On the 18th of April 2008 everything in my life was irreversibly changed by the sudden death of my Mother. The two years that followed were difficult for my family, all of us trying to find our way in a life that no longer featured someone so very important. During this time it occurred to me that if death and illness can ruin everything so swiftly and efficiently, then it’s far better to do the things you want to do now, rather than give disaster the time and opportunity to fuck things up. We gave ourselves a year, wrote a list of countries, planned, saved, packed our bags and went.

With me I took an unfamiliar camera, a bag of film and a mental list of “travel photography” cliches I hoped to avoid. First up . . . North America.