ON THE ROAD AGAIN

Can you hear Willie?

My compliments an a great shot...and I can hear Willie! I love the colors and the feel of this one...it puts you on the road. I hope you enjoyed the trip!

 

Dick

Thanks so much. I almost always enjoy being on the road. This trip started out on a low note (family illness in Des Moines), but once I had done what I could to help out, I was foot loose and fancy free. Give me a car and a map, and I'm pretty doggone happy. The day we left for this trip, my wife fell in the bathtub and split her eyebrow open. So, we drove to Fresno where we spent six hours in an emergency room. After a few stitches, we made it to Reno that day. You should have seen the shiner she had the next day that lasted for two weeks. Every time we went into a public place, I was sure people were looking at her and then at me as the person who gave her the black eye. For awhile I considered getting a tee shirt that said, "I didn't do it!"

 

As if that were not bad enough, while we were in Des Moines, I contracted an ear infection in my only working ear. The ear was so swollen that we could not even get drops down it, so a doctor had to implant some sort of thing in the ear canal to wick in the meds. That left me profoundly deaf for two days. Not too cool. Even though I am normally hearing impaired (one ear sixty percent and the other dead), the experience of being completely deaf is unnerving to say the least. So three trips to the ENT specialist and some meds and I was on the mend.

 

So mom had a stroke, wife busts her head open and I go deaf. Not too auspicious. I was wondering if I should not be worried about being jinxed.

 

As a side note, when I left Des Moines, I knew that if I timed it right, I could be at the opening reception of fellow Pnetter Susan Stone's show in Lewistown, Montana. So on the evening of August 8th, the wife and I walked in and gave her one hell of a surprise. It was so much fun, and she had a great show.

 

Thereafter, things went well, and we got to go to some nice places and meet some nice people. I've posted some in my "A DOZEN HOT OFF THE CCD" folder and hope you like them. There are some more coming down the pike. I think my best work is in rural America. Sorry for the longwinded story, but thought I'd give you some background of where I've been for the last month.

Beautiful, story-telling, envy-producing.

Which part is the envy producing one? My going deaf, or the wife bloodying herself up? LOL

Great story, David, and thank you for sharing with us. Sorry about your mom. I hope she can get through it. My mother is 81 and a stroke survivor. It's difficult but can be done. And I'm glad you and your wife are on the mend. Looks like you had a great trip and how cool that you made it to Susan's show! I think Summer has been a busy time for all of us. I'm looking forward to spending more time here as the school year begins. I'm not sure Tim would agree about the school year beginning!

 

Take care,

 

Dick

Thanks. I and my wife are as good as we were pre trip. Mom is making some headway, but it is a frustrating thing. She turned 92 yesterday, and has been really remarkably healthy all her life, so one cannot complain too much when dealt that hand. I'm not planing on making it near that far. Hope you enjoy the fall a bit before the snow comes.

A strong image David....the shadow/silouette, the land, the road, the speed....you embark us on the trip with this image...let's go....

 

PS: reading your comments I hope everything is fine now on the health side....what a trip...

I do have experience of sonic silence for few days.Yes, it is not a very pretty experience.After tympanoplasty my hearing was restored in one ear, just like yours. Life's like that:-)

 

I have enjoyed the beautiful sights on both sides of the road to Montana , on my way back from Yellowstone NP in 2004. I like the play of light & shade & colours in this image..

A beautiful classic shot, David, in great light and color. I wish I could go on those legendary American roads too. This is one of the things my wife and I plan to do in the near future.

 

Thanks also for the background notes. I hope everything's back to normal now, and that your mom and wife are better . Kindest regards to you and your family. Take care, Laurent.

Glad you enjoyed the image. I had fun taking it for sure. Not to worry, we are all pretty much physically fine. Thanks

Yes, there is nothing like the loss of something we have to make us appreciate it. I'm grateful for what hearing I have, and still can listen to music and the laughter of my grandkids. But boy, with only one ear, we sure can look foolish when someone speaks and we're not looking at them. I don't know about you, but with one ear, I have absolutely no ability to tell from what direction a sound is coming. Thanks for your great comments.

I should call this the anti sunset photo. On the other side of the car there was this most gorgeous sunset going on. I almost photographed it. The sky was full of those wispy clouds that hang down like shrouds, and the sun had turned them into pink cotton candy. But this was the scene on my side of the vehicle and I didn't even have to stop to snap it. Oh those point and shoots can really come in handy. Thanks for your thoughts, my friend, and I hope you get to make that American road trip soon. Please stop by here when you do.

That title or something very close to it came to my mind when I first saw this picture and before I read the title you had given it. So a successful presentation of the theme. Even the writing looks good here, kind of echoing the raw film look such as Laurent Lacoste has been using lately. Wonderful colors.

After reading Dick's comment and your response I'm glad to learn that you and your wife feel well, and hope your mother's health improves despite her old age. My grandmother is now 92 and I understand what you say very well. Moreover, I happened to get an ear infection last month that spoilt my holidays for a week or too. Nothing as bad as what you describe but it gave me a slight idea of what you and Amal had to go through. I'm glad you're both back and better.

 

David, this is far from being a mere snapshot. To follow the recent discussion on Jeff's site, I wrote there that the eye is often a much faster thinker than the mind. I can see all your experience, knowledge, practice, feeling and sensitivity in that quick shot. Wonderfully balanced, colored and lit.

 

P.S.: and David, thanks for your kind invitation. I promise that if I come to the States and close enough to your place I will pay you a visit. I'm sure we'd have a great time. Amities.

Well, it wasn't quite as snappy as the title you might have come up with, but I need a haircut pretty badly, and I've always got this scruffy facial hair, so I guess I'm entitled to steal Willie's song title.

At one point on an image of mine that I cannot recall at the moment, we had a rather long discussion of the use of the word snapshot. I, too, do not wish to engage in that discussion again, but I will say that it does not necessarily mean something bad.

 

When you show up, your room awaits you.

I wasn't insisting so much on the acceptation of snapshot as on the adjective "mere".

 

Thanks again for the renewed invitation!

Got it. Hey, while I didn't have to hike ten miles, or climb a mountain, or risk getting shot to take this, I will say that I (probably unwisely) did take a bit of risk. As I was driving along at about 80 MPH, alternately viewing the sunset out the passenger side and the long shadow bumping along the landscape with the nice clouds and the moonrise on my side, it became apparent that I should be photographing one or the other. You can see my choice. As I snapped away, I did several times wander a bit on the road. Fortunately, there were virtually no others on this deserted stretch, but after a couple of quick corrections of the steering wheel, my wife did become a bit concerned and took hold of the steering wheel so as to keep us going more or less straight while her careless photographer husband engaged in his insanity. All great fun you know.

God knows I used to be well-known for driving, admiring the landscape and holding the camera at arm's lentgh and out of the car window like a madman. I decided to be wiser this summer and let my wife do the driving while I would look out and click. Just like you, I made a wise decision !

 

Wonderful shot again. really love it.

Great colors, and I love the hard-light shadow. By the way, clearly I'm late to the game on these, and if I end up repeating what everyone else says, sorry--I'm feeling too lazy to read thru the thread right now.

I will not fault you for being late to the game. I'm just glad you're in it.

I don't watch your site for a few days and look what happens - now I have to take a vacation just to view all the new pics you posted. This one I like very much.

And it's a pretty picture, too. Just one thing - you bought a double-decker bus for your retirement? Or does your truck have such huge tires? I have two monitors attached to my (work) computer - one has saturated colours, and on this saturated one this pic looks even betterer. Cheers, Micheal

Nice to see you are back. Yes, I've been busy churning out stuff. I'll be honest, I really like this one, not so much because I think it is great art, but simply because it reminds me of how much I enjoy being on the road and how much there is out there in the wild blue yonder.

 

FYI, I drive a Toyota Rav4, and I had been pondering the shadow before you mentioned it. Somehow the shadow has gotten distorted so that it does not fully resemble the car. I can't figure out how the back got that pickup like look.