My father loved the back roads. He didn't want to take the Thruway west to Buffalo. He wanted to take Route 20. Out of the way. Passing shops and little towns. Passing diners. Not chain restaurants. Of course, we didn't want to do that. We wanted the speed and ease of the Thruway with it's strategically placed rest areas and fast food. We didn't want to wait one minute longer to get to our destination. We wanted to get to Aunt Lila Rae's house and see our cousins. At that point, we didn't appreciate the back roads.
But, people can change and grow to discover things. You can open your eyes and realize that the back roads take longer for a reason. There is more to see and do and notice and learn from. You pass farms and small churches. Village homes line the small towns where you have to drop your speed down to 30 miles per hour. You start to wonder about the people who live in these small towns and beautiful old village homes. They attend church services on Sunday and maybe gather at the little diner afterwards. They have gardens and quilts hanging on their clotheslines. The elementary school is down the street. Maybe they take their kids there on weekends to play on the playground. They probably enjoy high school football games on Friday nights in the fall. They surely have church suppers. And parades where more people are in them than are watching them. I'm sure they have those.
Wait a minute. I grew up in a small town with village homes lining the 30 mph section. We attended church on Sunday and ate at the Diner. We bought vegetables from the little farm up the road. There was no traffic light anywhere in our village. There was a butcher and a laundromat and the little public library. The house my mother grew up in was about a mile away. The house my father grew up in was right next door. The elementary school they attended together was the same one my brother and I attended. I played in the band at high school football games. My husband was on the field. You can be damn sure we went to church suppers. And, we marched in the parades as ball players or Girl Scouts or baton twirlers or band members. My mom marched with the ambulance. My Dad with the fire department. Were people driving through and wondering, even romanticizing about our life?
Things have changed. They have a traffic light now. The butcher is gone. (The laundromat is still there going strong.) The library has expanded in a new location. My mother's old house now has a second floor. The neighbors have passed away. The school has expanded, too. Other things have remained the same. They still play high school football, of course. Parades are alive and well. You can still find a good church supper.
But, if I stop and look back, I am who I am because of that small town. And, I certainly am who I am because my father liked to take the back roads.
And, this was the subject of a photographer's lecture I attended this evening. Tuesday March 20th. That is my father's birthday. He would have turned 67. So, I went to hear this photographer speak to the camera club for our March General Meeting. I have heard her before. She is known for her macro work. She is somewhat of a storyteller with her presentations and her photography. I guess, all photographers are storytellers, right? That is your goal. Take a photo that tells a story. "A picture is worth a thousand words." That may be excessive, but you do want your viewers to see your photo and feel the story of the situation. or maybe not. Maybe you are trying to portray some mystery. Still, that is deliberate and in hiding the story, you are still working words into your photos.
Tonight her presentation was not about her close up macro work. It was titled "Romancing the Rural Landscape." She said if you look over all of your work, you will see what you gravitate to. Or, if you were to show someone all the photos you ever took, they would say, "You shoot a lot of X." And she told us of her upbringing on Long Island NY with a family of farmers. She talked of her great grandmother's home where they were only allowed into one room of the house. She spoke of barns and old farmhouses. Since she had spoken to our club last year, she didn't want to give her macro presentation again, so in going through her work, she realized that the reason she loves finding old buildings and old homes on the back roads to photograph was because of how she grew up. She spoke to us about taking the back roads and stopping whenever she saw something interesting. She had many great photos and told stories of passing those same buildings for years only to now know that they are no longer standing. Stop and take those pictures now because you never know when that scene will change.
I didn't think much of it as she went through her talk. I didn't say "Hey, I am sitting here on my father's birthday listening to this woman talk about her love of the back roads just like my father" until she said that whenever she and her husband travel somewhere, they have a rule:
No freeways until after dark.
That was not a rule in our family. But, man, my father would have loved it if it were. And that is when I realized, "Hey, I am sitting here on my father's birthday listening to this woman talk about her love of the back roads just like my father."
I knew it was his birthday. I thought I was just sitting in on another camera club meeting. But, I wasn't, I was listening to someone else who didn't care if she got lost along the way or maybe arrived a little (or a lot) later than anticipated. The journey just might be worth it.
Happy Birthday, Daddy!
PS- that is Gretchen that he is holding up to see the horse.
