Over the course of 27 years, from 1991 until 2017, photographer Deanna Dikeman has a ritual. Every time she left her parent's house in Sioux City, Iowa, she would snap a picture of her mom and dad waving goodbye from the driveway.
The artist statement Nancy LeVine sent us for her series Senior Dogs Across America begins with a paragraph that left this writer in tears—a tribute to the two dogs she had to let go of. "I loved them passionately," she writes. "To the quiet, exquisite presence of each aged dog, I honor them with this work."
For as long as photographer Angelo Merendino can remember, leaving his parents' house involved a heartfelt goodbye at the door.
"There was never an, 'I'll just let myself out,'" he writes. "It was always, 'We'll walk you to the door.'" At some point he realized this goodbye wasn't always a given, and decided to capture it in photos for the remaining years he had with his 80+ year old parents.
Photographer Maria Sharp has had one constant over the past sixteen years, and that constant was a German Shepherd, Collie, Hound Dog mix named Chubby.
And when Chubby's health began declining rapidly, Sharp said goodbye the only way she knew how: by digging up old pictures, and taking a few new ones before Chubby passed away.