Hunter's full moon

We met the afternoon before the Hunter's full moon — that big, low October moon that rises gold and turns silver by the time it clears the ridge. The forecast said wind. The forecast was right. I told her to wear something that would move with it, not fight it. She showed up in two layers of chiffon, a pair of tan suede boots, and a stack of beaded bracelets she'd been collecting since she was a teenager.

The first field

We started in a tall grass pasture under the mesa, the sun still high enough to flare hard behind her. She lifted her arms and the kimono opened like a pair of wings and I just kept shooting. Some sessions you have to coax into existence; this one walked itself into the frame.

There's a kind of quiet that only happens in October — the grass is already gold, the air is already cold, and the light slows down like it's reluctant to leave.

Down into the grass

She knelt down between two tufts of dry grass and closed her eyes. I didn't ask her to. She just did it — turned her face up toward the warmth and breathed. That frame is my favorite of the whole evening. Nothing performed. Just a woman letting the season find her.

Into the wind

We walked deeper into the meadow and the wind picked up — really picked up — and her hair did that thing hair does when you stop trying to control it. She looked back over her shoulder, laughing, the chiffon snapping behind her, the boots planted in the grass. That's when I knew we had the cover.

Golden, then silver

The last twenty minutes we worked tight — hands shielding her eyes, bracelets catching the sun, a close-up of her profile lit from behind so the whole edge of her went copper. By the time we walked back to the cars the moon was already up over the ridge, pale and enormous, exactly the way Octobers in the foothills promise it will be.

She texted me that night: 'I feel more like myself than I have in months.' That's the whole reason I take women out into fields under big moons. Not for the photos. For that sentence.