the story
before i lay me down to sleep is an intimate documentary set almost entirely inside my father's small house in Quinlan, Texas. Once a stoic electronics builder and provider, he is now an 87-year-old widower moving carefully through his days with a cane, pill organizers, and long stretches of quiet in front of the TV.
For most of my life, we kept a careful distance. The 2023 medical crisis—both parents hospitalized, my mother's death, and the sudden shift into caregiving—cracked that distance open.
Rather than attempting a full life history, the film narrows in on three interwoven threads: our father-daughter relationship now, the philosophy of the in-between moments, and my own caregiving and anticipatory grief.
The camera doesn't look away. It stays with the small acts of care, the present-tense conversations, and the mundane moments that usually go undocumented. It asks what it means to finally see and hear a parent while there is still time.