Starting All Over

A half-year hiatus

It was spring of 2013: my fourth year in the Rockies. I hadn’t taken a photo in months.

Half a year earlier, I had developed cataracts and couldn’t see. Surgery fixed that, but it seemed that I had to learn all over again how to see through the viewfinder. I took a few shots here and there, but all of them were blurry, muddy and/or dull.

I had totalled my Jeep in Denver after misinterpreting a left-turn signal. I had also developed a permanent health condition, which brought on some serious depression.

IBM had hired me for a position at one of their customers in what Coloradoans call “NoCo” (Northern Colorado) - an onsite position that was too far from Indian Hills to commute. With tears in our eyes, my sweetheart and I moved out of our (and Pookie’s) little piece of Paradise in Indian Hills, Colorado and started living in the motorhome close to my work. Her work was remote; it didn’t matter where she was.

We bounced around between various campgrounds, spending the maximum two weeks in each one and then moving to another as I worked in a datacenter in Longmont.

My first successful shot was of Longs Peak, a prominent Fourteener in Rocky Mountain National Park. Both are just up the road from Longmont.

Longs Peak as seen from McCall Lake, near Longmont, Colorado

Perhaps Longs Peak was my talisman. I continued taking bad photos, but my shots of Longs were turning out. Here’s another one I got in a little burg named Allenspark which is just below Longs. It was still winter up there:

Equestrians below Longs Peak (center) in Allenspark Colorado

Finally, we went into Rocky Mountain National Park itself and I started getting some decent shots.

Longs Peak above Beaver Meadows, Rocky Mountain National Park

Bear Lake in RMNP, 9,500 feet above sea level, where it was still winter

We saw a marmot who looked like he had just awakened from his long winter hibernation:

A Yellow-bellied Marmot (Marmota flaviventris) in Rocky Mountain National Park.

I have written of these critters before.

They are the size of small dogs and are the largest species of ground squirrel. They live in the spaces between big rocks at high elevations and are cute until they establish a presence on your farm or ranch. This one looked a little dazed and confused, and I presume that it was still half asleep. Here’s another shot of it:

And the pasqueflowers aka crocus were in bloom:

Pasque flower (Pulsatilla patens) aka Crocus

I have written of these flowers before.

Like the marmot, I was still half asleep, artistically, but my long hibernation from photography was over. I was back.