In some ways, this has been my most successful week ever, both as a person and as a business owner. I pushed through one of the hardest things I have ever done, deeply expressed myself, my art, and my introversion in a visual way, earned myself credibility that I know I have deserved but hadn’t before had the ability to command, and came out on the other side still feeling like myself. There have been a LOT of good things that have come my way this week – so many, in fact, that my workload is growing already, just since Tuesday’s launch. On this front, I know that I have come into who I am supposed to be.

But there are still other things, conversations and nagging questions, uncertainties and the inevitable crash that comes as you process the culmination of something that has taken so much out of you. There is “what about ‘River’ now?” and getting an iron panel run and catching up with your life again to realize that some things you thought about those you love were wrong and you have collateral damage to deal with. There are questions of trust and “do I really see people the way I think I do?” because I have been wrong before, and they’re much more practiced at not being themselves than I am.

Walking out on faith isn’t easy, and it doesn’t end with the first step. I think I expected magic of some sort, that finishing my website after years and years of pouring my heart into developing my ideas and my voice would mean that my whole life would suddenly look like this perfect picture I had imagined.

Yet even as I worked to put my portfolio back together after the overhaul it sustained, I couldn’t help tracing the thread of black shadowing through every piece. No matter how light the photo is, you have to have the shadow to draw attention to the light. You have to recognize that fine art isn’t just a wash of whiteness; it is the mix of the black and the white and the gray and all the colors in between that sometimes you can’t even SEE, but you feel them – you know they’re there, and that is what keeps the image relevant.

I don’t want to become cynical, or to wall my heart off to hope or to others. The photography industry, the blogging world – it is horrible for that. You take a lot of hits, both online and off. There are friends and tribes and groups who will take your side no matter what, and there are enemies and tribes and groups who will rip you up no matter what.

I can’t help thinking of the jarring scene in the movie musical,Oklahoma, just after the wedding and the shivaree – the happiest moments of the movie – when Judd, the hired hand, had died after falling on his own knife while trying to murder Laurey and Curly. Laurie, whose dreams of love had just been fulfilled, asked Aunt Eller how she is supposed to go on with life now, after something so bad had happened.

Aunt Eller, holding her, explained that “All kinds of things are gonna happen in life, Honey, and sometimes you’ve got to take the good with the bad, and say, well, all right then.”

Disappointment and heartache go with living – that’s just a fact. But joy and hope come with it too, and shutting your heart to those things is a recipe for disillusionment and unkindness. The world may try to shove me into the corner, but I don’t have to choose it. The good and the hard are part of who I am, alive.

All right then. Let’s see what today brings.