Rest and Pace

Published on October 23, 2026

A vertical black and white photograph of my face (a white woman with short black hair). I am sitting on a bed holding a camera in front of my chest.

Long time readers will know of my drawn out struggle to find photography again since falling ill to long covid - as written about here and here and a few times in my Life this week series.

I endlessly miss working with a camera to create images of the world around. In a different lifetime, I wrote:

In that moment of pause, I bear witness and enter into an act of reciprocity with the world. I step out of my worries, quieten my mind, and let my body experience the world. In return, I attempt to capture those daily moments of wonder and stillness.

It turns out stepping out of my worries and engaging with the world is extremely difficult when my baseline keeps shifting. Last year, I could step out, walk, photograph as I used to-ish. This year... well let's not talk about this year too much. It's enough to say that walking has not been a strong feature. I am not homebound but outings are few.

I've attempted to photograph the home instead but it never worked. I suspect this is in part due to very ingrained habits with my current cameras. I like a 28mm lens and I like f11. Those are not settings I found myself able to work with in the home.

One day, a switch flicked in my brain. The light, the colours, the textures, maybe some content I had swallowed on YouTube... I am not sure but I grabbed my film scanning camera: a Nikon D3200 with a Nikkor macro 55mm lens. I made an image, and another.

A vertical colour photograph of a desk with a spindle full of wool. Around are notebooks, mini synth, a camera lens, cloths, etc. In the foreground is a part of blue woolen jumper on the back of a chair. In the background is a shelving unit with thread and photos. A streak of light beams squares of warmth at various spots.

A horizontal colour photograph of a corner of a bed unmade. The sheet is a dark grey. The duvet cover is a white and green leafy pattern. Light streaks in horizontal lines over the scene.

Over the next few days, I kept picking up the camera to record moments of stillness and it dawned on me that perhaps, possibly, I might have found a way forward with photography. I can shed my old habits, forget about the world that is so often out of bounds for me, and instead record my here and now.

And so, Rest and Pace was born, a blog to record my life with long covid. At the moment, the images are of stillness and quiet moments of beauty because this is what I need. I have no doubt that eventually the grief, the pain, the fog will come in.

You can go check the new blog out here.

PS: I will still be posting here. I just need to figure out my way back to words now.