The Ones That Get Away

My drive home from Fremont yesterday afternoon* got me to thinking about the many, many photo ops that get away. These are the shots that I’m pretty sure would get me published in National Geographic or at least Nebraskaland if I could just get them right.

There are, of course, any number of reasons I don’t get the “perfect” shots (don’t have my camera with me at all, not the right lighting, don’t have the right lens, don’t know what setting is best to use, not tall enough to get the best angle, not fast enough and the moment has passed, etc., etc.), but I don’t mean this to be an excuse-filled musing. I take plenty of shots that I’m pretty proud of—and plenty more that are just okay. No, what I got to thinking about yesterday are the shots that either aren’t actually capturable or that do just get away.

On my drive home yesterday, I looked to my right and caught just a glimpse of what I imagine would have been a pretty amazing shot. The sun was coming through the corn at just the right angle, and it looked so beautiful. I kept looking for a place to pull over and try to catch it, but I would have had to back up to where I first saw it—never again was the corn both close enough to the road and tall enough to create just that effect. I don’t know even if I had stopped to try to get the shot if it would have turned out like I pictured it—and I guess that’s the point I’m trying to make: I have that photo in my mind but not in my camera.

Right now is actually a good example as well: I’m sitting in the green chair in Simon’s room, and he’s sprawled out on the bed deep in napland. The shadows on the wall above his bed are quite interesting (I’ve been looking at them for several minutes trying to figure out exactly what part of the curtains are making those shapes); the lighting is that of an overcast sky seeping in through thin fabric, and everything is kind of an afternoony blue. And the thing is that even if someone who knew exactly what she was doing (lighting, lens, settings, etc.) were here, I really don’t think she could get the photo just the way I am seeing it—the hubbub would wake up the Bub, for one thing, and the moment would be gone. And I’m sure that in a few hours or days I’ll forget this lovely moment too (but I’m here now!).

I always have a couple of ideas brewing as far as shots I’d like to get. My current obsession is to get a shot of the baseball field in the park across the street. But, of course, not just any shot, the shot I have in my head. I really don’t know if the light would ever hit the field in the way that I’m thinking, and who knows, if it does, it might be in December, when the quality of light is far different than a late summer evening. (And to be honest, I haven’t even ventured out at the time when I picture the light being just right, but I will eventually I’m sure.)

Memory can be a tricky thing, and sometimes it seems that the shots that get away become exaggerated in the coolness-that-might-have-been. Still, I think it is good to have a few (or several) in that the shots that get away somehow motivate me to go after the ones I might still get.

* I happen to think that Highway 77 between Lincoln and Fremont (where my parents and sister live) is one of the prettiest drives in Nebraska, especially in the summertime. I love the blues and greens of the sky and fields and often wish I could stop about every hundred yards or so to take a picture of the horizon. There’s been quite a bit of construction on the road this year, so we’ve been having to find alternate routes after Wahoo (or before Wahoo when we’re on the way home) to avoid waiting in line for the one-lane stretches. One of my favorite alternate routes involves an eleven-mile gravel road, and that’s the way I chose to come home yesterday.