How the Arizona Desert Taught Me to Slow Down
I used to be obsessed with being busy.
A busy life meant a happy life, and I had a Google Calendar that would make a homebody cringe. I was living in Washington, D.C., enjoying the hustle and bustle of a career in politics, a social life in one of the country’s most robust queer scenes, and a side hustle taking graduation and engagement photos for friends and acquaintances.
I was happy — and I loved my life — but I grew tired. Fast.
I started to miss the slower pace life offered me when I lived in Arizona. I longed to be back in Phoenix, surrounded by desert landscapes and warm, endless sky.
The Open Road Was My Reset Button
Before I moved to D.C., I developed a deep love for road-tripping through the Southwest. There’s something incredibly therapeutic about being alone in your car, music blasting, surrounded by nothing but rocky mountains erecting from dusty plains.
I’d drive for hours with no real plan — just chasing light. When I’d step out of the car, a muffled Fleetwood Mac song still humming through the sunroof, and raise my camera toward a red butte or piney canyon, I felt it. The quiet reminder of what this life is really about.
Those Drives Became My Meditation
I didn’t always know where I was going — just that I needed to follow the light with a full tank of gas and a weathered camera bag riding shotgun.
It was in those wide-open, wind-swept spaces that I started to realize how much I’d been missing. I wasn’t just tired in D.C. — I was disconnected. From myself. From stillness. From the reason I started taking photos in the first place.
Homecoming
I made my way back to Arizona in the summer of 2023.
It was a homecoming — but not in the nostalgic, “returning to the good old days” kind of way. More like a reunion with the version of myself that breathes deeper, moves slower, and pays closer attention. The one who pulls over on the side of the highway because the light hit a saguaro just right and he had to feel it.
The desert welcomed me back like an old friend. When I crossed over the state line just past the Four Corners, I wept — overwhelmed by the journey (12 days, 8 national parks) and the quiet relief that bloomed in my chest. The land felt sacred. Familiar. Ready.
The Desert Doesn’t Rush You
Out here, nothing hurries.
The sun takes its time sinking below the horizon. The wind moves like a whisper. The cacti bloom on their own schedule — unapologetically slow.
And now — so do I.
Whether I’m photographing a couple tangled in laughter during an elopement, or someone standing in their own skin for the first time in front of the camera, I bring that same slowness with me. That same sense of space. Of presence.
No pressure. No pretending. Just time to breathe.
The Desert Is My Office
The more I let go of rushing, the more honest my work has become.
I don’t script sessions anymore. I follow the energy. I wait for the wind to move someone’s hair just right. I notice the quiet gestures between people — the way a head rests on a shoulder, fingers intertwine when no one’s watching. That’s where the story lives.
This pace — unhurried, intentional, sun-drenched — feels like the truest version of who I am and what I want to offer.
If You’re Craving Slowness, Too…
Then maybe you’re in the right place.
I don’t just take photos. I hold space. I wait with you. I see you when you’re not performing. And I help you see yourself the way the desert helped me — without heavy filters, without noise, just light and truth and stillness.
If that’s what you’re craving, I’d be honored to create with you.
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