Salt Lake City, UT
oliviaethington02@gmail.com
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the things to say will be there when you need them
I never know what to expect when I walk through the door. It could be a good day and he’ll remember my name. Or maybe it will be a bad day and he won’t use my name for fear that he will get it wrong. My grandpa has dementia, and over the past few years, the disease has been steadily progressing. This past summer I spent a lot of time with him and cherished every moment—moments he’d likely come to forget. He frequently confuses my dad and my uncles, and occasionally can't remember the names of family members. He forgets whether he’s eaten, or if he has somewhere to be. What he does remember are songs he learned to play on the piano at age 10, the birth and death dates of random ancestors he’s researched, and the day-to-day tasks he did as a kid on the farm.
Through the things to say will be there when you need them, I visually navigate how my relationship with my grandpa is ever-shifting and document the mundane, domestic parts of life that slip away with the development of dementia. The repetition of color, light, and shape throughout the pictures reflects the cyclical conversation I have with my grandpa, the gaps in sequence mimicking the gaps in memory.