Over the years I've had many friends send me pictures of doors from their travels and adventures. But I've always refused to add them to my collection. When we went to Italy back in 2004, I fell in love with doors. I wasn't the first to do it, but it wasn't yet the typical trend, so my family laughed a bit at me, and my class was mostly annoyed with me for constantly slowing them down as I tried to capture a shot of yet another door. When we returned home I created a little collection on my wall, grouped by city. They are my favorite.

Since then, when friends sent me pictures of doors, I enjoyed them, but I politely informed them that I only framed my own photos of doors I had myself visited. It's something symbolic to me. I love the purpose doors stand for, that they negotiate space from inside to outside, from one place to another, from the public to the private, from the common to the sacred, from the unsafe to the safe, from the known to the unknown. I love that doors are where we kiss goodnight, and welcome friends in. The door is where a husband carries his new bride through to her new home, and where a wife meets her husband home from work. I love the beauty of a door physically, its detail and strength. I love that it signifies a home or a church, that it is a piece and yet marks the whole. I love doors.

And I've come to love when friends take a picture of a door they see abroad, for me. Yes, today I decided to change my rule. It's been slowly processing in me, and now when I have a home, I want to display the doors my friends have seen, visited, walked through and thought of me.

I've always had a conviction in my heart that I'm a sort of bridge (we all are). I've had a feeling I'd end up in another state. And my friends would be here and there, and a dozen places in between. It has always been the case and becomes more and more true as the years go by. Too often we let those who move away slip from our lives and to the far corners of our hearts. I've seen the pain that can cause them, when people feel forgotten somewhere across the state lines. I know my friends will move and travel and put down roots across rivers and lakes and maybe even oceans. And while our friendship will no doubt look different, I know that those ties from their roots to mine will still be bringing us both life. I think this is part of why I am always working so hard to remember and collect memories and moments. Part of it is I'm a story-keeper by creation. Part of it is I've always known I'm going someplace, and every moment here will be dear to me, and will serve to keep me close, keep me soft, and to not let me forget the tree from which I came. Not only me, but if others are going too, or returning, we'll need those moments to hold us just the same.

So yes, doors. I cannot wait to create a little keepsake of the doors friends have sent me from Spain, Costa Rica, Czech, and the rest of the world. Thank you each of you, I treasure them, and especially you.