30 December 2024
Stopping to Notice
I started 2024 with Miranda Keeling’s The Year I Stopped to Notice , and I’m glad I did, as it helped me frame a lot of life moments this year. I wanted to counter what I (formerly!) used social media for and be more mindful about what I photograph. I’ll admit, this newfound habit was largely informed by age-related anxiety of a possibly weakening memory, as I inch closer to 40. But instead of being crippled by the thought, I wanted to see life in a more celebratory way, as all moments, big or small, are worth closely inspecting.
As inspired by the book, I started writing down at-the-moment observations in my commonplace book , and at times belatedly, when writing tools are unavailable.
My handwriting is GREAT /s
Here are my Stopping to Notice (S2N; abbreviation mine) attempts this year, in the hopes that this practice becomes a life constant. In writing things down this way, I carve out a fragment of time and take it as a piece I can truly call my own. And later, I hold these pieces up again, hoping to be thrown back to a moment and maybe see them in a new light.
Singapore, January 2024
🔜 Tokyo, January 2024