had been working with the homeless for two weeks already, it didn’t hit me until that day. The fact that truly, as cliché as it sounds ……what the world needs is love.
And that day, I felt that love. By maybe just asking Seb to write a letter. By maybe just asking a punk why he likes photography. By maybe just caring.
Just a little bit.
That day I felt that love because I finally allowed myself to feel it.
After Seb handed gave me the letter I walked down the boardwalk, away from the city, whispering life to the words he fiercely wrote in my book. That night I cried for Seb. I cried for all the Seb’s of Portland. That night I cried because of the Seb inside me.
That night, I cried for this day.
The day that I would have to leave, the going home day. Today is the day that I will leave my friends in Portland and go home and be the change in my own city, as painful as it may be. My Files are transferred, but my vision hasn’t . My bags are all packed up, but alas my heart is not. I think that part of me will always be here in Portland, here on the streets, under the bridges. These people, these smelly, dirty, beautiful people have changed me. This fact compels me. It moves me forward. I want to change the world. Really, I do. I want to travel and see the trees in Singapore, I want go to the deep south and cover Katrina. I want to move to India and photograph orphans. I want to continue to change and be changed.
I Maybe I will some day. For right now, though? I will be the change I wish to see in the world.
But I will start here.
In my own country. In my own town.
In my own heart.
What next you ask?
There is only one option.
Forward.
Written by Laura Clawson, photographer of all things deepandbeautiful
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