There is a story about this place that I will not tell today, perhaps later. But if you knew that story you would wonder how I managed to sit so peacefully on this wooden bench on the dam for Pinnacle Lake, facing the majestic Table Rock Mountain. This photograph was taken in the spring of 2013. Many years ago, long before I had received therapy for post-traumatic stress disorder, I experienced a day at Table Rock that held no peace for me.
But on this day in 2013 my earlier experience was just a bad and distant memory, not one I often thought of. The only sounds were birds in the woods and water flowing over the dam. It was the kind of peacefulness that a man could long for if his life had known much turmoil, as mine had. The air was warm. The sun was behind me and off to my right. The dam overflow was about 15 feet from the bench I sat on.
If my pale-yellow shirt was not in the way, you would be able to see the curve in the bank across the water. Just around the curve is an almost perfect spot to take photographs of the mountain. I had already been there by this point and taken a few photos. The rest of my day was going to be hiking around the lake, then going across the road to Lake Oolenoy. That’s where I once had a little anxiety- driven episode where I thought I was seeing a lake monster throwing around human body parts in the lake, which, at closer inspection, was just some kids swimming in the distance. Every trip to Table Rock includes spending a little time at both lakes.
To get today’s photograph I set up my camera on a tripod, did a manual focus for the spot on the bench where I planned to sit, and then did some timed photos. Not too long after that, I stopped lugging around my tripod. It was just too heavy. I even tried a monopod for a while, but there were too many circumstances in which the monopod got in the way. When you are switching between landscape photos and wildlife photos at a moment’s notice, tripods and monopods are not very useful. And they are heavy; did I mention that they’re heavy. You can get a much clearer and more professional looking shot that way, but I’m not looking for that level of quality. It’s just too much trouble. Plus, you miss a lot of shots that require quick repositioning of the camera.
And so I sat there on that bench, on that lovely spring day, looking up at that incredible view, letting my mind wander. I’m not sure what I was thinking about on that day, but I can clearly recall how great it felt to sit there. I had passed by that bench a number of times. And the only reason I stopped this time was to set up a photo shoot that included me, something I almost never do.
But long after I got my photograph I continued to sit there, drinking in the morning, feeling the warmth of the sun as it rose above the trees off to the right, listening to the birds, and the water rushing over the dam, and feeling good to be alive.