Art of Dying Volume II | Page 30

SARAH TREANOR Death is an incredibly valuable teacher, an incredibly valuable part of my life. 30 | ART OF DYING way to acknowledge some of those emotions that I didn't necessarily want to share through writing. I was taking pictures of what I was feeling. I was certain that other people who were going through these things would want to share my experience. I started posting a portrait every week, sharing the emotion that inspired the photo. People resonated with my portraits. Although I’m a writer, it's hard to put everything into words. Sometimes you can say much more with an image. You don't necessarily need everyone else to understand every little meaning behind a photo you make as long as you know what it means for you. Others can interpret it how they want. Opening myself felt so healing. I knew I had to keep pouring it out and letting other people be a part of it. It helped a little bit, a little bit, a little bit at a time. My mother died when I was 9. That was very hard. My whole life changed. Fortunately certain things like my school stayed the same. That really helped. My dad suffered from alcoholism and had not been very present in raising me. After my mom died, he had to raise me. It was only then that I started to have a relationship with him. Thank God he somehow managed to gather himself enough to quit drinking and start going to AA meetings. It was just the two of us. I was very aware of not having a normal family. I didn't know any other kids who had lost a parent, had divorced or anything. I had a lot of fear around being different. I was hyper aware of people dying after that. Death was always on my mind. I remember feeling like this couldn’t be normal. My dad was also handicapped, so I worried that something would happen to him. I'm often a nervous person. It's