At 16...

At 16, life hit me with two brutal lessons in heartbreak.

My father’s second divorce shook the foundation i stood on, and just months later, i lost a friend in a car accident.

He was fun, full of life, smart and gorgeous!

Someone who lit up every room, who made you believe in the beauty of the moment.

He was the rockabilly, always in his signature red leather jacket, fearless and unapologetically himself.

Since then, I’ve always had my own red leather jacket.

Not just to honor him, but to remind myself that when life gets hard, when everything feels like it’s falling apart, we keep going.

We rise, we push forward, and we carry the ones we’ve lost with us in the way we live.

Life will knock us down, but we don’t stay down.

We wear our scars like armor, we hold onto the memories that shape us and we find strength in the symbols that remind us who we are.

For me, that’s my red leather jacket.

A reminder to live boldly, to love fiercely and to never let life’s hardest moments break me.