The Finder
Some of you may have heard this story before, but not long after Ann and I got married and we were still working on the house Ann suddenly realized that she wasn’t wearing her wedding ring. We’d just finished cleaning and organizing Jim’s work space as well as the rest of the house. Ann remembered that she took her ring off at one point., but she couldn’t remember where.So we went back to the house to look for her ring. We couldn’t find it. We told Jim to keep an eye out for it, and we went back and searched the house again the next day. And again the day after that, and the day after that. Nothing. We waited a few days and tried again. Nothing. And again. Nothing.
About 10 days later we were on the highway coming home from I forget where, though I remember it was dark outside and we just wanted to get home. Something spoke in my head and said to stop. So I said, “Hon, I want to stop at the house.” “Why?” “To look for the ring.” Ann wasn’t very optimistic - we had checked everywhere.
We got there and started in the garage which was where Ann through she’d left it. I started looking at places I’d looked at several times before and then stopped to ask myself why would I look where I’ve looked before? Where haven’t I looked? So I walked around looking at everything I could see and asking myself if I’ve put my physical hands on it. I walked around a stack of plywood we had on the floor and on the ground was a big pile of sawdust. I bent over and started sifting it with my fingers. . . and found a ring.
Without a word I walked over and put it on Ann’s finger.
To this day we’ll be driving down the road and Ann will say, “I can’t believe you found the ring!”
Well, it happened again this past weekend. Not quite with something as precious as a wedding ring, but the feat of finding was just as impressive. Impressive enough for Ann to call me The Finder.
We got a break from the heat this past weekend and decided to try and take advantage of it. So Ann and I went to the old standby - Brice Creek. There were a couple of places I wanted to check out because the low summer water flow might give a very different results than we had in the past (and a couple of places I knew I didn’t want to try). So we got up early Sunday morning to get there before sunrise.
Our first stop was upper Brice Creek by Parker Falls. It was beautiful. I thought I was making some really great images (until I got home and found out that the overcast skies [I think] were doing some really funky things with the water during the fairly long exposures I was using in the early hours) and just loving being out. Ann too was enjoying herself.
After photographing for a few hours, we were ready to head to the next stop.
We drove back downstream to the east trail head and hiked down to where Trestle Creek meets Brice Creek and there’s a series of small falls and riffles. It’s really a beautiful location, but the several times we’ve stopped by the water flow has been too high or the light was too harsh for good images.
I scrambled down to the creek for the image I thought I wanted to make. The overcast skies were reflecting off the water and it looked lifeless. Here’s one of Ann’s photographs from a good while later, but before the sun has really come out.
But when we first got there, I just wasn’t seeing it. So I moved away from the creek, and Ann moved into my spot. I scrambled around a bit, took one photograph, and decided to pack up and move downstream a bit. Ann had set her tripod over a big rock in the water and was standing in about an inch of water at the edge of the creek (thank goodness for Goretex!) setting up for a photograph. I was about 15 feet away and 5 feet up on a couple of rocks.
I turned around and put my camera into my backpack and just as I finished zipping up my bag I heard a “CHINK” from behind me. Not a natural sound. Metal or glass on rock. My first thought was, “Ann’s dropped a filter.” I didn’t say anything, but you could hear the silence through the sound of the rushing creek. I turned around. Ann was standing there not saying anything but looking perplexed. “Did you drop something?” “Yeah, my Lee filter holder, with a graduated neutral density filter in it.” “Where?” “Well, into the creek.”
I hopped down to look in the creek with Ann. Not much to see and most of it too deep to just walk around in with regular boots. “So where did the filter drop from?” “From the front of the lens, off the rock and into the water?” “Did you see exactly where?” “No.” I took off my shirt, leaned over the rock and stuck my arm into the water, feeling around - Nothing.
Fortunately Ann had asked me to put our water boots into the car the day before, so I hiked the half mile or so back to the car, grabbed my knee-high Baffin boots (like I said, the best piece of non-photo photo gear I have!) and hoofed it back to Ann. After pulling on my boots I stood at the shore and surveyed the area - I knew I needed to have a method to my search. Behind the rock it was pretty shallow - an unlikely spot for the filter to wind up, but necessary to search lest I step on it. I’ll then work my way up stream around the rock and reassess. So I started.
Behind the rock - nothing. Beside the rock it was pretty deep, so I used Ann’s tripod as a brace and shoved my arm into the water - I hit bottom right as the water line hit my shoulder. Felt around blind. Nothing but rocks. My boots weren’t long enough to just walk through that part, so I had to jump to the area in front of the rock. As I thought about it I realized but I was faced with the “I bet Dan steps on the filter” dilemma. I saw a rock surface through the water and aimed for it. I stayed dry (which means I didn’t fall in!).
From in front of the rock my view was substantially better. The sun was at my back so the major glare on the water was eliminated and I could partially see though the water through the shifting reflections. I stuck my arm down and felt around - nothing. Pulled it out again to let it warm up (yes it’s summer, but the water is cold!!!!). As I leaned over trying to see into the water I realized that you could. It was hard, but you could.
Much like those posters where you have to look through the poster before you can see the image, I had to concentrate to look through the surface of the water to focus on the rocks below. But that wasn’t enough, because the white glare on the surface of the water was constantly moving (which attracts the eye) and the brightness makes the eye want to look at it (something photographers and painters know about images in general). So you had this constantly moving image that you had to totally ignore and to look through it. I thought that if we can do it for movies - they’re just a series of still images projected in front of us, we just ignore the blank spaces in-between - I could do it there. I also realized that you can’t scan the bottom. Like they teach you in the military, you have to look at one spot, pause a bit, then look at another spot, pause a bit, then another and another to scan an area.
So I started looking and realized that if I just looked at one place and totally relaxed my mind, my eye could see an image behind the white distractions. An image that would come and go through the white flicker but that would occasionally show incredible details of the rocks 12 - 18 inches or more below the surface. Some areas were just too dark, but I could see what was below. No filter, but several black areas between rocks so I stuck my arm back in and felt in-between the rocks. Nothing.
Undeterred, I leaned back and rethought my strategy - break the area into zones and stare into the water. I’d start from in front of the rock, then behind it where the stream flowed around the rock, and then out into the creek a bit downstream from the rock before it went over some rocks and dropped a couple of feet. I’d then move immediately behind the rock and follow the lower flowing creek around the drop, then try in front of the drop.
I worked my way around the rock again. Stopped, looked, searched the black spaces. Nothing. Behind the rock - stop, look, form a mental image, search, nothing. Stepped out into the creek - the water about a half-inch below the tops of my boots - looked around my feet, feel around the in-between spaces - nothing. Looked to my left, upstream - pause, relax, look, form a mental image, feel around the black areas - nothing. Looked to my right into the creek toward the rocks at the top of the drop-off - paused, relaxed, look, form a mental image . . . a white spot in the midst of a black crack. Relax, focus on that spot - everything white was moving all over the place, that one didn’t. Blink, relax again - it wasn’t moving; the only bright thing in a field of black. I reached in and paused, sure that it was what I was looking for, but what would it be if it wasn’t? Glass. I carefully moved my hand forward . . . and felt the familiar knob of the spring connecting mechanism of a Lee filter holder.
“Hey Ann!” “OH MY GOD!”
Just call me The Finder.