08/28/2026
Ah! I’ve reached the end of my August sessions. It’s been a real month: beautiful, yes, but also painful and a little bit scary. There’s so much we carry in our souls that we never dare speak. Fears we swallow instead of naming.
Last night at one in the morning I sat making the final changes to our Tokyo Game Show business cards. Those lymph nodes in my neck have been swollen since mid-July, and every single day they’ve been on my mind: please go down, for the love of all that is holy. They did not. I couldn’t afford the bad shoulder this month. I really couldn’t afford something more serious than that.
So I looked at the hospitals. Lunenburg wouldn’t be open. Liverpool was closing soon. Bridgewater: three-to-six-hour wait. I walked over to Chris and said, “You know I should go. Just get the blood checked. At least eliminate the worst of the thoughts.” I wanted to know and didn’t want to know in equal measure.
Eight hours later: I was fine. Just a spectacular histamine reaction to a mosquito bite. But in those days of thinking the worst, it becomes a spiral. You’re in an ocean with your head barely breaking the surface, trying to breathe while the world rushes past. You pretend you’re just out for a swim. You lie: mostly to yourself.
After the ER, I napped before heading to Hubbards for a family session. And of all the people to show up in the dream: Dr. Ashley Margeson ND | TEDx Speaker & Burnout Expert. We hung out quietly talking about life the way we often do. She reminded me to take care of myself, the way she would in real life. Then I woke up. How very fitting that it was her of all people.
We are not forever. One day we will find ourselves replaceable; someone younger and cheaper will come along who imitates our work just enough, and just like that we’ll slip into the shadows of irrelevance.
But the people who love us? We’re not replaceable to them.
As beautiful as August was, it was also the hardest. The most real. The most emotionally consuming. And so, sleep-deprived but finally carrying a little peace of mind, I drove to my last August session, relieved in more ways than I can count that I made it through. ❤️
