March 8, 2015: Optimism or Insanity?

I have often heard it said that doing the same thing over and over and expecting a different result is a form of insanity.  When I think about that, particularly if taken at face value, it's pretty hard to argue to the contrary.  But then again, that old adage doesn't take into account that wonderfully illogical human trait, optimism.

Every spring we take to the fields.  Every spring we do the same thing over and over, work the ground and get the fields ready for another season.  No matter how disastrous the previous year was, each spring we're right back at it.

Such behavior would indeed fit the definition of insanity.

Enter in optimism.  If insanity is doing the same thing over and over and expecting a different result, certainly optimism is doing the same thing over and over believing this is going to be the year.  Optimism grows with the crop.  It starts about this time of year when I breathe in those first whiffs of wet dirt getting opened up to dry.  It really takes root when I drop the plow into the ground and start turning the good earth over.  It reaches full bloom when the rows of strawberries are a deep green heavy with ripe fruit.

Then comes the reality of harvest.  That's when optimism ebbs and the thoughts of insanity begin to creep into my mind.  Harvest is when the harsh realities of endless red tape and rules, lack of help to pick, foreign competition keeping domestic prices below the break even point, all those things that rip optimism from me hit home all at once.  Harvest is when I realize insanity is real, optimism is just something I have to try and conjure up to keep going.

And yet, I do keep going.  Insanity can take the forefront at times, but it never totally eliminates optimism.  It seems each year I can come up with another reason for hope.  This year is no different.  There is hope.  There is opportunity out there.

There is a reason to once again push insanity aside and make room for optimism.

February 26, 2015: Is A Picute Worth a Thousand Words?

We've all heard the saying.  Most of us have used the saying more than once.  But is it true?  Can I pen 1000 meaningful words about a single photo?  Let's give it a try.

                                                                   Looking Back

Montana Rail Link engineer Sam Sutton peers through his rain splattered mirror.  His locomotives are cut in the middle of a heavy westbound coal drag.  He looks back as the rear half of the train rounds the horseshoe curve at Austin, Montana.  Within 3 years of the taking of this photo, Sam would not be with us.

Looking back. Like Sam looking back on his train, I find myself looking back on my experiences in Montana.  Like the effect of the water droplets on the mirror, I'm sure my view of what I did and saw has been a little distorted by time.  The photos taken can bring when and where into focus, but the more important emotions felt, the nitty gritty details of the experiences I had, that's where time tends to either enhance, or fade.

Montana would have never happened were it not for a set of events that had nothing directly to do with me.  Our son Seth, transferred from the University of Washington to Montana State.  The 4 year plan became a 12 year stay.  Looking back,  even if I set aside my WSU Coug roots requiring a hate of the U of W Huskies, Seth's move to the Gallatin was a good one.  It revived his pursuit of a Master's of Architecture and my enthusiasm for rail photography.

I remember the trips to Helena and Bozeman.  It seemed once across the Idaho boarder and the closer I came to the top of Homestake Pass, the more relaxed I became.  When the aggression and hustle of the "west side," and the seeming endless monotony of Eastern Washington finally were replaced in my rear view mirror with the Bitterroots and the Clark Fork River, a degree of ease settled in the like of which I have never experience before or anywhere else I've been.  Not just the open spaces of  "The big Sky Country" it was the attitude of the people.  Look again at Sam.  He is helping to move 15.000 tons of coal up a mountain grade.  He is controlling 14,400 hp along with two other engineers operating that many horses, or more, and yet you can see his sense of calm control.  Looking back, I saw the same demeanor in most I met.

Of course, over a period of 12 years things are going to change.  The biggest change for me is one of priorities.  Seth and his wife Jess moved from Billings this past summer and are now living a mere 20 miles from us here in Washington.  With them, (and our soon to be born granddaughter) here, driving to Montana has slid down the "to-do" list to the point it no longer even appears.  Looking back, taking train pictures along the Montana Rail Link was important to me, but these trips were always planned around spending time with Seth.  It's no coincidence that 2014 was the first time in 12 years I did not go Montana.

Changes have come to the people I've met which is to be expected.  Three of my MRL friends have retired, two have taken other positions on the railroad, and as mentioned, sadly, Sam has passed away.  Looking back, it is these connections, these friendships that I value far beyond the images they allowed me to take. 

Looking back, I sometimes think I was able to experience the Montana Rail Link during a time of transition.  I was there when the tried and true old locomotives of the 70's were being replaced with sleek new, high tech engines that were supposed to run more by computers than the seat of the engineer's pants.  Looking back, the mountain grades of Montana more than tested that theory.  But there also seemed to be a shift in attitude.  The pressures of surges in rail traffic forced the MRL to shed its local, hometown, regional point of view and lean more towards the corporate, Class 1 mode of operations. 

Sam was old school.  He was the Montana I look back and choose to remember.  Climbing the east slope of Mullan Pass he was watching his train, watching over his power, and watching for where the local elk herd was grazing.  It was getting close to hunting season.  He was back and forth sparring with the Road Foreman of Engines who was riding with us and one "Did I ever tell you about the time...." after another.  He was a man that treated me, a total stranger, like a best friend within minutes of meeting.  Like Seth, Sam was a good reason to keep going back to visit Montana, and like Seth, when Sam left, a little of the incentive to travel back left with him.

Is this picture worth a thousand words?  I think the question should read, are a thousand words worth this picture?  Right now I'm at 809 words.

I guess the answer is "No."

February 19, 2015; What Was I Thinking?

All photographers, professional and amateur have a fair number of shots no one will ever see.  Even the best in the world probably have pictures that had them saying to themselves, "What the hell was I thinking about?"

Of course the digital age has changed all of that.  A photo is taken, not liked and deleted forever, usually within seconds.  Even slide shooters had the ability to look at individual images and throw away the rejects.  Those of use who shoot negatives, weeding out the trash is no so easy.  All too often a real clunker is the middle image of 4 or 5 good negatives that have been cut and carefully stored in sheaths. Each time I pull out a string of negs to scan or print the good images, I also get to revisit that mistake or two that seems to show up in every roll.

Case in point:  look at the above photo.  I give up, what's so great about a couple of tank cars?  The pattern of the ties is kinda cool, were it not for the grass I so cleverly used to further clutter the image.  What was I thinking?

Taking a photo from a train is tough to do, at least for me.  I know what I was trying to do in this shot.  The concept was getting a photo of the switchman on the ground.  But why would I wait for that exact moment when the wiper blade and handrail bisected the guy's body?  What was I thinking?

There is so much I could have done with this opportunity.  That old milepost marker, the back lighting, the helper set, everything was there for a good shot.  Maybe I just couldn't decide how to pull it off and by the time inspiration arrived the helpers were almost out of sight?  Maybe I meant to have a telephoto on and somehow "forgot" I had the wide angle?  And here's the real mystery, there is no negative of the helper set coming at me as one might think.  It appears this IS the shot I wanted.  What was I thinking?

A really good "away" shot of a train can be a little tricky.  A really bad "away" shot like this, all too easy to take.  Look close and you'll see just what a debacle this shot actually is.  Standing in the grass is the Old Man watching the train pass.  Why was I more interested in trying to get a crappy "away" shot than I was getting a good shot of Dad watching the train go by?  What was I thinking?

There is a train in this shot, I swear to God there is.  Using a wide angle lens to photograph a train a half mile away, passing behind a grove of trees.  What else can I say?  What was I thinking?

So there you go, 5 examples that took me probably less than 5 minutes to find.  A really good photographer would learn by these mistakes, but I'll probably revisit this topic a few more times to illustrate just how slow a learner I actually am.