Alive in the Details

The Perfect Day, Notes from a Shaky Camera

The other day, Facebook memories surfaced a video I made in New York City in 2016.

It shook me in that quiet, reverberating way a moment from the past sometimes does. It was just a single day, one warm, golden thread woven into the fabric of my life. But it was also everything.

I’d just finished my radiotherapy degree. It took everything I had to complete it: my stamina, my belief in myself, my sleep. But somehow, I did it. Somehow, amidst the self-doubt and the sheer workload, I also had some of the best times of my life.

That summer, I returned to work at the summer camp where my journey through treatment had begun years earlier, that had led me to radiotherapy. I brought my best friend from radiotherapy, KT, with me. She was one of those people who had seen me through the hardest parts and made space for joy too.

That day in NYC was my first proper day back in the world, back in myself. Away from the shackles of the degree, back closer to what I originally thought my life would have been like pre-sickness.

I filmed it on a small handheld camera. No stabilisers, no filters like we have today. The footage shakes, the zoom lags, but it's real. It begins in the early morning and follows us all the way to the edge of night. I was trying to hold on to every small detail. Trying to capture the feeling. The spirit. I didn’t think I’d ever get back to New York, or even to a life where a perfect day like that was possible. So I paid attention. Deeply. And I try and take that practice into days like that. Where I can close my eyes, and feel like i’m there - because I paid such close attention to the details.

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Now when I watch it back, all I see is life. Real, flawed, radiant life. Mostly because I remember the feeling I had when I filmed it.

There is a kind of liberation that comes with imagining a future, especially when you’ve lived without one. For so long, I didn’t allow myself to think past the next appointment, the next scan. But slowly, something shifted. The freedom to dream crept back in. And with it came hope.

I look back on that day and see a version of myself I was just getting to know again. Braver, reshaped, still in a lot of pain & fatigued, and raw but reawakened. I pushed myself that summer. I tried things I never would have dared seven years earlier. I walked into unfamiliar places, struck up conversations, sat with the strangeness of being alive. I traveled outside my comfort zone in every possible way. And I found something waiting there: connection.

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Anthony Bourdain once said culture isn’t about aesthetics. It’s about how people survive. It’s what we sing when we’re hurting. It’s the ritual of joy in the middle of chaos. Late-night diners and love-worn notebooks. Food trucks, subway performers, street corners, kindness. That stuck with me. Because being in a place isn’t about seeing the sights. It’s about paying attention. To how people move. What lives theres and how they hold dear. How they keep going.

But Bourdain also reminded us that even surrounded by that richness, despair can still find you. Sometimes it sharpens the edge.

I understand that. I’ve lived behind glass. Masked, alone, plugged into machines. Watching life carry on while I fought to keep mine.

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So much has happened in the years since I filmed that day. Sometimes it makes me dizzy trying to hold it all. The pain, the people, the loss. The slow rebuild. And yet, somehow, I’m still here. On to another new chapter that hurts, still reflecting, still reaching. Still alive.

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This weekend, after being taught the same lesson of paying attention to the details whilst out surrounded by peace and nature, I asked a good friend & mentor what do I do next? In this raw, vulnerable but full potentially open landscape space. Where do I go next? I’m a bit lost! The answer came without hesitation: do what makes you happy. Follow your passion.

It sounds simple, maybe too simple, but it’s the most honest thing I know. Life can change in an instant. Comfort, plans, careers, beliefs - none of them protect us. But connection does. Curiosity does. Joy does. Friendship does.

I don’t know what comes next. None of us do. But I want to make things. I want to meet people who surprise me. I want to throw myself into everything that feels meaningful. Even the small, shaky moments. Especially those.

Getting sick, and then being a healthcare professional, and then a councillor gave me a front-row seat to the fragility of life. But also to its beauty. It introduced me to people with more heart and strength than I ever thought possible, like my friend & mentor. Some of them are still here. Some of them aren’t. But every one of them helped me not only BE in the world, but to see the world differently.

This road is messy. But it’s also full of light. Full of laughter. Full of chance encounters and fleeting moments that make your chest ache with gratitude.

That’s what that day in New York taught me. A day I never thought I’d get again.

Facebook memories giving me this video, alongside this past weekend is clearly giving me the lesson to:

Pay attention. Let yourself be awed by small things. Say yes more. Take the picture. Be in it. Talk to strangers. Order the weird dish. Stay out late. Keep making things, even if they’re imperfect. Especially if they’re imperfect.

Because the most important thing is this: you’re alive. Right now. And that’s more than enough reason to make it count.

So if today is ordinary, or shaky, or beautiful, or boring, or painful, or everything all at once—live it.

I filmed that day to remember what it felt like to truly live.
I write this now so I won’t forget.
Maybe that’s all we’re really here to do. Pay attention. Make others & ourselves feel seen. Share it.

Here’s the crazy shaky video of a perfect day in NYC, after everything.

An imperfect film. A perfect day. A reminder to keep going.

PS: All the photos in this post apart from the field photo is from that amazing 2016 summer of living.