I took this photograph while walking in Loreto, noticing how the painted lines of the crosswalk interrupted the landscape and guided the body forward. The stripes were bold and deliberate, white against dark pavement, demanding attention. Beyond them, the path softened into stone and shade, flanked by palm trees and desert plants that had no interest in straight lines.
The crosswalk became a threshold for me. It marked a moment of movement between where I had been and where I was going, between institutional belonging and personal becoming. I stood at the edge of the painted lines and felt the weight of all the crossings I had made before. The ones that led into classrooms, into contracts, into roles that asked me to perform readiness while offering no certainty in return.
In black and white, the scene shifts from a colourful resort walkway into a study of passage. The ordered stripes of the road meet the uneven textures of stone, palm, and foliage. I felt the tension between structure and growth, between systems that organise bodies and the quiet, living pathways that emerge beyond them. The path past the crosswalk disappears into shade, suggesting that transition is rarely linear or fully visible. We cross, and then we discover what lies on the other side.
This image sits within my broader inquiry into trauma, creativity, and place-based learning. Walking, photographing, and noticing have become methods of recovery and research. Each step across the threshold is both an embodied practice and a form of data. The land becomes a co-teacher, offering pathways that invite slowing, noticing, and choosing presence over productivity.
For years, I believed my belonging rested in institutional rhythms. Student needs, colleague expectations, committee meetings, and the fragile promise of contract renewal. Standing here, camera in hand, I began to sense another form of belonging. The land does not require performance. It offers passage without evaluation, crossing without consequence. This crosswalk became a quiet declaration that I can move into a different relationship with work, place, and self.
The photograph documents a moment of transition and asks how thresholds shape identity, memory, and healing. The painted lines will fade eventually. The path beyond them will continue to grow. I crossed that morning without knowing where the shade would lead, trusting only that the crossing itself was enough. Photo Credit: Amy Tucker, January 2026
