We never wish for pain, but in its own strange way, it can remind us how truly connected we all are in how we feel love and loss. Sometimes we need to stop pushing it away and feel the pain in all its depths, and to remember that it means we are so much more.

This illustration based on a line from Eloise McGraw’s book “The Moorchild” reads “It must be human—this tearing apart that she was feeling.”

HOW IT’S MADE: This piece is a real Polaroid, made with the same chemical process as taking a photo with a Polaroid camera—but with my original illustration as the subject! This bit of magic means each print is just a bit different, and totally unique. Your print will have its own variations of color and depth so you can know it’s completely one of a kind!

WHY IT MATTERS: These are not archival prints, meant to last for centuries if carefully handled. They are memories, stories in illustration form, captured at a unique moment in time, by me, just for you. They’re meant to be handy, to be used, to be looked at and loved on and shared and lived with, like the memories in our family scrapbooks. Your Polaroid print will change a bit over time, depending on where you put it and how often you handle it, and I think that adds to the magic of it. It’s now a sort of living piece of art that can change and grow with you as you move through life day by day. It’s not a gallery piece, it’s a piece of your life, and no longer mine—it’s now a part of the story of you.