Gander Bay, Newfoundland

Tonight, I came across this image which I believe had been taken back in 1972. It was shot with my old Minolta SRT101, on Kodachrome64 Slide film...remember that stuff? The camera and photography was brand new to me. It had been in my possession only about a week, and I had acquired it to just take pictures of our kids, who were really small then. To say I had no clue what I was doing would be an understatement. All I was told was that you had to turn a ring on the lens to centre the "lollypop" needle over the other needle in the viewfinder, and there you go, you had a "proper" exposure. Wow! Those were the days! If I had any idea where this photography idea would take me, I might have thrown the whole lot in the nearest garbage can, and saved myself thousands and thousands of dollars over the years. Anyway, I digress. Even though I had no clue that there was such a thing as composition, and leading lines, and rule of thirds, etc.., while we were driving by in the old '66 Chevy, I saw this church with white boats beside it, and slammed on the brakes. When I grabbed the camera, and ran across the highway, my family thought I had gone crazy...they had no idea how accurate that thought was!! Still, to this day, even with the irretrievably blown out highlights in the clouds, and the tops of the overturned freshly painted boats, it is one of my all time favourite images. In recent years, I have seen other photos taken by other professional photographers, and sad to say, the old church was in very bad repair, with the little cross on the steeple falling over at an angle, and the clapboards falling off. It still makes me happy that I was able to capture this image before it had reached such a sad state....and the long profusion of daisies growing all along the old rail fence just sent tingles up my spine...I've always been a sucker for daisies, and buttercups, and lupines. They all scream HOME to me, no matter where I happen upon them. Now, all these years later, it still brings back many fond memories of the "good old days" before the world went bonkers, and folks knew who and what they were, and your "friends" actually shook your hand, and you knew that when the chips were down, they would be there to give you a hand up, not to take advantage of your situation.....remember those quaint old times? Cheers!