A Small Courageous Walk

I've wanted to do this for a while, but it's taken some time to build up the courage.  

Most days out of the week, I take a walk or run through my neighborhood.  With spring, comes beautiful growth (insert cool spiritual analogy here), and right now, my neighborhood looks like a rain forest.  Take my word for it.

In all these runs and walks through my hood, I have fallen in love with with the bright green of the leaves against the bright blue sky.  Then, I come across trees and bushes and flowers in bloom-dogwoods mainly and I feel a little giddy inside.  

On Sunday, I finally had the courage to carry my camera with me.  With Fern strapped to my front and the camera strap twisted around my hand, I bravely went for it.  I walked around and snapped pictures.  I stood on my tip-toes at some points.  I got down on the ground.  I walked into neighbor's yards.  I took those pictures that I had been thinking about for so long.

I was going for the perfect shot.  The it shot.  I tried and tried and I didn't get what I was hoping for.  

Instead, I just got over the hump of fear.  I so feared what my neighbors probably said about me.  Before I turn this into a go-conquer-those-fears-post, I'll stop myself.  Even though that's what I did.  Even though I thought about all the things people said from inside their homes when they saw me:

"look at the yuppy and her big camera and her fancy baby carrier"
"honey, come quick, there's a girl on her knees trying to take a picture of some grass and she has a baby strapped to her chest!"

"someone thinks they're all arty-fartsy"

Deep down inside, I was still laughing at the ridiculous-ness of the situation.  I was still afraid of what people thought.  Pretentious is a 4-letter word around here, and here I am strutting around the neighborhood with a baby and a camera.  So what was the point?  What did I learn?

Did I learn not to care what people thought? I wish.

Did I learn to face my fears and just do what I want? Maybe

Did I learn that it's not about getting the shot but the process it takes to get there? Now I'm talking.

What I learned most from this experience is that the shot that I wanted probably won't come from my neighborhood.  I learned that I might need to spend some time by myself, finding a pasture (the fancy word for field), and trying to take those pictures.  That's what I want to do.  That's what I learned.  To keep thinking about what it will take to get what I'm hoping to get.