Nicole

Sometimes life can feel like one big story, with different chapters that align to moments in time, places we’ve lived, people we have met and experiences we have had through the years. Much like those well thought out novels, there are scenes of the story where we as the reader know we are experiencing a foreshadowing of things to come - and we continue reading to understand those connections, the significance and the impact on the plot and main characters.

In my life, October 2, 2009, was one of those moments of serendipity. Where the present and the future would collide at a single music event in SF. Celebrating a couple I had never met. In a room filled with people I did not yet know. Dancing to the music that helped me return to the person I remembered being after the separation from my first husband. Out, for the night with mah kin, David “Gumbo” and our friend Angie to shake our asses for an evening of funk.

But it was so much more than that.

The couple being celebrated that night, under a disco ball blender, were Nicole and Erik Keller. “For the Love of Funk” drew an audience that, when I look back now on group photos (thank the lord Brian Smith had an iPhone!), I realize became my closest friend group in San Francisco. But in the moment, that night, I knew not a single one of them. Not. One. In under a year, I would know 90% of the people in that room. But that night? None.

Nicole and Erik would take every baby item I had for Nicky when Benny was born. We would celebrate holidays, birthdays, anniversaries with them and the “Blender Krewe.” We did family vacations to Big Sur and NOLA, girls’ trips to Mexico, Napa, Sedona and many other places and they were with us in Kauai as Chris and I married on a beach in tropical paradise. Watching them leave the Bay Area, to understandably be there for family back east that needed them, was one of the saddest days I have had since moving out here.

I chose this picture because I thought it truly captured the joy of the evening, the gratitude for the music, and the love that was felt by all, even if our friendship was a mere foreshadowing in the moment. There are few people I am as grateful for as Nicole. And no matter how far apart we are, we will never be separated by miles.

My next portrait is entitled, “Nicole.” I tried to capture the radiance of her glowing hair with different shades of glass, and her fabric shirt has glow in the dark stars. Her face has pressed flowers in all different colors and rainbow glitter and has the words “You are pure sunshine” alongside purple butterflies. She is wearing a real feather earring (being the rocker that she always is!) and is standing in front of a disco ball background of iridescent glass. Finally, Alex’s shirt is a piece of hand blown Fremont Antique Glass that looks like rock star zebra print.