Am I the only one who likes this photo?

Every year at Christmas I give certain family members and friends a photo book filled with images from my previous year's adventures.  As said friends or family members turn each page, my commentary usually goes something like this, "Ooh that's one of my favorites......That's one of my favorites.......That's really one of my favorites."

So basically, every photo is pretty much one of my favorites.  Otherwise, I suppose, it wouldn't be in the book.  However, if you put a gun to my head and said, "Choose or die," I would have to pick the above photo.  The repro on Blogger really doesn't do it justice, but if you click on the link below it, it will take you to the photo on my website.  That's a much better representation.

I'm not certain that others love this photo as much as I do.  My attachment to it may have to do with the circumstances in my life at the time.  One day I was on my way home from work and was stopped in traffic, when my car was slammed from behind.  I won't go into all the exciting details of what happened or what I went through.  Suffice to say, it really screwed up my back.  The pain became worse and worse as the days went by until I was barely able to walk.

A couple weeks later, we happened to get one of those late fall snowstorms.  It was a heavy, wet snow that stuck to everything.  It was gorgeous.  I'm going to try to not say anything rude about people who don't like the snow, but ARE YOU OUT OF YOUR FREAKING MIND?  You're nuts, cuckoo, looney, one brick short of a full load.

Oops.  Sorry.  I tried.  Okay, not really.

Hmmm.  Where was I?  Oh yeah, snow.  I love snow, and I wasn't going to allow a little excruciating pain stop me.  It was only a year earlier that I had decided to begin building a nature and wildlife portfolio, so it was, basically, get the hell out of my way pain.  I'm on a mission.  Plus, it was so beautiful.

I threw my gear into the car and headed out.  I'm not really sure why I picked this particular spot to stop.  However, as I pulled my car over it immediately became evident that it was not the best place to park, and I decided to find another spot.  Mother nature had other ideas.  My wheels spun, and I rocked her back and forth but the car made no progress.

Now, it would have been blatantly obvious to anyone who passed that I was stuck and, as luck would have it, a snow plow came slowly ambling along.  I continued to spin the wheels and rock back and forth, so that Mr. snow plow driver would see that I was having trouble and would, hopefully, come to my aid.  But do you think that *bleep*ing [expletive deleted] would stop?  No, the *bleep*ing [expletive deleted] continued on his merry way like the *bleep*ing [expletive deleted] that he is.  He even stopped briefly right in front me, just to taunt me, I'm sure.

*bleeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeep* you!  Okay, deep breaths.

I finally just said, "Screw it.  I'm already stuck, so I may as well just get the pictures and deal with the car later."

 I threw on my backpack and dragged myself across the road.  As I started walking into the woods with my back screaming at me, all I could think was, "This is not a good idea."  But that's never stopped me before.

Fortunately, the scene above was only about 50 ft. in.  When I saw it, I stopped immediately and was in awe.  It was so quiet and peaceful and beautiful.  And for just one moment I forgot about my pain. 

Ummmmmm.  The End.