When I was a child at the age of 9 I had a random camera. I don’t even know what it was. It was some sort of yard sale special, not a toy but a hand me down. I would wind the film with my thumb. All I can recall about this camera is that i could never load the film correctly and when I did, I would go through the entire roll real fast, perhaps at 24 frames per second in modern terms. Yes, that’s right I would take 24 pictures of an ant or a rock, or if I was feeling particularly creative....an ocean wave. I remember mailing the undeveloped film off to Fuji labs in a little plastic bag. I was living in England at the time and the options for film development seemed rather limited. My Air Force dad would take me to the base on occasion to pick up some more 400 speed film for his camera (he had a fancy underwater Nikon SLR-that I could never touch) and 100 speed, 12 to 24 exposures for mine. Dad was wise and he knew I would “waste” the film. Sure enough, before we got back in the car to head home, my film was used up. As we pulled into the drive, I would run to get the mail and there would be my Fuji film bag with another free film and my processed photographs! As I ripped the envelope open (and loaded my newest film) I would flip through these blurry, dark, sometimes blank photos. I had failed each and every time to take a proper photograph. The cycle continued for a couple years at most. I became frustrated and the camera went into a yard sale of my own. Wasting film was expensive. Dad was no photographic genius either but he had a fancy camera that enabled him to take low-light pictures of the deep ocean. I envied him and his camera but I discovered sports and BB guns.

When I was 11 years old, my dad was reassigned to Eglin Air Force base in Florida. He bought a house in a very nice rural community in Okaloosa County, Florida. I had more friends than I knew what to do with. England was a small country and I was an American living in an entirely English neighbourhood...it had its perks but still, I longed for the U.S. again. I wanted to fit in so I did what all American boys do...I begged dad for a BB Gun for my birthday.  At that age, you need what cool kids have. I didn’t want a rat tail or a tattoo so I settled for the BB Gun. Sure enough, On some holiday, birthday or Christmas, (both in the winter but it WAS Florida) I unwrapped the ten pump BB/ Pellet gun. Though it was ten pump, my friends and I always tried to pump it as far as we could trying to turn it into a high powered rifle of sorts. My dad had a few rules regarding my new “weapon” : No pointing it at animals or people. I believe in addition to taking the gun away from me he said he would kill me. Again, at that age you believe everything your parents tell you. I agreed. For weeks, my rat-tailed friends and I would go deep into the Florida woods searching for good firing ranges. We saw some amazing landscapes and vistas. We discovered deadly poisonous snakes and fire ants that would inflate you into a blimp. We found obscure trees and arrowheads. We saw the most amazing birds and sunsets. I was 11. Never did I point my gun at anything other than a junked out car or a few bottles that we purposely set up , to be blown up. This excitement can only last so long before you get bored out of your skull. One day I went down to visit some friends at the bottom of the hill, their dad was also in the Air Force. I had my BB gun and they had none. We were standing around under the tallest tree in our neighbourhood. At some point the conversation turned to “Street Hawk” or “Knight Rider” and we found ourselves unable to hear each other because of the squawking bird in the upper echelons of the dated pine towering over us. Next came the cheers of a unified crowd of children. The ultimate, the dare. “Shoot it.” “Do it.” I was fine. I was holding my own until the group grew into a mob and began to say awful things, vicious things such as “he can’t hit it!” These words were enough to drive an 11 year old to drink! Without further delay, I aimed, poorly. I shot, poorly. There was a slight pause. It was fine. I was ok with it. I never intended to hit it anyway, it would have been the wrong thing to do.  As I peered into the towering tree I noticed a speck of something coming at me, much like a train coming through a tunnel in one’s direction. It was the bird trying to fly but rotating more like a helicopter. It was helpless and slamming into every branch until it landed in the middle of the street. As I stared at it in disbelief watching it struggle and, ultimately, suffer I had no idea what to do so I did what any kid holding a BB gun would do...I ran around crying and screaming for help.  I was both scared and confused. I was ill-prepared for a partial hit.  An immediate kill would not have been right either but at the very least the situation would have ended there. My neighbor’s dad examined the bird. I had hit it in the wing which he said may be reparable with the help of a vet. He scooped up the bird in a shoebox and took it to the vet. That night, the bird refused to eat. It died and my life has never been the same. 25 years later I prefer to shoot birds with my camera and I have to say it is much more rewarding. My preference in photography is nature and landscape. My aim may have originated with a BB gun but I didn’t need my dad to take the gun away to appreciate the true value of our surroundings. A few lessons were learned as a result of that incident but my favorite just may be an understanding that pain and suffering can do a 180 with the right tools and a lack of ignorance. Photography for me is that tool.