A friend of mine sent me an email a few months back.  In it was a description of an idea to connect photographers with children who have chronic illnesses in order to tell the children's stories via photographs.

The idea was thought up by Katie Lemieux, in conjunction with Gilda's Club of South Florida.

I have a close friend who was diagnosed with breast cancer at just 24.  When she called me to tell me that she had cancer, I was having the time of my life, snowboarding in Breckenridge on its opening weekend in 2008.  I remember how quickly what had seemed so enormous lost its mystique as I wondered if she was going to be okay and what I was supposed to do or say when a friend you've had for 15 years drops a bomb on you while you are 2000 miles from home.

The next year was filled with surgeries, chemo parties and a whole lot of hanging out, seeing as my friend wasn't able to work and suddenly had a lot of time on her hands.

I remember her telling me how she used to go to Gilda's Club for activities that were provided for people suffering from cancer and how it really helped her to connect with others facing the same challenges.  So when I got this email about a project being spearheaded with Gilda's Club, it seemed like one of those fate-filled events that I was just supposed to be a part of.

Finally stepping foot into the beautiful, peacock-laden property of Gilda's Club, I was linked with a young woman named Deana, who, a month after graduating from high school, starting seeing strange bruising on her body and experiencing dizziness.  After a visit to the emergency room, she was diagnosed with leukemia.  After having to undergo chemotherapy over the span of a few years, Deana lost all her hair.  Twice.

As someone who is in a chronic state of 'hair crises' and feels the need to make radical hair changes on a weekly basis, I can't imagine what it must be like to be 20 years old and to have not only had to face a mortality most of us choose to ignore, but also to lose a part of us that seems to be the external symbol of our femininity.  Deana told stories of how she was so weak from the treatments that she was unable to walk up and down the stairway in her house and became confined to one area in which she could maneuver. 

When asked how she feels now, she smiles a big, beautiful, I'm-20-years-old-and-I-know-how-good-it-is-to-be-alive smile and tells me she feels great, has recovered all her energy and, very importantly, she has hair again.

Beautiful, shiny, thick, black, Pantene Pro-V commercials hair.

You know what's funny?  You see people walking around day after day and you can never really know the story of the person standing in line in front of you at Publix.

If I had seen Deana one day, I never would have thought that this vivacious 20 year old has suffered through more trials than anyone should in a lifetime.

And I guess that's an important lesson in itself.  We're all struggling with different battles and a little compassion goes a long way.

There's something infectious about the smile of a person who knows what it's like to suffer and survive.

Luckily for Sarah and Keith, at the time of our outing in Breckenridge, I had just purchased a super cool new lens and was still playing around with it and trying to get familiar with its awesomeness.  I happened to get it right just when this was happening:

I am a lucky girl:  this year I got the chance to travel like crazy throughout the country, giving me the opportunity to visit with some friends who have moved away.

Sarah hired me to shoot her wedding back in 2007 in Ponte Vedra Beach, Florida.  A few months after that, she called me to let me know she was in town and we spent the fourth of July together at the beach sunning and enjoying the Florida sun.  We kept in touch after she moved away to my all time favorite state of Colorado, and I decided to pay her a visit.

Sarah, Keith and I spent a weekend enjoying the slopes of Breckenridge, Colorado.  After a day of boarding (for me, skiing for them), we went around town to take some photos of the two: