PREPPER SHOPSOBSERVATION • STORY • THE ROAD
“Not every photograph is about the grand view. Sometimes the story is in what everyone else walked past.”
I photograph what makes me stop and look. Sometimes it is a storm rolling in, morning light catching steam, roots wrapped around stone, or something small and peculiar that might otherwise go unnoticed. Other times it is simply life happening along the way. These aren't postcard photographs. They're observations from back roads, campgrounds, ordinary places, and wherever where is.
Photographs gathered along the way.
The Lamp Lighter
Volume 1 · Paperback
The Lamp Lighter
Volume 2 · 7 × 9 Hardcover
THE BACK ROADS LIBRARY
Choose a photograph. Each one opens with the story that belongs to it.
THE BACK ROADS LIBRARY
Choose a photograph. Each one opens with the story that belongs to it.
THE BACK ROADS LIBRARY
Choose a photograph. Each one opens with the story that belongs to it.
THE BACK ROADS LIBRARY
Choose a photograph. Each one opens with the story that belongs to it.
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Everyone else was busy doing whatever kids do in a dugout between innings. Talking, watching, waiting, probably not paying much attention to the woman with the camera. Then Richard looked over and gave me that smile. I wasn't looking for a portrait. I was just watching what was happening when nobody thought anything important was happening.
Henry wasn't feeling well that day, probably from the heat, so he was sidelined while the game went on without him. He stayed at the fence, watching the other kids play. I took the picture from behind because his face wasn't the story. The way he watched the field was.
I don't remember what made me look down instead of at Todd. Maybe it was the way the afternoon sun stretched his shadow across the pavement. He was just a kid running barefoot near the water. But for a second, Todd's shadow seemed to be having an adventure of its own.
There were plenty of things Joe could have been interested in that day. The water. The pool. Whatever the other kids were doing. But Joe had found something much more interesting. Her. I saw that look and knew where to point the camera.
Liam, completely delighted in Gary's arms. No posing, no looking at the camera, just one of those ordinary moments between generations that says more because nobody was trying to make it happen.
Some photographs preserve faces. The best ones preserve the moment. Michelle opened a birthday card surrounded by family and friends, and whatever was written inside got exactly the reaction it deserved.
Family, friends, flowers, cards and a room full of people gathered to celebrate Michelle. The posed photographs record who was there. The candid ones remember what it felt like.
Some moments need no explanation. A hand held when words are no longer enough.
I made the little fairy door. Later, my granddaughter Reina sent me this photograph with a snake stretched out in front of it. And just like that, a story was born. The snake wasn't simply passing through. It was guarding the Princess Fairy's door.
Mama had snagged a snake in the yard. The fledgling watched as she taught it one of the lessons it would need to survive. I happened to be there with the camera. Sometimes the story behind a photograph is something the photograph alone can't tell you.
I love mountains, but this morning the mountain wasn't asking to be the center of attention. Mist softened the distance, autumn followed the shoreline, and the branches framed a lake that seemed perfectly content to be still. Some photographs aren't about where you went. They're about what made you stop.
For a little while, this nest was their whole world. They waited, grew, and eventually did exactly what they were supposed to do. They flew. I was lucky enough to photograph the part before they did.
The sun slips through layers of cloud, turning an ordinary evening sky into something almost abstract. I was drawn less to the sunset itself than to the light finding its way through.
As the color spread across the evening sky, one tree held the foreground in silhouette. Sometimes the thing that makes me stop isn't the whole landscape. It's one shape that gives the landscape its story.
A long roll of cloud stretched across the sky as the storm approached. It was the shape of that single formation that made me stop and look.
Exposed roots twist around stone, their weathered texture tracing the places they found a way to grow. Persistence leaves its own patterns.
The fallen tree had weathered into lines and cracks. Small flowers and plants were growing beside it, fresh green against the old wood.
I thought I was photographing what was behind me. Instead, I caught myself in the view more than once. The road, the camera, the photographer and the warning on the mirror all became part of the same picture. Sometimes what we're looking for is closer than we think.
Christmas didn't need a house. That year, home was a little van beside the Colorado River. A few lights, a candle, everything I needed tucked into its place, and the river just outside the door. Turns out home can be wherever you decide to make it.
A quiet stop along the bikeway becomes something more. Fishing rod in hand, the message on the sweatshirt says what the photograph noticed: “Love yourself on bad days too.” Sometimes the story is already written. You just have to be there to see it.
A comfortable chair, a little shade, and the outdoors all around. The phone still managed to get the best seat.
Three small rocks were sitting together on an old picnic table at a picnic area. Nothing unusual. Most people probably walked right past them. But something about the way they sat there in the light made me stop. Sometimes the photograph isn't waiting at the grand view. Sometimes it's sitting quietly on the picnic table.
The steps had become a lost and found for shoes left behind at the beach. Different sizes, different owners, different days. I couldn't help wondering how many shoes had graced those steps through the years, waiting for someone to come back and claim them. Everyone else saw lost shoes. I saw a group portrait.
Fog softened everything beyond the window. The sun was there, the tree was there, but neither needed to be perfectly clear to be seen.
Years of weather, footsteps and gatherings have left their mark. Sometimes the story of a place is written on the way in.
A professionally made sign announcing “HOMEMADE.” Sometimes the photograph takes itself.
The old brick pavers were a craft in themselves, laid by hand, fitted together, weathered by years of footsteps and rain. Then, sitting across all that workmanship, one cigarette butt. Someone took the time to build what would last. Someone else took a second to leave something behind.
Rust, heat and seasons have done their work. Still standing. Still useful. Still waiting for the next fire.
At a baseball game, I spotted him settled into the bed of his pickup, chair out, feet up and a giant umbrella overhead. I asked if I could take his photograph. He said yes. Sometimes the best seat in the house isn't in the house at all.
I spotted these locks during an e-bike ride to Lake George. One was different from the others, a geocaching marker hanging in plain sight. Sometimes the interesting part of a trip isn't where you're going. It's what makes you stop along the way.
Morning light caught the steam rising from ordinary compost. For a moment, something easy to overlook became unexpectedly beautiful.
An apple head among pinecones on an old stump. Apparently, the forest had a character I hadn't met yet.