The Unlikely; Cross Hatched Heiress

So I know this girl.

She’s pretty amazing.

Her whole life has been a series of mountains to climb, valleys to weather, and some peeks at beauty and happiness. And dude…she is a champ about it all. She loves people to an extent that blows my mind.

She will listen to anyone’s heart because she believes so deeply that everyone’s heart deserves to be respected and loved. She just keeps trucking up these mountains and through the valleys and through it all she is looking for the beauties in it all. She uses the idea that she can use the pain she’s experienced in her life to help someone else that she meets along the way.

She wants to know people.

Actually know them.

Not a skin deep, weekly interaction. She wants to love people, not just hop in and out of people’s lives at her own discretion but really become a part of their hearts and them become part of hers.

She has had so many reasons in her life to give up hope, so many reasons to shut down, but she still believes in people. She believes in beauty when she can’t see it.

Some of you may think, “wow, this girl sounds amazing.” Well for those of you who aren’t thinking it, get on that thought track.

She has taught me a lot about loving people and loving them through difficult and complicated times. She never stops loving people. Never.

She is so patient with people. She has been hurt but she never writes people off. She knows the sting of losing someone before she could right a wrong. It is a scar she feels every day and refuses to add more.

You should be thinking at this point that you need to meet this girl. I agree with you.

Fair warning though. She’s a creative. She isn’t afraid to disagree with you, which makes her all the better of a friend. A good friendship isn’t people who always agree; its people who can disagree and move forward through life holding hands and standing up against the storms of life together.

She and I don’t agree on a lot of things.

But we also agree on a lot of things.

She has different colors of hair, she has lots of piercings(wants more), has gauges, wants tattoos, and is one of the best people I know.

By this point you should be thinking, “Hilary, tell us who this girl is already so I can get to know her.”

Well I’m sorry, but you don’t get to know who she is.

No, I’m not joking.

But please see her in every person that you don’t know.

Please see that kind heart behind the tattoos.

See the hard worker behind the unconventional hair color.

See the beautiful heart that has gauged their ears.

See beyond your own judgement and love someone you might have overlooked because they don’t look like you or see the world in the same way that you do.

The best people I know are people that aren’t like me.

They challenge my thought process.

They challenge the way I see the world.

They challenge the way I see myself.

So step outside your box that you’ve built for yourself; you know the one that you’re more than happy to stay in. You’ve got a bunch of pillows piled up in the corner and you’ve dealt with what you are comfortable with and you think you’re living a godly life.

Well you aren’t.

Get outside of your box. Tear it apart.

Don’t build a box ever again.

Boxes keep you in…but they also keep life out.

They may keep you firmly within your illusion of safe.

But they also keep you firmly out of reach from beauty that is beyond your scope; and trust me, we only see so far.

So, next time you see that person in your life that you’ve decided you’re not going to know because they’re a little, “different”.

Please tear that box up and step out and see the tapestry of life.

I have a theory that life is like a tapestry.

We see the back of it. The back is a hot mess of threads. A. Hot. Mess.

Threads crossing over and back and under and then just in a pile in one corner and you can’t tell where one thread starts and another begins but all you know is that you see a lot of colors intersecting.

You see colors that don’t go, that could never go, and then you turn the tapestry over and the colors you thought couldn’t go…well they somehow do. And somehow those unlikely colors make the tapestry all the more beautiful.

Throughout our lives all we see is the hot mess.

We wonder how, why, and what the -?!?!?

But then we get to the end of our life and that’s when we turn the tapestry over and somehow it’s beautiful. Beyond Beautiful. And all that hot mess and the unlikely people and things that we’ve known and loved have made it all the more beautiful.

I challenge you to seek out, meet, and love the unlikelies.

Seriously. Go.

Sincerely yours,

The Undefeated Photographer