Skip to main content

A Photo from Crater Lake

I've been looking at this photo a lot lately.


I put it on Instagram with the caption "sometimes you just gotta jump" because I think that's a lesson that could be taken away from it, but I admit it's also because I like to pretend I'm a photographer on Instagram and that's what a photographer might say. 

I've been looking at a lot though, and I guess there could be several reasons. 

Maybe I look because I think it's a cool photo of me. Maybe I look because I wonder exactly how high that jump was. Maybe I look because I remember how cold the water was. 

Maybe I look because jumping off of something is freedom. Maybe I look because that moment of anticipation before hitting the cold water is the clearest moment of thought that a human can experience. Maybe I look because Oregon, and specifically Crater Lake, is beautiful.

Maybe I look because I used to be more comfortable with heights than I am now, and I remember how I was more comfortable jumping the first time than the 2nd time. Maybe I look because it's the truest "ignore the camera" photo of me in recent memory. Maybe I look because the rocky outcrop looks more intimidating than I remember.

Maybe I look because it's a moment frozen in time so beautifully that I wonder what my exact thoughts were at the moment. Maybe I look because there really is a life lesson hidden somewhere in this photo and I have just never quite found it. Maybe I look because the photo itself is the lesson simply by living a life worth photographing.

Maybe I look because there will be a time in my life when I can't be so carefree as to take a long hike down a steep path, climb up on a small rock wall, and safely, comfortably jump into the cold waters below. Maybe I look because there will be an extended time in my life when I'm physically unable to take that hike and make that jump. Maybe I look because I don't know if I'll be able to duplicate this photo at a later time for any of thousands of reasons.

Maybe I look because this photo is a representation of a specific day of my life and depicts that day more clearly than almost any other photo represents a specific day of my life. Maybe I look because I wish other days could be represented so clearly by a photo and I'm jealous, in a way, of how good this photo looks. Maybe I look because Jenna took this photo and the one I took of her is not as good as this one.

Or maybe I look because I think it's a really cool photo of me.

I guess a picture's worth 475 words.
Labels:
Location: Crater Lake National Park, Oregon, USA

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Excitement

Alright. This is going to get emotional, y'all. Get your tissues. This post is because my brother and sister-in-law are about to have their 2nd child. If we're friends on facebook, you've seen that my profile picture has been some incarnation of myself and their first child for the entire duration of her almost 3-year-long life. Simply, I love that child. But there's another one coming. I'm having that fear that I've been told parents have. The one thing I know for sure is how much I love the kid who already exists, and I don't know if I have the room in my emotional spectrum to unconditionally love another human the way I love the current one. I mean, I'm sure I will. How could I not, right? How could I not love something that's a sibling to this kid? As it stands now, I spend my time in Chicago and fielding questions from people back home about whether or not I'd ever move to NYC or LA (because they clearly know that I'm just...on ...
Post a Comment
Read more

The Naples Archaeological Musuem and Its Penis Room

When the situation calls for it, I am a mature person. I can talk comfortably about reproductive health, I can watch a movie with a sex scene and not make a joke, and I can look at nude statues and think nothing of it beyond art. Hell, my senior yearbook quote was about how maturity is just knowing when and where to be immature. I won't laugh when you fall down because you might be hurt and I absolutely do not laugh when an animal humps something because it's instinct and the animal can't help it. I believe you shouldn't laugh at something if the thing you're laughing at is helpless in the situation. But sometimes you find your limit. The National Archaeological Museum of Naples (abbreviated MANN in Italian) pushed me near my limit. See, Naples is home to brilliant and interesting historical artwork. With the nearby town of Pompeii buried under the ash of Mt. Vesuvius, tons of pristine artifacts which were rescued from Pompeii ended up in MANN. Some of these p...
Post a Comment
Read more

1000 Words a Day, Day 10: On Old Friends

At some point in college, it dawned on me that my group of friends from home was unusual. Yes, we were all weirdly close an did some objectively strange things to each other (and with each other, but mainly to each other), but apparently it was weird to stay so close to people from your hometown. We all thought nothing of it, because that's just the way we were. Others, however, were surprised and often confused. Some of them were "adopted" into the group of us from the Chesterland area, and it's hard to say how much they still stayed in touch with people who didn't go to high school with us, because they sure assimilated into our friends-since-early-childhood clique. But still, that was only college. Later, I moved to Chicago and found that there were people who I hadn't seen in years who would gladly, willingly, almost eagerly bail me out of I was in a pinch or needed a place to stay. These were people I wasn't even necessarily close  with when we were...
Post a Comment
Read more