As a kid, I took a lot of pictures.

I had a little point-and-shoot, and when I’d finished a roll of twenty-four or thirty-six exposures, my mom would take the film to get developed. A few days later, I’d discover that every photo was blurry, or had my finger in the shot. I once took twenty-four pictures on a fourth-grade field trip and every single one was the back of Adam Winn’s head.

But despite the poor quality—and Adam’s consistent skull—I was not dissuaded.

I kept taking pictures, usually with my cousin Erin. We’d go hiking and take photos the entire time, not of the scenery, but of each other. Either standing majestically by the waterfall at the end, or posing as though we were near a tragic death. Nothing in between. No casual joy. Just National Geographic or Dateline.

We hiked a lot. And we put ourselves in more than one dangerous situation. We wouldn’t pay attention to the trail and would end up miles from where we’d started, then accept rides from strangers to get back to our car. Another time, we lingered too long and it started getting dark. As we walked down the trail, I heard my dad’s whistle—unmistakable. We started running and found him hiking up to find us.

It turned out the mountain was on fire.

This was before cell phones. We had no idea.

I have a lot of photographic evidence of being young, dumb, and adorable.

In high school, I took a photography class. We learned basic composition and the importance of light. We shot black-and-white film on whatever point-and-shoot cameras we had and developed our photos in the darkroom. It was fascinating and genuinely fun.

Most of my photos were still terrible.

Blurry. Boring. Mostly whatever I could find to fulfill the assignment between work, school, and theater.

My mom, meanwhile, had a fancy Canon with interchangeable lenses and filters. She took community photography classes, and Alan and I were often her homework subjects. She shot weddings. She knew what she was doing.

Alan also got into photography and bought one of the first digital cameras with changeable lenses. My mom, with her film camera, was openly jealous.

I stayed in my lane with my point-and-shoot and didn’t try to compete.

Photos remained important, but purely for documentation. College Life. Mission Life. Proof of life. Nothing was ever just for fun or beauty.

I eventually upgraded to a digital camera, but it was woefully underused. I’d take one or two pictures a year.

In 2005, I had forty-three photos.

In 2007, when I found my camera to take pictures of flowers for my wall, I jumped to one hundred and two.

In 2015, when I got my first smartphone, I had one thousand six hundred and seventy-six images.

I had lost control.

Suddenly, I had a camera in my pocket that produced images far superior to anything I’d ever owned, and I could not contain myself. Flowers. Animals. Bugs. Plants. Signs. Buildings. Doorknobs. Everything got documented. The more pictures I took, the more I wanted to take, and I started walking all over the city, down every side street, hoping to find something new.

It became an obsession.

And while I honed my photography skills, I also learned the city. Intimately. Block by block. Alley by alley.

I grew more comfortable. More confident.

And since life was feeling better, I decided to give dating another go.

I met a guy for dinner who stared at me so intensely he barely ate. So, I ate his food. Which caused more staring. We went out a few more times.

He seemed nice, but his intentions shifted constantly. First, we should take things slow. Then we should move in together. Then that was too fast, but we should be exclusive. Then maybe polyamorous.

He planned and replanned our entire future while I was still finishing dessert.

It felt like he was trying to guess what I wanted instead of expressing what he wanted, and the whole thing felt unstable. So, I ended it.

And then I met Greg.

We went to dinner and the chemistry was insane. We clicked immediately. Same sense of humor. Easy rapport. It felt like we’d known each other for years.

At the end of the night, he told me something important.

He had told me he was a Delta pilot—which was true. What he hadn’t mentioned was that he’d applied to train on a new aircraft that didn’t fly out of Salt Lake. There were two possible airports he could be assigned to, and he didn’t know which one—or when he’d be moving.

But it was coming.

And when he moved, it would be over.

He didn’t want me to get attached.

This was… not ideal.

But I really liked him. And I figured I might as well enjoy a good thing while I had it.

So, we did.

He cooked for me. Took me out like he wasn’t embarrassed of me. Hosted a party and told me to invite my friends. I brought Alan and his wife Monica, who enjoyed the refreshments and agreed he was, in fact, a pretty cool guy.

I told my boss Ann about him and relayed stories from our dates.

I was excited—but I kept reminding myself, per Greg’s instructions, not to get attached. I kept my emotions on a very tight leash.

Which turns out to be hard when someone is treating you well.

The physical side of things with him was very good.
I felt comfortable. Safe. He paid attention in a way that didn’t feel transactional, or rushed, or like I was supposed to perform gratitude afterward. He seemed genuinely invested in my enjoyment, which—at the time—felt both novel and suspicious.

One evening, while dinner was in the oven, he led me into the living room, laid me down on his retro orange chaise lounge, and put on a record.
He liked vinyl.
Of course he did.

As things escalated, I felt that familiar resistance—that internal emergency brake that always kicked in right before the finish line. The part of me that didn’t quite trust joy. Or release. Or myself.
And for once, instead of fighting it, I told myself to stop. To let go.

And my body listened.

What happened next was… unmistakable.

This was not a delicate or subtle response. This was not a tasteful, cinematic moment. It was more like I’d tipped over a kiddie pool in his living room. A surprising, impressive, and frankly unreasonable amount of liquid appeared—suddenly and decisively—enough that when he pulled back, he froze for half a second, blinked, and said,
“Oh!”

Then he sprinted to the kitchen for paper towels.

The afterglow evaporated instantly. I stood there, wrapped in one of his T-shirts, staring in absolute horror at the very real puddle spreading across the floor. Mortified doesn’t quite cover it.
But—silver lining—I was also deeply, spiritually grateful.

Hardwood floors.

That was me. I had done that.
I did not know that was something my body could do. I did not know I contained that much of… anything. Physically. Emotionally. Hydrologically.

Greg cleaned it up without flinching. No jokes. No visible disgust. Just calm efficiency and an impressive number of paper towels. He told me not to be embarrassed, kissed me, and went back to plating dinner like this sort of thing happened all the time.

It did not happen all the time.
It had happened once.
To me.

And for someone who usually deflects shame by telling the story first—and louder—I did not laugh. I did not make a joke. I didn’t even manage a self-deprecating quip.
I told no one.

I am deeply uncomfortable admitting it now.
But it belongs here.

A few weeks later, Greg came to pick me up for dinner.
I was waiting outside, but he said we should go inside to talk.

I assumed this was it—the assignment, the move, the inevitable ending.

Instead, he told me he was breaking up with me.

He’d been dating another woman the entire time.

He’d told both of us not to get attached.

It was a test.

I had failed.

Apparently, the correct response had been love. Declarations. Emotional fireworks. Despite being told—explicitly—not to do that.

She had done it.

So she won.

And I burst into tears.

Not because I was sad.

I was furious.

But once again, my body had decided to react without my permission. Crying like this was an emergency. Like something had died.

I couldn’t get words past it. Just noise. Water. Humiliation.

My body, loyal to absolutely no one, was betraying me again.

He excused himself.

I never heard from him again.

And for the first time in a long while, I didn’t chase an explanation.

I let the silence stand.

That was the last date I went on for a very long time.