Blasphemy

O.K. I’m sitting at the Kentucky Derby and I’m showing airplane pictures, to make it even worse I will confess I don’t really like horses, and I hate women’s big hats. Can you imagine a person being in worse place than here with those opinions? Don’t get me wrong, I think race horses are beautiful, I just think their dangerous and unpredictable. I have ridden horse a few times, and I never really liked that either. I love baseball caps and have collected many to remind me of great adventures I’ve enjoyed, but I probably look worse in a baseball cap than any man alive. By contrast I’ve never seen a women, no matter how beautiful, that I thought a huge flowery hat made her look even better, at least not to me……

Now this is what makes life wonderful, you can love women’s hats, and horses, and mint juleps
and still be o.k. by me, but just don’t ask me to join in on your enthusiasm. I’ll be happy for you, just let me smile from a distance. I’m so glad that every photographer is not interested in shooting the same things. My personal career took off when I started flying and shooting from the air. Not many people were doing it and the look is very different. Some people love it, some could care less, and both are fine with me.

I’m sorta mellow today, spending time with a lot of old friends and some new ones as well. These kinds of events are filled with flurries of wild activity followed by slow times as the shooters are out at the track photographing the current race. This is a great place to catch up with some friends you seldom get to see. Skip Dickstein one of very best racing shooters, Bill Frakes, a true legend from Sports Illustrated, Dan Dry another legendary newspaper and magazine photojournalist. Tonight Ricky Skaggs will join us and the good times will continue to roll. All are truly dear friends and it’s great to get to see them and visit. I know I way over used the legendary term there, but these guys really are at the top of the mark.

Well, I went through all that to say, “Thank You Lord, you’ve blessed me beyond measure. I work with great people, I get to serve great people and great friends. I do for a living what I do when I have day off! Every once in a while I tell Bill Pekala, who hired me, thanks for the job. I really mean it, this is a great way to ride toward the sunset…….”

the pilgrim

….and people think I’m crazy! This is an Kolb design from the early days of ultra light flying.

This is the gorgeous Electra 18B like the one Emelia Earhart flew.