IN WHICH I SPEAK OF CAMERAS X-MEN, & BOTOX.

Somebody picked up my camera recently and remarked,

"Wow, your viewfinder is really scratched. What'd you do to it?"

Coming from someone shooting on a much nicer camera than mine, yet who rarely shoots, I could not resist a sort of passive-aggressive*, somewhat snarky response:

"Well, it goes pretty much everywhere with me,"
I explained.
"If I was worried about it getting banged up, I'd leave it at home. And if I had a nicer camera, I probably WOULD worry about it getting banged up. But my interest is primarily subject, then image quality. So it wears the makeup and grit from the five billion photographs I've snapped."

"Oh."
he said.
"It's just really scratched up."

"Yep."
I said.
"Like me. I don't plan to be lookin' pretty over the years either. I'm gonna get scratched down, roughed up, wearing the battles of adventure and hard play all over my face. My action figures get played with**, I'm still wearing the same t-shirts I was a decade ago, and I'm not gonna be six feet under someday with my tank half full. Empty. I'm not gonna keep my nice stuff locked up so it can look pretty. Pretty to me?: Life getting played hard. My camera gets played hard.***

So...where's your camera? What do you like to shoot?"

"Well,"
he said.
"I mostly just shoot during the summer, when it's good weather. It's too cold now."

"Oh."
I said.
"I'm sure your camera is warm at home right now."

I patted my little beat-up image-grabber and hiked**** off into the unknown.

I think we have different philosophies about a lot of things.
____

*probably more the latter than the former

**some of them don't yet. because I'm waiting for my kids to get a little older before I pull out mid-90s X-Men loot to pass along. but that's another conversation.

*** that being said, I will gladly accept a complimentary Canon 5DMIII to play even harder with


****walked

*****the known, but it wasn't as strong an ending

Happy day, all.