street photography – Roadkill Crossing

Street Photography With a Twist

I love photography. It keeps me alert for the extraordinary while doing the ordinary. In this case, I was with my wife, her cousin, and her husband, all septuagenarians.

We get together every so often about halfway between our home in Virginia’s lovely Shenandoah Valley and their abode in central North Carolina. Lynchburg is a handy place to meet up, a two-hour drive for each of us.

We like many of the same activities, like playing cards, dominoes, antiques, and birding. We also enjoy casual strolls along city streets and well-marked biking and hiking paths. Lynchburg offers plenty of both.

Since we are not out to set any speed records on our walks, I can wander ahead and find the unusual among the usual rural or urban landscapes. Occasionally, I charge ahead too fast, and the others call me back to see what they have found. Together, we discover much to appreciate, ponder, and enjoy.

Take our most recent excursion, for example. Lynchburg is a city of hills and valleys, with a rich history, old buildings, waterways, sidewalks, cobblestone alleys, and lazy trails often following the winding creeks and the James River. One trail even had an old railroad tunnel, now lighted for bikers and hikers. The city is a paradise for photographers.

We came upon curious subjects to photograph every path we took. Along a creekside trail, we found this textured object. Any guesses? A tire? An alligator’s back? No to both. There’s a hint in the photo.

This is the closeup of an old fallen tree. The trunk was rotting away while its life-protective bark remained.

Not all photographic opportunities were so secretive. Still, using your imagination is critical. This old snag has stood the test of time, and the elements of four seasons have weathered into a once-living art object. Does anyone else conjure an owl flapping its right wing?

Speaking of living, this diminutive plant waved its once-green leaves red for the holiday season that is upon us. It is a volunteer burning bush, likely deposited by a seed-eating bird. There was no missing the bright color among all the trail-side leaf litter.

A short distance away, a competitor vied for attention. This sugar maple sapling shown like the sun on this dismal day. It made us all chuckle.

Not everything was so obvious, however. This photo has a complex combination of both natural and human-made actions.

Any idea what this abstract consists of? Look close. What’s on the left side? You are halfway home if you said a rock outcropping leached with calcium-laden groundwater. The right section is an old drainpipe. Some wannabe artists eliminated the plain rusty look by adding some pretty red and blue with a meaning. Those colors covered up some previous graffiti in faded white.

That pipe was a hint for us. The city lay just around the corner. We soon found this intriguing old set of double doors in a two-story brick building, likely once a warehouse during the railroad’s heyday. It faced the James River. The nearby trail was once a rail line.

A few steps away was a nearly block-long mosaic timeline of the history of Lynchburg. The blight of slavery was front and center. It’s an incredible piece of artwork often blocked by parked cars. This photo shows the intricate detail needed to tell the town’s story. I couldn’t imagine the time and effort it took to create this masterpiece.

We headed to the Amtrak train station away from Old Town. The building was magnificently reconstructed and expanded to hold city offices that had nothing to do with trains. We had a look around and came across some interesting finds.

An old luggage hand cart parked against the sturdy brick building caught my eye. No longer used, it can’t help but take train passengers and visitors back in time.

Across the street, an abandoned building seemed frozen in time. Dozens of solar bobbleheads danced behind a window in the late autumn sun. It was a curious collection that seemed abandoned, left to survive without human help.

This wasn’t our first rendezvous in Lynchburg with our friends. Given all there is to do, see, and photograph, it won’t be our last.

The Street Artist

There she was, sitting in the hot summer sun sketching away. The oversized, floppy straw hat she wore blended in with the stucco building behind her and created its own shade. This septuagenarian was just one of many street artists participating in the Plein Air Festival at Lakeside, Ohio, where my wife and I vacationed.

With her permission, I captured this shot of her sketching a cafe scene across the street. “The Street Artist” is my Photo of the Week.

Fabricated Rainbow

We enjoy showing visitors the backroads sights of where we live in Rockingham Co., Virginia. We often stop at this dry goods store, which offers all kinds of merchandise for customers. Rocky Cedars is situated among the Old Order Mennonite and Conservative Mennonite folks who populate the countryside in the western section of Virginia’s second-largest county.

The bolts of colorful fabric caught my eye. “Fabricated Rainbow” is my Photo of the Week.

From Switchboard Road

It was Thursday, and I hadn’t decided on my Photo of the Week, which I normally do well ahead of time. The last few days have been hectic with family responsibilities, writing deadlines, and yet another winter storm that brought snow, sleet, freezing rain, and rain.

I was thinking about what photo to feature as I drove home from a meeting this morning. When I turned south onto Switchboard Road, this scene grabbed my attention. I looked in my rearview mirror and to the road ahead of me. The narrow, curvy road is a busy thoroughfare, but the coast was clear. Down went the window, and I quickly snapped the scene.

The morning’s sun filtered through the storm’s residual clouds and a streak of rising fog. The rays glinted off of the three inches of snow encrusted with a glaze of ice. It looks black and white with only a hint of light blue showing.

I knew right then and there that “From Switchboard Road” would be my Photo of the Week.

Old Truck, Old Tree

When I saw this scene near Mt. Storm, WV, a multitude of questions zipped through my mind. Why was this old farm truck parked under this giant sugar maple tree? What stories could it tell? What had it hauled during all those years of service? Did the farmer have a special place in his heart for this faithful old truck? Did he park it under the tree for protection? Did he park it close to the highway for others to enjoy?

I don’t know any of the answers to those questions. However, I do know that the truck and the tree caught my attention. There was something poetic about the ancient tree sheltering the old vehicle like a hen protecting its chick. Whatever the reasons, “Old Truck, Old Tree” is my Photo of the Week.

Repurposed?

lost hat, fire hydrant, repurpose — Repurposed?

Much of the United States is in the throes of a massive cold spell brought on by a polar vortex courtesy of our neighbors to the north and a truncated jetstream. At first glance, it might seem that a good Samaritan wanted to repurpose this child’s stocking cap by helping to keep this fire hydrant from freezing. However, a more accurate guess would be that a youngster lost the hat and the finder merely placed it atop the fireplug in the hopes that its owner would find it.

When I walked past the hydrant a couple of days later, the hat was gone. I hope its actual owner retrieved the headwear.

“Repurposed” is my Photo of the Week.

After the rain

raindrops on berries, color contrasts — After the rain. © Bruce Stambaugh 2015

The gray, rainy day drove our little group into the local history museum. We enjoyed our 90-minute tour but were ready for a tasty lunch from one of the excellent restaurants in historic Fernandina Beach, Florida. We exited the museum and discovered the rain had stopped, at least for the moment. As I turned the corner of the old brick building to head to the car, these bright berries quickly caught my eye.

I loved the way the glistening raindrops, ready to drip, made the berries shine. Their fire engine red brightened the dull day.

“After the rain” is my Photo of the Week.