Today has my replacement wide lens arriving, so I felt a little handicapped in planning a sunrise shoot. I dropped the other one and now it refuses to focus and though it costs about $600 to replace it, having it fixed would have been just over $400 and barely worth it.
So I bit the bullet and ordered another wide lens from a different manufacturer … will be interesting to see if it is any good.
In any event, heading down to the lake first thing after a poor night’s sleep seemed like a remedy I needed, so handicapped or not, the decision was made.
I was far too early to go anywhere near the pier so I went to a spot down on the south west corner of the lake and hung out there until the colors started to make themselves known.
There is a lot of lily pads and such that obscure the water close to the shore at that part of the lake and wanting more water in the shot than this position was giving, I wandered up the shoreline a little in search of something that would give me a better reflection.
I found an old concrete pier, which was gated at the near end and a “no trespassing” sign that was visible even in the darkness of the early hours.
For a few nanoseconds, I obeyed the rules, but knowing that the better shots awaited at the end of that pier, I maneuvered around the gate and wandered down in the darkness to where the pier ended and set up there.
The view was much better from there and although I didn’t get millions of brilliant shots, I have attached some at the end of the blog for you to check out.
(By the way, if you check out picture three, you can just about make out the end of the pier where I was standing. Lily pads all around me.)
As I stood there in the darkness, I looked down at my feet and I could just about make them out. The pier I was standing on was sturdy but at its end, it was only about two inches above the water level and I mused at how easy it would be for an alligator to get me now if he wanted.
Truth is, I didn’t care, and worse case scenario in my final act I end up someone’s breakfast. Sounds a good way to go and definitely add some purpose to my life.
Knowing that you don’t care provides a genuine sense of calm in a moment that others might regard as disconcerting and I really enjoyed it. I took out my phone and made a little video or two and recorded the only sounds that seemed evident around me.
There must have been hundreds of birds in chorus somewhere out there in the dark and their early morning sounds were simply amazing and humbling.
I quickly messaged out the video so that if I didn’t make it past sunrise, at least someone would know what happened to me and then I went back to what I was doing, watching the horizon pick up some beautiful ambers to confirm that a new day was on its way.
When it finally got bright enough to see a distance, I saw an alligator probably about ten feet away just lying perfectly still in the waters to the right of the pier. I spoke with him for a moment and then gathered up my shit and headed back to the safety of solid ground beyond the gate.
As I walked back to the car and began to think about whether I had gotten any decent images or not, I smiled at myself for disobeying the sign, ignoring the safety aspects, and making the vantage point my main decision factor.
Taking chances is something that may one day catch up with me but I don’t really care. I have found that my best successes often follow such decisions and when you recalibrate what is most important to you at a given moment in time, other concerns do indeed become secondary.
I don’t advocate recklessly putting yourself at risk for no good reason. Bungee jumping and sky diving are for idiots if you ask me. But when there is a legitimate reason to take a chance, then oftentimes, that is the right thing to do.
For example, if you watch Christian Pulisic’s goal for the US that took them out of the group stage at the world cup, you see that he could have done the safe thing and let the ball go by. But he didn’t. He put his body on the line and went for goal. Yes, he got seriously hurt but he also got the goal.
We oftentimes shy away from a goal because of the risks attached to it. They may indeed be physical or financial risks but they are very often simply the risk of failure.
We allow the possibility of failure to alter our willingness to try something. And that is an awful way to go through life.
Taking risks is very often a key characteristic of successful people (and quite possibly gator-food) and it is often the only difference between those that live a full life and those who shy away from it.
… just a thought.
