When life gives you lemons, make lemonade. It’s funny that at some point in your life, you pass through events that will influence your life in the next days, the next months, or the next years. In two months I have lost my grandfather and my dad. This is still a trauma for me because it’s just almost as fresh as this photoshoot. My previous life was barely satisfying, with no desire to men, no self-confidence and no professional goal.
I remember his (my dad) last words to me. “Hurry to live”. When I hear that in a movie I’m always smiling a bit, thinking, yeah, another pot-pourris of a romantic movie. But lately, it has been a real echo.
Participating in this project is a good way to tell myself that I can do things, that I can manage things, and that I can undertake visions for myself. Hiking more, more sport, loving more, starting to feel that, despite the fact that I’ve been facing difficult times with my family, my drug addictions, and alcohol issues, now I can proudly say that I’m out from this, but still trying to accept that my failures, makes who I a mand that I can say it out loud that I was sick and now I’m feeling better and I feel ready to love myself and to love another person.
This is a lot like a “me” introspection, but in that case, a photoshoot is, whenever it is done with the talent of a photographer, it is also a way to erect a picture of me, like a test where you’ll have to show the world that you always have to be proud of yourself and never hesitate to look back and say that this is over, let’s build a future.
The gay community is definitely not the loving community that I was expecting when I was younger (I still am!!!). It’s harsh, it’s judgemental, there are so many rules, and sometimes too few rules, and no one will teach you the operating instructions. You’re alone, you born alone, and you die alone. This is obviously my own experience.
But at some point, this is not all dark. I had the chance to be raised in a very loving family. Hopefully I have that. I am full of trust, I trust people, and I always will. This conviction is slowly, day by day, making me more than happy with the situation, sometimes even resilient, which is really useful today. And seeing this makes me believe that I occupy something in this world, that I want to be part of, deeply.
I hope that those pictures, and my story, will tell some other lost minds that even if this is not a bright world, they are not alone, nothing is written in stone forever, even your reputation.
I am not just a picture or a broken person. I’m responsible for myself and I have the power and the opportunity, every day, to change it.
