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We all remember September 11th. We remember where we were when we first heard the news, the images we watched over and over, and the incomprehensible knowledge that thousands of people had begun an ordinary Tuesday morning and would never return home. We remember the horror of that day because remembering September 11th has become part of our collective history.

Recently, I was inspired to remember what happened when September 11th became September 12th.

We woke up the next morning grieving together, and something remarkable happened among us. People lined up for hours to give blood. Firefighters, police officers, construction workers, medical workers, volunteers, and ordinary citizens worked side by side. Restaurants fed rescue workers. People searched for the missing, made signs, passed out water, donated supplies, checked on neighbors, called family members, and comforted complete strangers. Across the country, people found ways to help because helping one another suddenly felt like the most important thing we could do.

For those first days afterward, we joined.

I keep returning to that word because joining feels different from unity. Unity can sound like an ideal we aspire to, whereas joining is something we actually do. It’s a choice. It asks us to reach beyond ourselves and recognize that whatever happens to one of us matters to the rest of us.

Perhaps that is why I have been thinking about a sculpture I created in 2013 called 9/11. I rarely talk about this piece, mostly because I feel it speaks for itself. It has a solemn and reverent presence, for sure. When I look at it, I see something there that feels as much about September 12th as about September 11th.

Two lengths of steel stand beside one another, connected by thick rope that forms the rungs of a ladder. The rope passes through holes in the steel and is secured with large knots whose fibers and frayed ends remain completely visible. In gallery language, I might say the tension between those materials matters: the rigidity and weight of steel joined by something fibrous, tactile, and meant to bind one thing to another.

The ladder exists because the two sides are joined.

In this ladder, I see us.

I see people connecting with one another through acts of care, generosity, courage, and Love. I see people reaching out to strangers because someone needed them, and in those moments, that was reason enough. Whatever ordinarily separated one person from another seemed to matter far less than the human being standing in front of them.

There is something about the knots that feels especially important. They are large and exposed, and the rope bears all the evidence of being tied by hand. The connection itself becomes part of what we are asked to look at. Those knots are doing exactly what knots are meant to do: they bind separated things together and, in doing so, they make them stronger through joining.

That is the part of September 12th I want to remember.

September 11th showed us how suddenly the world could change. September 12th revealed something about ourselves. Faced with enormous grief, we instinctively reached for one another. We helped people whose names we would never know. We recognized another person’s suffering as worthy of our attention, our hands, our time, and our care.

Maybe September 12th deserves a place in our collective memory for precisely that reason. It gave us a glimpse of who we are when the divisions between us lose their importance, and a complete stranger becomes, very simply, one with us.

Twenty-five years later, I find myself wishing we could remember that part more often. We are living through a time when division has become part of the daily language of our lives. We sort ourselves into sides. We have become frighteningly accustomed to seeing human suffering and first asking who those people are, where they come from, what they believe, or which side they belong to. Somewhere along the way, compassion itself seems to have acquired conditions.

Around the world, people are living through wars that ask one human being to regard another as an enemy. Here at home, contempt has become increasingly comfortable in our public conversation. We hear people reduced to labels, entire groups spoken of as though they were somehow less deserving of dignity, and cruelty defended because it has been directed toward the “right” people. Perhaps most painfully, we are becoming accustomed to it.

And yet September 12th reminds me that we know another way of being with one another. We have lived it. For those days, we understood that another person’s grief could matter to us simply because they were human. We understood that helping a stranger required no agreement, allegiance, or similarity between us. Before we knew someone’s politics, religion, nationality, or beliefs, we knew they were hurting. And that was enough. We understood, perhaps more clearly than we usually do, that beneath every difference lies something far more fundamental.

We belong to one another.

That understanding is at the heart of my sculpture. Those two buildings will never exist again, but they remain together in our collective memory. In the sculpture, two steel forms rise side by side. The rope joins them, rung by rung, transforming their parallel forms into something else entirely. Their connection creates the ladder.

On September 12th, we joined. And for a brief moment, we remembered that we are one.

Since Dolly Parton passed, people have shared story after story about her genuine, heartfelt kindness. It reached people as naturally in private as it did in public, embracing celebrities and strangers alike. Dolly’s kindness seemed to come from a deeply held belief that people—all kinds of people—were worth loving.

Dolly was openly Christian, and she expressed her faith through acceptance. Long before acceptance was fashionable, particularly in country music, she welcomed her gay fans wholeheartedly. She understood something many people who stand in the pulpit are still learning. A pulpit can preach love, but people recognize love by the way they are treated.

The title of this essay, “The Church of Dolly,” reflects the way she practiced her faith. She welcomed everyone and refused to judge. She treated kindness as something sacred. Hers was a faith revealed not by whom you declared morally or spiritually unacceptable, but by how generously you loved.

Throughout her life in the limelight—and even after her death—some people claiming to speak for Christianity insisted that Dolly could not have been a “true Christian” because she supported the

LGBTQIA+ community. But Dolly answered them this way: “Love is love.” People do not control whom they love, and same-sex couples should be allowed to marry. She added: “I believe in God. I think God is the judge. I don’t judge or criticize, and I don’t think we’re supposed to.”

Her kindness was not merely generosity toward people who loved her. She maintained it even when people were actively trying to insult or condemn her—which is a much harder kind of kindness.

No membership requirements. Everyone belonged. No interrogation at the door. Come as you are. There will probably be rhinestones.

Her Imagination Library may be the most extraordinary example of how her mind worked. Dolly knew that her father had never learned to read, so in 1995 she began mailing books to young children in her home county in Tennessee. The idea grew beyond anything most people could have imagined. Eventually, children in five countries could receive a free, carefully chosen book every month from birth through their fifth birthday, regardless of their family’s income.

Who thinks of that?

Who thinks: A child needs books, so I am going to make sure one arrives at that child’s home, with that child’s own name on the package, every single month?

A mother recently posted that her little boy was heartbroken when Dolly died because he believed she had personally chosen and sent those books to him. He believed Dolly Parton knew who he was and liked him.

Of course, Dolly did not personally select and mail each child’s book. The program she created handled the book selections and monthly mailings. But the little boy’s belief made perfect sense because personal, attentive kindness was exactly what people believed Dolly capable of. That was the kind of person she had shown herself to be.

And he was not the only child who felt that connection. After Dolly died, I discovered her song “Light of a Clear Blue Morning” through a video of a tween girl filming herself in the backseat of a car as someone drives. She sings along with Dolly, smiling the entire time. Her face is pure joy. She even mimics Dolly’s laugh a couple of times during the song. Oh, that iconic laugh! The song was released in 1977, yet here was a child from an entirely new generation connecting with it—and loving Dolly. Grandparents love her. Parents love her. Now their children love her. To remain that beloved across so many generations is extraordinary. Indeed, that is rare—but so is Dolly. That is why we all miss her so much.

And the books were far from her only act of generosity. After the devastating 2016 wildfires in East Tennessee, her My People Fund provided displaced families with monthly payments—no strings attached. She donated $1 million to COVID-19 research at Vanderbilt—funds that helped support early testing of the Moderna vaccine. Years earlier, her foundation created a “Buddy Program” that promised students money if they helped each other stay in school and graduate. The dropout rate in those participating classes fell dramatically.

That is kindness with its sleeves rolled up.

But this really isn’t an essay about Dolly Parton. It is about the choice she demonstrated over and over again: the choice to make life a little less difficult for somebody else.

We need that choice now.

We live in a time when rudeness is treated as entertainment. People laugh at humiliation, reward cruelty with attention, and call insults “honesty.” We have watched the president of the United States mock a disabled reporter, call a female reporter “piggy,” and tell another reporter she was a “terrible person” simply for asking a question.

Whatever our politics may be, that behavior matters. When the most powerful person in the country treats humiliation like a punch line, people receive the message. If he can do it, why can’t I? If the crowd laughs, how bad can it be?

Children receive that message especially clearly.

My son works as a restaurant server. Recently, he waited on a large, loud family that had rented a party room and seemed determined to take over the entire restaurant. They stood on the stairs while servers were trying to carry food, making an already difficult job even harder.

But the worst part was a little girl at the table who was deliberately rude to my son. She thought it was funny.

So did her mother.

Instead of correcting her daughter, the mother laughed. She was not teaching that child how to be strong, confident, or clever. She was teaching her that another human being’s discomfort could be used as entertainment. And then we are shocked when that lesson takes hold and becomes what popular culture has come to call “Karen” behavior.

For what? A moment’s laughter?

What if, someday, that little girl is the server? What if she comes home and tells her mother about a family who treated her as if she were beneath them? Would it still be funny?

Since when is rudeness funny? And why have we decided that kindness is somehow corny, weak, or naïve?

Kindness is not weakness. It does not mean allowing people to mistreat us. It does not require silence in the face of injustice. Sometimes kindness is soft. Sometimes it is fierce. Sometimes it is a book arriving in a mailbox. Sometimes it is moving out of a server’s way. Sometimes it is correcting your child even when everyone else is laughing.

Researchers have found that rudeness is contagious. A person who experiences it, or even witnesses it, becomes more likely to carry it into the next interaction. We know this without needing a study. One person snaps at a cashier; the cashier loses patience with the next customer; that customer goes home irritated and speaks sharply to a child—and the child learns something.

There is an old expression for a particularly ugly version of this: “kick-the-dog syndrome.” It is a recognized popular expression, and the formal psychological term is “displaced aggression.” The American Psychological Association defines it as directing hostility away from the source of our anger and toward another target—often because the original source feels too powerful to confront.

The boss humiliates the employee. The employee cannot—or will not—challenge the boss, so he goes home and snaps at his wife. She loses patience with their child. The child, having no one smaller to take it out on, kicks the dog.

The anger keeps traveling downhill until it lands on the one least able to fight back.

It is an awful image. It is supposed to be.

We may not literally kick the dog, but we pass our hurt along all the time. We hand it to someone who had nothing to do with causing it, simply because that person is nearby—or because we think they cannot do anything about it.

But every person in that chain has the power to break it.

But kindness travels, too.

Holding a door. Paying a sincere compliment. Thanking the person who brings your food—and looking at them when you say it. Letting someone merge in traffic. Waving thank you when someone lets you merge. I love that little wave. I admit, I’m always a bit disappointed when I don’t get one. Returning the shopping cart. Checking on the lonely neighbor. Sending the thank-you note—or email or text—because kindness should be acknowledged when we receive it, too.

Small things are not small when they alter the way another person moves through the rest of the day.

I think that old bumper sticker got it right: PRACTICE random acts of kindness.

Kindness is a practice. Kindness can be modeled from president to citizen, employer to employee, and parent to child. Every one of us is teaching by example, all the time.

Dolly Parton showed what happens when kindness becomes a way of life. In her hands, kindness became action—a book in a child’s home mailbox, a welcome offered just when someone needed one. The Church of Dolly lives on each time someone notices who might need a little love—and acts. Its doors remain open, and everyone belongs.

When a pebble gets tossed into a pond, our eyes can easily follow the ripples across the surface for the first few seconds. They widen in perfect circles continuously until they become so broad that the eye can’t separate one from the next. We stop seeing them, but they don’t stop moving.

I’ve noticed that kindness works the same way.

You may recall, years ago, someone came up with that simple bumper sticker: ‘Practice Random Acts of Kindness’. It spread everywhere. People repeated it, smiled at it, remembered it. More importantly, I think it nudged people to notice kindness opportunities they might otherwise have missed.

I’ve never forgotten that.

For over half a decade now, I’ve worn multiple identical rubber bracelets on my right wrist. All the same color. Each has the same writing on it that asks the question:

WHAT WOULD LOVE DO NOW?

I give one of those bracelets to someone (most often complete strangers) when I recognize kindness in what they’ve said or done—and, by doing this, I hope to create more of it. By the time I pull one off my wrist, something wonderful has already happened. Someone has been generous, comforting, unexpectedly funny, or simply present to me.

I recently began calling these bracelet-giving moments bestowals after reading Allen Levi’s book Theo of Golden, where Levi has inventively used the word for Theo’s acts of giving. I liked it. The word feels true for what I am doing, too.

Each gifted bracelet becomes a small acknowledgment of something worth noticing. It’s my way of saying: I saw what you just did or what just happened between us, and I didn’t want this moment to pass without telling you. Or: You’ve just done or said a really kind or loving thing, and I want to mark the moment for both of us. Or: You seem like you could use a random act of kindness.

For example:

I met Nichol at 3:30 one morning in the Portland airport.

We were standing in the priority baggage check line. As we began chatting, Nichol told me that her mother was working at the counter ahead of us. I explained that I had chosen that line because the other one had an entire men’s basketball team ahead of me.

I feared I had gotten into the wrong line, but when I reached the counter, her mother checked me in through priority instead of sending me away.

I waved goodbye to Nichol, who had told me she was there to get a package from her mom because she was moving from Portland to Phoenix.

Later, I saw Nichol again as she walked up to the CLEAR area, which wasn’t open yet. I knew this because I had tried to use it too, only to be turned away by a sign announcing that it was closed between 3:00 a.m. and 6:00 a.m.

What’s the point of that?!

Well, anyway, I laughed and went over to the packed queue, which looked like a huge serpentine maze.

I was surprised to see Nichol because I thought she had only come to get a package from her mom. She explained that she was actually traveling to Phoenix that day to start moving some things into her new home. She had said goodbye to her mother and gone over to CLEAR, only to make the same discovery I had.

“You can get in line with me,” I said. “Your mother was nice to me, so I’m paying it forward!”

She jumped into line beside me, and we started talking again.

“I’m Nichol,” she said. “No e—but add an h.”

Nichol told me she was 45, though she looked much younger. She was warm and wonderfully open. Maybe it was the hour, or maybe it was just Nichol, but within minutes, we had moved well beyond airport small talk.

Before long, she was telling me the highlights of her life, including how the death of her father had set a series of changes into motion for her.

Her mother had worked at the airport and retired, but after Nichol’s father died, she went back to work. Hence, her mother being there that morning.

“When he died, I was living at home, but I needed to get far away from everything,” she said.

“So, you left?”

“Yeah, I moved to Hawaii.”

“Wow, that’s wonderful.”

“I thought I’d live there forever, but then COVID came. It was dreadful. I was like, ‘I gotta get outta here.’”

“So you moved back home?”

“I did. I moved back in with my mother.”

But home was not the refuge she might have hoped it would be. Her mother was grieving too, and living inside all that shared grief became too much for Nichol.

“I couldn’t stay with her,” she said. “It was just too much.”

“What did you do?”

“I called my aunt, who lived in Phoenix. We’re really close. And she said, ‘You can move in with me.’”

Her aunt took her in, and that gave Nichol a place to rest, save money, and begin putting her life back together. She paid off her credit card debt and raised her credit score.

While she was doing all of that, she held on to a very particular goal.

A year earlier, she had applied to buy a house in a neighborhood in Phoenix. She said it broke her heart when the loan was denied.

“One year later, I found an even better house in that same neighborhood and reapplied.”

“And?”

“I got the house!”

Her face lit up when she said it.

“And it’s even a better house. It’s near the clubhouse. There’s a gym and a pool.”

She was so proud of herself and so excited to be moving into her new home. And I was happy for her, this complete stranger I had met less than an hour ago.

But that’s how it goes sometimes with people we meet. There’s just something there that makes us connect on a deeper level.

By then, we had reached the place in line where we had to go our separate ways.

I reached for my wrist and took off a bracelet. I explained that I give them away when I make a connection with someone.

“This is for you,” I said.

She looked down and read the words:

WHAT WOULD LOVE DO NOW?

She gave me a huge hug and told me how cool it was that I did that. She slipped the bracelet onto her wrist, and I asked if we could take a photo. I had decided to start writing down these encounters—the stories behind the bestowals.

What began with her mother letting me check in through the priority line had rippled into another small act of kindness.

Nichol was part of my life for only half an hour, but in that time, she gave me the chance to recognize the courage, hope, and hard-won joy she had shared with me.

I’ve thought about that morning many times since because two strangers chose to have a conversation rather than remaining silent, and both walked away richer for it.

On another morning, I had a different kind of encounter.

Outside a Royal Farms convenience store, a man asked me for spare change. I apologized that I didn’t have any and walked inside, but something stopped me. I wondered if maybe he was hungry. So, I went back outside and asked if I could buy him something to eat.

Without hesitation, he said, “Eggs and bacon.”

The specificity made me smile.

We went inside together, and I told him to pick up whatever he wanted, and as we were leaving, I remembered the bracelets on my wrist. I offered him one, and he slipped it on before he even looked at it.

“WHAT WOULD LOVE DO NOW?” I asked.

He looked puzzled.

I repeated it. “WHAT WOULD LOVE DO NOW?”

His whole face opened up.

“Love!” he said

“That’s right,” I said, laughing. “Great answer.”

We both smiled, and I got back into my car and drove away.

More recently, the bracelets took on a different meaning for me.

When my beloved dog became critically ill, the doctors and staff at the emergency vet surrounded me and my kids with compassion. I gifted so many bracelets there. Sadly, my dog didn’t survive, but the kindness of that entire staff altered the devastating impact of that loss.

That compassion continued to the very end, when a tech named Percy had to take my dog’s lifeless body away.

He was so empathetic and gentle with me and my kids before he lifted my dog onto the gurney. When I handed him the bracelet and explained what it was for, he glowed with love and appreciation and said he’d wear it always.

A lot of people say that, and I believe they actually do wear it, because sometimes receiving the bracelet means as much to them as giving it means to me. That, too, is part of the bestowal.

A card arrived in the mail a couple days after my dog’s passing. It was from the staff of the Pet ER, signed by many of the kind people who cared for her.

I will never forget that card and the entire extraordinarily compassion-filled experience that went with it.

One day, my son-in-law walked into his local bank and noticed the teller was wearing one of my bracelets.

“Where did you get that?” he asked the teller.

“Oh my gosh,” the teller replied, “the nicest lady came in. She was so kind, and she gave it to me. She said I had a really great smile. It made my day. I love wearing it.”

And, being curious, my son-in-law asked, “Did she happen to have long gray hair in a braid?”

“Yes!”

“That’s my mother-in-law!”

I laughed when my son-in-law told me that story. Not only because he recognized the bracelet, but because it made me joyful to hear how kindness was the thing that lingered in the teller’s memory.

There have been other times just like that.

My son-in-law once spotted the bracelet on an unhoused man near where we live. My daughter noticed one on a sales associate at a store we both frequent. My kids have started teasing me that I’ve “painted the town” with these bracelets. I think that’s so cute.

And then, just last evening, I saw those ripples move in a way I never expected—and it stirred my heart.

My son works as a server at a restaurant. One of the other servers had confided in him that her marriage to her somewhat younger husband wasn’t going well. She was struggling to hold on to hope and searching for some kind of meaning in what she was going through.

My son understood some of that searching. He told her that he had recently gone to church for the first time “ever”—his words, although he had gone when he was a little boy—because he had begun wondering about God’s Presence in his own life. I found all of this interesting that it happened after our dog had passed.

Anyway, during his break, he came home and asked, “Mom, where do you keep those bracelets?”

I told him where they were, and he took a few and put them on his wrist.

I was so excited that he wanted to make bestowals of his own. That alone felt like a sign of Spirit at work.

When he returned to the restaurant, he gave his coworker one of the bracelets.

He told me she cried.

She told him how kind he was and asked him to tell his mother that she had done a great job raising her son.

Well, that melted my heart. I was already proud of him for recognizing that she needed encouragement and wanting to give her a bracelet. But it got even better.

Later that evening, after work, she sent him a text message. She explained more fully what receiving the bracelet had meant to her. At that particular moment in her life, it felt like a sign from Above—one she desperately needed. The words on it had given her a sense of peace and encouragement.

“That’s exactly why my mom gives them out,” my son texted her back.

There was much more to their conversation, but he didn’t share all of it with me because he wanted to respect her privacy, he said.

Another proud moment for me.

I knew why I wore my bracelets and handed them to people whose kindness or spirit had touched me. But now my son wanted to wear them too.

That, in itself, felt like the work of the Spirit also.

Here he was, wondering about God’s Presence in his own life, and without even realizing it, he became a sign of that Presence in someone else’s. He noticed someone who was hurting and needed to be heard, so he listened. And when something inside him said, “This person needs love right now,” he acted.

The bracelet passed from me to him, and then from his wrist to hers. I wasn’t there. I didn’t choose the person or witness the bestowal. Yet the message still found its way to someone who needed it at precisely the right moment.

Do you see those ripples??!!

Ohmygoodness.

The truth is, they’re not just in my town anymore. I take a supply of them wherever I go, and they find new wrists in new places.

The bracelet is a reminder that marks a moment. Love is what sets the ripple in motion and keeps it moving.

Just like the old bumper sticker nudged people to notice kindness opportunities, I hope this rubber bracelet with its memorable question, WHAT WOULD LOVE DO NOW?, does the same, long after I’ve gone my way.

Maybe it comes to the wearer’s mind so that patience is easier than anger. Maybe it appears when someone pauses long enough to really listen. Maybe it just reminds somebody to smile at a stranger.

I’ll never know. I only see the first ripples.

The rest of them belong to the Love that shows up in this world.

Prefer listening? Tap the play button above to hear this post narrated.

Every time someone who has read Hummer & The Boy mentions The Boy, the Mole, the Fox and the Horse as a comparable title, my heart does a happy dance. Charlie Mackesy’s book has reached millions of readers with its tenderness, wisdom, humor, companionship, and faith in kindness. To hear Hummer & The Boy mentioned alongside a book that has meant so much to so many feels like an extraordinary compliment.

They are the books teachers, librarians, parents, grandparents, and even counselors reach for when they want to comfort, encourage, or begin an important conversation.

I understand the connection immediately. Both books speak to the part of us that needs encouragement, companionship, kindness, and the reassurance that love is still there, even when someone’s presence isn’t. Mackesy brings those ideas to the page through conversations among four unlikely friends. Hummer & The Boy follows the returning visits between a boy and a goose from childhood through maturity. Their endearing friendship grows more significant as the years unfold. Their kindness becomes one of the greatest comforts they share.

I have noticed that readers welcome Mackesy’s book into their lives in remarkable ways. They return to favorite passages for comfort or quote them in cards to encourage those they love. They frame his artwork and display it where they’ll see it every day. They gift the book to a friend who may be going through a difficult time, hoping it will offer the same comfort it brought to them.

I’ve always been drawn to a story I know, on the very first read, will become one I remember and treasure.

I love that. I’m that kind of reader, too. When I discover a book that truly touches me, I want to share it. One of the first reviews my book received was from a 5th-grade teacher. She read it to her class and built a discussion around it. She shared her own story about her relationship with her grandfather, and her vulnerability became a catalyst for her students to open up about their own experiences with love, friendship, and regret.

Hummer & The Boy and The Boy, the Mole, the Fox, and the Horse both come from the same belief in the lasting power of love and friendship. The indelible bond between the goose and the boy is the best part of who they are together, and it remains an unforgettable part of who the boy becomes. Both books have a way of leaving the page and becoming part of people’s lives. They are the books teachers, librarians, parents, grandparents, and even counselors reach for when they want to comfort, encourage, or begin an important conversation.

I’ve always been drawn to a story I know, on the very first read, will become one I remember and treasure. Those are the books I love to discover. I’ve smiled more than once when someone has said, “This would make such a wonderful gift book—especially to welcome a new baby or celebrate first-time grandparents.” After reading that fifth-grade teacher’s review, I realized something else… Teachers, too.

If The Boy, the Mole, the Fox and the Horse has found a place in your heart, I hope Hummer & The Boy earns a place beside it.

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There is a phrase I grew up hearing for years: “A jack of all trades is a master of none.” Only recently did I learn that the full quote is actually: “A jack of all trades is a master of none, but oftentimes better than a master of one.” Learning of that second half has changed everything for me.

The version most of us recognize, the first part, seems critical, suggesting a scattered focus and mediocrity. It speaks of someone who dabbles in many things without ever becoming truly excellent at any of them.

As an artist working in many disciplines, I’ve spent most of my life feeling pressured to “pick one thing.” Even close friends and family discouraged me from pursuing anything beyond photography. I believe their concern came from a fear that I would weaken my efforts or spread myself too thin to succeed at the highest level. Yet, this experience made me feel deeply unsupported because something inside always resisted the idea that creativity should be confined to a single medium.

I didn’t become five different artists. I became an artist whose different disciplines enrich one another.

Photography was my first artistic language (well, technically, interpretive dance, but for this article, I’m referring to the visual arts), and it will always be central to who I am as an artist. Over time, I discovered sculpture, then jewelry, writing, and now, more publicly, painting. The funny thing is, I have been painting for over a decade, but I have only done so privately. I used acrylic paint and only my hands and fingers to apply it to the canvas—never brushes. I paint when I am moved by some emotion or circumstance. I make paintings for my children on meaningful occasions and have kept much of my work to myself. On one occasion, I shared one of my paintings with the daughter of a very famous female photographer, who told me it belonged in a gallery because she was so moved by it. Her encouraging words have stayed with me through the years.

Recently, something shifted. I fell completely in love with painting in oils using brushes. It has opened an entirely new dimension for me. At the same time, I rediscovered something I used to do with my photography over twenty years ago: hand-coloring photos. But now, instead of hand-coloring them, I am oil painting them.

And the subject is flowers. I’ve always adored them, and now I have the joy of painting them. I find myself in this amazing place where I get to photograph something that genuinely makes me swoon, then paint those photographs on canvas with oil paints and brushes. I revel in every part of the process. The photography. The texture. The color. The movement of paint across the surface. The emotional atmosphere flowers create.

It feels like an extraordinary blessing. And all of it exists because I did not limit myself to one form of expression.

Had I believed the shortened version, I might never have become the artist I am still becoming. I’m grateful I discovered there was more to that old expression—and more creative possibilities than I ever imagined.

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I was twelve years old when Rocky premiered. It captured my heart, and I saw no distinction between the character and the actor who brought him to life. I developed an enormous crush on Sylvester Stallone. When I discovered that he had written the screenplay, it only added to the magic, and I adored him all the more.

I grew up in an Italian-American family, and seeing an Italian hero portrayed with dignity, humor, vulnerability, and strength meant something to me. It filled me with a kind of pride I hadn't experienced before. Rocky wasn't polished. He wasn't perfect. He was genuine. His decency, humility, determination, and heart made him someone you wanted to cheer for long before the opening bell.

There was another reason Rocky found such a permanent place in my heart, though I couldn't have explained it at twelve years old. Like many children, I struggled to recognize my worth because it was rarely reflected back to me. Rocky wasn't trying to impress anyone. He simply kept showing up, kept believing, kept moving forward. I didn't have the words for it then, but something inside me understood all of that. Looking back, I can see that it taught me to challenge the insecure thoughts and limiting beliefs I held.

The more I learned about Sylvester Stallone, the more I realized how much of Rocky came from the man who created him. Here was someone who had poured his own struggles into a screenplay, slept in his car, endured rejection after rejection, and refused to sell Rocky unless he was the one to play the lead. He had vision and saw the future the way he knew it could be. He simply refused to surrender it to someone else's vision.

Over the years, my love has grown, and so has my admiration for the artist, the writer, and the man whose perseverance gave the world one of the greatest underdog stories ever told.

That's why I could hardly contain my excitement when I learned about I Play Rocky. It brought all of those happy feelings rushing back. As we get older, I think we appreciate nostalgia and the feelings that come with reminiscing.

Whether you're writing a screenplay, painting a canvas, starting a business, raising a family, or writing your first book, every dream begins with a single person willing to believe in something that doesn't yet exist. Rejection has a way of testing that belief. Persistence turns possibility into reality. Never give up, as they say. That's the legacy of Rocky.

Years later, Sylvester Stallone gave us a speech in Rocky Balboa that, for me, distilled everything Rocky had represented since I was twelve years old. On the surface, it's a father speaking to his son. Beneath the surface, it's the kind of encouragement every child—and perhaps every adult still carrying that child within—needs to hear. It goes like this:Let me tell you something you already know.The world ain't all sunshine and rainbows. It's a very mean and nasty place, and I don't care how tough you are, it will beat you to your knees and keep you there permanently if you let it.You, me, or nobody is gonna hit as hard as life. But it ain't about how hard you’re hit, it's about how hard you get hit and keep movin' forward. How much you can take, and keep movin' forward. That's how winning is done!Now, if you know what you're worth, go out and get what you're worth - but you gotta be willing to take the hits. And not pointin' fingers sayin' you ain't where you wanna be because of him or her or anybody. Cowards do that, and that ain't you! You're better than that.I'm always gonna love you no matter what. No matter what happens. You're my son, and you're my blood. You're the best thing in my life. But until you start believing in yourself, you ain't gonna have a life.

In 2006, I didn't hear that speech the way I would have heard it at twelve. I heard it as a grown woman. As an artist. As a writer. And I realized something I hadn't understood before. What had once sounded like a father encouraging his son had become something much more universal. It was a reminder to each of us to believe in ourselves, especially when life gives us every reason not to.

What makes that speech unforgettable isn't simply that Rocky redefines winning. He reminds us that life will knock us down, sometimes again and again. Winning isn't avoiding those moments. Winning is choosing to get back up. To believe in yourself when no one else can do it for you. To keep moving forward because you and your dream are worth fighting for.

Fifty years ago, the twelve-year-old girl who got swept away by Rocky could never have imagined becoming an artist and author herself. Today, I understand what it means to believe in myself, whether anyone else does or not. I understand why some dreams are worth holding onto no matter how many challenges arise along the way.

That's why I can't wait to see I Play Rocky—to reminisce, to celebrate, and to spend a little time once again with the character who captured my heart... and the man who wrote him into being.

Have you ever noticed how you’re scrolling through social media and every once in a while, there’s one video that immediately captures your attention while dozens of others simply don’t? You click on it, and as you’re watching it, you feel grateful to have seen it.

Recently, that happened to me. It was a university commencement speech given by children’s book author Mo Willems.

If you have seen the video, you already know what happened. Mo stood before a crowd of graduates and families and began reading aloud one of his children’s books. As he read, a small child in the audience loudly and enthusiastically joined in, repeating each phrase Mo spoke. Like a reverse heckler, the little boy happily echoed every line as though he were sitting on his living room floor during family story time rather than attending a public ceremony. And nobody shushed him. Mo didn’t mind. In fact, Mo played along joyfully with the boy.

What moved me was not just the little boy’s infectious enthusiasm, but the response he received that day from the audience and later from everyone online. He was welcomed and celebrated. In a matter of seconds, a child who could have been treated as a distraction became part of the experience itself. The comments beneath the video were just as heartwarming. Thousands of people shared their thoughts, and although they used different words, one theme emerged again and again. Whether they spoke about inclusion, encouragement, or the importance of children being heard, they all seemed to be responding to the same thing. A child’s voice had been acknowledged rather than dismissed.

While I continued reading through the posted comments, a thought occurred to me: the video was highlighting one child, but the comments were about all of us. Many of us know what it feels like to yearn for that kind of recognition. We know what it feels like to have something to say and wonder whether anyone wants to hear it. We hope to receive acknowledgment.

As a child, I spent many years yearning to feel seen and heard. I can recognize, when I look back, how deep that desire went. In many ways, I became an artist because art allowed me to express myself. The arts gave me a voice. Dance, photography, painting, sculpture, and writing each became another way of saying, “This is what I feel. Does anyone else feel it too?”

Perhaps that is why the little moment with the boy landed with some force. The child spoke, and instead of being corrected, he was acknowledged, welcomed, and celebrated. His response enriched the experience for everyone.

If it is even possible, I found myself appreciating Mo Willems even more than I had before. His children’s books have always been dear to me. How masterfully he invites readers into the story’s world! Yet his delivery of the speech revealed an even deeper understanding of children. He understood instinctively that response was exactly the point. The child’s participation was evidence that the story was working its wonder, as the best children’s books are meant to.

That realization led me to think about read-alouds and how the real magic comes when they become collaborations. Children laugh, interrupt, repeat phrases, anticipate what comes next, and make observations while they are being read to. I believe the magic of read-alouds continues long after childhood storytime. As adults, we gather for author talks, listen to podcasts and audiobooks, and attend public readings because something within us still responds to the wonderful experience of connecting with the story.

What happened in that auditorium was a perfect example. A college graduation ceremony became story time, which ultimately became an unplanned lesson in having a voice and belonging. Being heard and included matters. There is something profoundly meaningful about discovering that your voice has a place in the room, whether you are a child sitting cross-legged on the living room carpet, a graduate preparing for the future, an artist searching for connection, or an adult scrolling through social media.

I have since added Mo’s book to my treasured collection of children’s books. I’d be happy to do a read-aloud for you anytime.

When I look back now, I believe I became a photographer long before I ever held a camera. As a little girl, I spent countless hours beneath the bushes in our backyard. Tucked inside a carefully swept clearing, I built entire worlds with my miniature Schleich figures, animals, and Tonka safari and farm vehicles. Just across a small patch of grass was the large side porch where my parents entertained friends at dinner parties on warm summer evenings. A cacophony of voices drifted through the air as conversations rose and fell while I remained out of sight, content in my own little world.

Every so often I would look up from my imaginary adventures and simply watch. I noticed the woman who kept touching her necklace while her husband did all the talking. I noticed the loud man who kept putting his hands on the women he talked to, his laughter increasing as the evening went on. Then I returned to my play, those observations settling within me in ways I could scarcely have understood at the time.

By the time I entered grade school, I had learned that I experienced sound differently. Repeated hearing tests became part of my academics, although no one ever explained why they continued or why I always felt as though everyone else knew all the right answers that I had somehow missed. I eventually taught myself how to pass the hearing tests so I could return to class and feel as though I was no different than everyone else. Along with undiagnosed ADHD, the world seemed intimidating and foreign, leaving me convinced that everyone around me was probably smarter than I was. I wonder how deeply those experiences shaped the way I came to know the world. While everyone else listened, I watched. Faces became language, and body language became conversation. Expressions, pauses, and glances helped me understand the exchanges occurring around me. Long before I ever picked up a camera, I was already an observer.

Loneliness shaped me as well, stemming from family trauma, neglect, and the feeling of being unseen. Children rarely possess the language to describe that particular feeling; they simply live it. When little attention is being paid to you, you begin to notice everything. You recognize the expression that lasts only a second, the gesture that cues what usually happens next, and the behaviors that put you on alert. You take note of other people’s feelings to monitor your own behavior. You notice who is left sitting alone and who the teacher always picks on. Perhaps my compassion began then, in knowing how it felt to be overlooked or unincluded. The same attention that helped me navigate the world made me highly attuned to the people and moments around me.

When photography entered my life as a teenager, I recognized something that had been there all along—sensitivity. The camera gave form to the way I was already seeing the world and a voice through which I could express my compassion, my awareness, and my fascination with what other people often walked past. Perhaps every time I lifted a camera, I was learning to pay the kind of attention I had longed to receive myself. I searched for moments that deserved to be seen: the impression made by a human being, a gesture, a relationship, an expression, or the fleeting alignment of elements that made a moment worthy of my attention. At the time, I believed I had found photography. Eventually, I understood that photography had found me.

Consider Childhood, my series of black-and-white portraits of children. Each session began as a commission, while the moment I chose to preserve arose from my own response to the child. Something in the child’s expression moved me enough to press the shutter. In raising the camera, I was saying, “I see this. I see you. This moves me.” Each image reveals the moment I witnessed, and it also reveals why tenderness, relationship, and human connection have continually drawn my eye. What appears inside the frame was the child’s story; what compelled me to create the image was part of mine.

I have come to understand that this is how and why I became a photographer. Photography gave expression to someone I had already become, and every choice I made—the people who drew my attention, the moments I was compelled to preserve, the things I could never simply let pass—left traces of me within the photographs. Each image answered questions I did not even realize I was asking. Who am I? What do I value? What moves me enough to stop the world, if only for a fraction of a second? The answers accumulated over four decades, one photograph at a time.

Seen as a whole, my portfolio is, in many ways, autobiographical. I see my compassion, my awareness, and my fascination with tenderness, relationships, vulnerability, resilience, beauty, and grace. The people and scenes are the subjects, while the images also express my response to them. Two presences occupy every frame: the subject before the lens and the heart and mind of the being behind it.

My entire body of work has revealed that the child who longed to be seen found a means of self-expression. She grew into a woman and an artist who, through her work, has formed invisible bonds with people who understand what she has seen. The truth is simple, personal, and inseparable from my story:

The lens reveals the photographer.

— Vienne Rea

Author VIENNE REA announces her debut children’s book, Hummer & the Boy, a story created for readers of all ages. Watch the video for a first glimpse, with more about the book coming soon.

Discover more and follow the book’s journey:

www.VIENNEREAWRiTES/Hummer

It’s a work of love, acceptance, and empowerment that inspires Pride Month’s core values.

Wishing everyone a happy and healthy month, and sending so much Love your way.

—VIENNE

#VIENNEREA #sculpture #ArtThatSpeaks #MeaningfulDesign

Fourteen years ago, I wrote a spoken word piece called ‘TONIGHT I REMEMBERED’ (click to open pop-up page to view on YouTube). I wrote it while still living in the emotional undertow of the experience itself. I wrote it to understand what had happened to me. I was trying to make sense of why I continued interpreting so much of it through confusion and the deep desire to believe love could somehow heal what continually caused harm.

Back then, I interpreted endurance in many ways as love. I believed that if I could understand him, perhaps I could reach him deeply enough that it would “change him.” I hardly—if ever—considered my own trauma. Trauma reshapes one’s reality like that. The mind gradually rearranges itself around what wounds it.

At the time, I still rationalized and excused the abusive experiences in the relationship, believing they were about his pain because of his childhood, his struggles, his suffering, his feelings. I was so far removed from my own feelings because I was focused on him. Most likely, this was because I figured that if he could get well, then everything would be so much better for us. Back then, I interpreted endurance in many ways as love. I believed that if I could understand him, perhaps I could reach him deeply enough that it would “change him.” I hardly—if ever—considered my own trauma. Trauma reshapes one’s reality like that. The mind gradually rearranges itself around what wounds it.

‘FROM HERE’ (click to open pop-up page to view on YouTube) is a second spoken word poem that I wrote fourteen years later. It addresses what changed for me most across those years, which was perspective itself. Distance revealed things that survival hid while I was still inside the experience. I could face the embarrassment I carried around it. I could choose to break the silence surrounding it. I could see the exhausting emotional labor that was involved in continually translating his behavior in ways that allowed me to stay with someone without fully processing what the relationship itself was doing to me.

While I looked back, another kind of clarity emerged alongside all of that recognition. I stopped viewing myself through the lens of self-condemnation for what I believed was weakness. I began seeing the woman inside those years with far more tenderness. I could understand how desperately she wanted love to triumph over harm. How much hope existed inside her. And how much strength she had to navigate through experiences she barely knew how to name aloud.

I could also see more clearly the impact my choices had on my children. That recognition brought a different kind of grief. For many years, convinced there was something wrong with me, I met that grief with shame and regret. I wished I had understood sooner. From here, I meet it with honesty, compassion, and a deeper understanding of the woman who was doing the best she could with the awareness she had at that time.

Real forgiveness, at least for me, has very little to do with denying reality or pretending suffering somehow became beautiful. Forgiveness means choosing to look at what happened while not allowing bitterness, hatred, or shame to become the author of my life.

Those shifts in perception changed me profoundly, as forgiveness began to take on an entirely different meaning. Real forgiveness, at least for me, has very little to do with denying reality or pretending suffering somehow became beautiful. Forgiveness meant choosing to look at what happened while not allowing bitterness, hatred, or shame to become the author of my life.

This poem belongs to that miracle, and perhaps that is why it could only be written from here.

With So Much Love,

VIENNE

“We create meaning through the way we choose to walk our lives.” — Joy Harjo

Two decades or so ago, I felt a profound shift within my conscience, and I stepped away from the traditional Thanksgiving holiday, because the story behind the celebration never aligned with my values.

The traditional Thanksgiving day grew from a narrative shaped around the Pilgrims, and never the fuller truth of Indigenous history, which has far greater complexity and pain. I have always felt attuned to that truth, and I could never reconcile the idea of honoring gratitude through a story woven with loss, manipulation, and the taking of land and resources from Native communities.

Many people asked why I would choose to forgo a day devoted to family, togetherness, and thankfulness. While I understood the sincerity with their questions, it was my values around human dignity that guided me into deep reflection. The answer ultimately formed within my heart.

Many people asked me why I would choose to forgo a day devoted to family, togetherness, and thankfulness. While I understood the sincerity with their questions, it was my values around human dignity that guided me into deep reflection. The answer ultimately formed from within my heart.

In 2020, I created a new way to honor gratitude and family, one that felt aligned with both conscience and compassion. I named it Thanks & Giving Day. The intention behind that name—as clever and heartfelt as I hoped it would be—guides the way my children and I gather during this season. We celebrate together on the day before or the day after Thanksgiving in the United States.

Thanks & Giving Day helps me express the values that guide my life, and each year I choose a craft project that allows my children and me to engage with generosity in a hands-on way. The projects respond to the real needs of people and families whose lives touch both our own community and the broader world around us. These curated activities offer my children and me a way to participate in compassion as a lived experience.

Over time, these shared projects grew into something we all cherished. Thanks & Giving Day has become a meaningful tradition for our family each year, one that offers us a way to gather that feels genuinely right for me and, I believe, is filled with true connection and love, as well.

For my children, there is a sense of anticipation each year because the project remains a secret until the moment we gather. I love the way that anticipation turns into warmth once we begin, and joy follows as we create together—enjoying the process, the outcome, and its imagined impact on the lives it will touch.

Years ago, during their homeschooling years, I led my children in several charitable projects that shaped their view of acts of kindness. One of those projects involved creating tie-blankets with fleece they selected from JoAnn Fabrics. We brought them to a nearby church, which distributed them to first responders, domestic violence shelters, and foster care families.

Months later, I received a letter from a fire survivor who wrote about the comfort that the blanket offered during a time of upheaval. Another blanket I had handed directly to an unhoused elderly man standing at a traffic signal on a blustery late Fall afternoon. When I saw him again weeks later, he shared that he had given the blanket to his daughter because she loved it so much, and she kept it on her bed. That moment remains vivid for me because it revealed how a simple gesture can move through several lives.

Through the years of celebrating Thanks & Giving Day, each of us has developed favorite memories from the projects we completed. One of my favorite memories comes from painting duffel bags for foster children, because countless children move from place to place with only a plastic garbage bag for their belongings. We personalized each duffel bag with chosen themes—everything from Baltimore Ravens spirit to bright floral imagery—so each one became a colorful expression of creativity and compassion.

We all fondly remember that during our first Thanks & Giving Day in 2020, I prepared all the traditional Native American feast foods so we could honor the season in the most authentic way possible. We enjoyed those dishes, and as is my die-hard habit, I taught them the names of these traditional dishes and some of their ingredients in Native American words.

This year, after long workdays for all of us, I plan to bring a nostalgic smile to the evening by reviving the tie-blanket project from their childhood. In the spirit of both comfort and practicality, I will serve pizza and salad so we can talk, and eat, and create at the same time.

Thanks & Giving Day gives my children and me a grounded experience for connection, and it affirms my belief that kindness grows through actions we choose with intention. I would love to know the ways your family honors gratitude during this season.

With So Much Love,

VIENNE REA

Prefer listening? Tap the play button above to hear this post narrated.

I have loved children’s books since I was a child myself. When my mother read to me, the world of my imagination seemed to open wider. It was never just about the story—it was about being together with her, and the experience of worlds unfolding for us. Even then—in those early childhood moments—I must have been an artist and writer in the making, because I remember feeling brim-filled with wonder, as the words and images on the pages spoke directly to my creative spirit.

I always dreamed of writing a children’s book of my own. I waited patiently for the right story—one that felt deep and meaningful, one that could offer young readers both beauty and emotional insight. I have always loved the kind of books that give children language for their feelings; stories that become teachers of empathy and awareness.

Even then—in those early childhood moments—I must have been an artist and writer in the making, because I remember feeling brim-filled with wonder, as the words and images on the pages spoke directly to my creative spirit.

The idea for HUMMER & THE BOY arrived unexpectedly during a breath-cloudy wintry walk with my dog in 2024. In the middle of an open field stood a lone goose that had not flown south. The sight stopped me. Why was it still here? My imagination immediately began to answer. By the end of that walk, an entire storyline had formed in my mind—complete, emotional, and full of possibility. I used speech-to-text as I walked on, so I could capture every word before it faded.

That goose brought back a memory from when my son was five and a half. At the time, I had come up with the idea to create a “hand” puppet using my own bare hand and arm to become the head and neck of a goose—my long manicured nails forming the beak. We called him Hummer. My son spoke to Hummer as though he were quite real; he cared for him, and he learned from him. While Hummer could only nod yes or no, or would hide beneath my arm when he felt shy, the goose somehow managed to communicate very well with my son and me. Through their connection, my son developed deep emotional awareness, learned empathy, and gained an understanding of friendship.

Over his early years, Hummer returned many times to comfort or amuse my son. I remember one time when I pretended Hummer was upset, and we both questioned Hummer to understand what had happened. My son hugged him tenderly to make things all right. The culmination of simple play between imagination and love became an extraordinary tool for teaching compassion.

So, as I stood in that field this past winter, I suddenly recognized the connection—the goose before me and the goose of my son’s childhood were one in the same. Spontaneously, a wave of energy moved through me—the unmistakable signal I feel when inspiration rises. The story came alive in my mind instantly: a family, a mother, her child, and a goose who arrives in need of care, creating an emotional bond that transforms all of them. By the time I walked home, I had written the first draft on my iPhone. Thus, eighteen years after the start of my son’s childhood friendship with our beloved Hummer, that near-same goose took flight in my imagination again—this time onto the written page.

Within weeks, I had what felt like a publishable draft. I hired a publishing assistant, and after rereading that first version, I began revising—because every writer’s first draft can feel completely done, and somehow, tormentingly, repeatedly feel done at 57 edits and counting.

I also started searching for the just-right illustrator. I envisioned enchanting watercolor-painted scenes filled with luminous tones and cinematic storytelling detail—making the story come alive with whimsy and heart. When my first-choice illustrator agreed to collaborate, I felt immense gratitude. Our partnership became a creative dialogue. As a photographer and documentarian with a cinematic eye, I approached each scene through the lens of composition, light, and emotional expression—the same care I bring to my sculpture and photography. We collaborated in the service of the story, and she rose beautifully to every edit I requested, capturing my vision with precision and care.

I approach storytelling across all my art disciplines with that same balance of visual precision and emotional care. Just as I have spent years translating ladders into symbols of human experience—creating what I think of as a soundless, wordless language of empathy—I guided the visual world in the book with that same instinct. Beneath HUMMER & THE BOY’s gentle story lives a deeper intention: to help children and parents recognize—and be moved by—the language of emotion, compassion, and connection.

As I enter the final stages of production, I remember the love and imagination that have made HUMMER & THE BOY a reality for me. I hope it will bring joy to my readers.

Some of you are just finding me, and some of you have been alongside me for years.

Either way, I’ve learned that introductions aren’t a one-time moment. They’re something we return to.

If any part of that speaks to you, you’re welcome here…