The Good Ship??

Too bad if you don't like going on a cruise because, as photographers, or at least as people who enjoy using a camera, we are on one. Along with everyone else of course. So perhaps it's best to make the most of it. The buffet food is quite good, as is the entertainment, on certain parts of the ship anyway. If you're lucky of course. 

It's a strange ship. Very large but not immune to storms which causes the passengers seasickness at times. I'm currently uncomfortably close to the rear or stern. It gets much less fun back here. Looking over the side I can see the sides of the ship sliding through the water. But the really odd thing is that the ship is also sliding past me right under my feet, pulling me inexorably towards the rear. The actual sea and myself are stationary relative to each other as far as I can tell. It's the ship that's moving. Weird. Very weird. 

In order to avoid the rapid disassembly that inevitably occurs at the far rear of the ship when I eventually fall off, I must keep walking along with all my fellow passengers against the flow of this travelator and towards the front for as long as I can. A lot of my fellow passengers are more extreme in this shared endeavour, but I refuse to dress in lycra, run and eat lettuce all the time. I'll just stroll along, thank you. It's a hopeless task after all. 

As I walk, I see many other passengers passively been pulled along towards the rear, some gazing intently out at the vast sea as they go. The ones with really puzzled expressions on their faces are the philosophers. They've noticed you see, that people are continually arriving at the bow of the ship and then disappearing off the rear, and they're wondering why. I've no ideaeither, or indeed what lies beyond the stern of the ship. There are plenty of ideas though. Some say you once you fall off and are disassembled, you then get to go to First Class and meet the Captain for dinner, but no one has come back down to tell us about it, so I'm not sure. I'm not so convinced there is a Captain. I thought the philosophers might know, but they are struggling to make any sense of things too. Many of the passengers are convinced they know the answer, but their convictions haven't convinced me. 

So what, as mere photographers, can we do? Well, we can either join the philosophers on this cruise or leave something more physical on the ship for the new arrivals to wonder at. Or do both, why not. And a camera is a rather good tool for this, especially if you are not blessed with other skills like hedge fund management or painting.

Carry on creating whatever you create as long as you create. It's as good a reason as any for being a photographer, don't you think?