One Day, El Cap

Some dreams are supposed to feel too big for us at first.

One Day, El Cap. is about looking toward something beyond who you are today and imagining who you might become. The dream may change as you grow. What matters is continuing to have something in the distance that makes you want to keep going.

Artwork Story

El Capitan rises almost straight out of Yosemite Valley. Climbers travel from around the world to attempt it. Some spend years developing the strength, skill, and courage to be ready.

When I painted the little girl sitting across the river from it, I was thinking about my own daughter. She grew up climbing, and today she is a young adult beginning to build a life of her own.

The wooden blocks beneath the girl matter to me. Those were once challenges too. She learned them, climbed them, and now she can see something much bigger in the distance.

Maybe one day she'll climb El Capitan. Maybe she won't.

That's the part of this painting I've come to love most. Growing up isn't about reaching a destination someone else chose for us. It's about becoming capable of choosing for ourselves—deciding what is worth working toward, what we're willing to practice for, and ultimately, who we want to become.

Our El Capitans will change throughout our lives. The mountain that feels enormous at ten probably won't be the same one we're looking toward at twenty, forty, or seventy.

But I hope we always have one.

Never stop having an El Capitan.