The Landscape Photograph

“Get me a fantastic fall leaf photo,” she said as I carried my camera and tripod out the door on a November morning in 2025.

For her, my landscape photography is meant for the house. A piece of me in her decor.

That’s not why I do it.

I do it for dirt trails, trees, heat and cold, the wind and dry grass.

For walking a long way in silence.

I photograph for the clockwork whirr of the shutter, the smell of sheet film and the patient wooden frame of my view camera.

I photograph to have something I can look back on and say, “There it is. I did that.”

I returned with this photo. I made her a print. It hangs in the house now.

Doing exactly what she wants it to do.