Difficult sunset

End-of-day via smartphone
Laval, QC
June 2019
This photo originally shared on Instagram

This is the scene I used to shoot when my mother-in-law was still alive. As the setting sun painted the sky multiple shades of orange, salmon and pink, I'd run out to the 12th floor balcony and grab the moment before returning to the dinner table. She'd quickly scan the raw pics on the camera's screen, nod her approval, and we'd go back to eating. She got me.

We didn't do big family meals here with my father-in-law, at least not in the same way. But I still pointed my lens westward whenever the sky decided to put on a show, and still shared the results with him when I got back inside. It was a bittersweet continuation of one of many strange little traditions that over the years had indelibly fused me into the core of this family. He got me, too.

So it felt normal - amid a period that feels anything but - to wrap my hands around my DSLR and have a little photographic fun while the house was full of visitors. The setting sun was casting colorful patterns through the cloud layers and onto the interior walls, and I thought to myself, "Myself, this is why I shoot."

So I timed out from the chaos, hefted my DSLR and did what Irving and Zelda would have wanted me to do. Although this is merely a test shot from my smartphone, they doubtless both would have wanted to review my screen and nod their approval before we all went back to the routine of being a family. Of being us.

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