Lens Around Lamorinda: Beginnings

Golf. That's the main reason I took up photography. What's the connection? In a word, failure. Complete, utter, unqualified, abject, humiliating failure. Having retired some time ago at the urging of my son - who actually knows how to play the game - I went out and bought myself a set of clubs, bag, shoes - the whole enchilada.

After spending thousands on equipment, lessons and greens fees, and thousands more on golf-induced psychotherapy, I reached the conclusion that if there's little hope of scoring in double digits, it's time to look elsewhere for recreational enjoyment. I felt so bad about the countless foot-long divots I created that I made a sizeable donation to the Greenskeepers Association of America, which, in turn, sent me a nice thank-you note and a warning to keep the hell away. No problem. I promise, I'm away.

So there I sat, with nothing to occupy my time. There are only so many lattes one can consume at the local beanery. As much as I like espresso drinks, quaffing them wasn't exactly an exercise in creative fulfillment. My wife Pat, who continues to draw a paycheck and who got sick of having to dust me along with the Swarovski, insisted that I find something "constructive."

At the time, we were building a cabin in the mountains – hey, isn't everyone looking for a second property to maintain and watch depreciate? As construction neared completion and having no budget for art, Pat said, "Tom, why don't you go buy a camera and take pictures of some barns to hang on the wall?"

It had been eons since I had taken so much as a snapshot. The digital era had since dawned, and the Kodak Brownie given me as a child is now on display at the Smithsonian. I put a DSLR (digital single-lens-reflex) camera on my wish list. Santa came through with a Nikon model then new on the market. Even before reading the manual I was out taking pictures of barns in the boonies north of Lake Tahoe. I was reasonably satisfied with the results, as was Pat. Not bad, we agreed, so on the wall went several framed pictures.

In sum, the (shutter)bug bit ... and it continues to bite.

In the course of photographing barns I would inevitably chance upon what I have come to call "abandoned art" – old, rusted, discarded cars, trucks and tractors put out to pasture, in many instances literally so.

I've always been a car buff, so the allure was natural - old barns and old iron. Mutually complementary. A happy marriage. Finally, I was on to something that really interested me, and from which I could derive a sense of creative accomplishment.

In my role as purveyor of "Lens Around Lamorinda," however, I won't be looking for barns and abandoned art – even though I have found some savory photo ops hereabouts. Rather, I'll be out on the street, looking for faces, places and stories that make Lamorinda Lamorinda.

The first installment will appear in this space soon.  Look closely, you may find yourself a part of the offering.