Path's Have Branches

Sarah
5 days ago
5 min read

"Path's have branches". Every time I think of this statement, I am reminded of the movie Shrek, and his famous statement, "Ogre's have layers", referring to ogre's being like onions.

That's probably the only comparison to Shrek that you will find in this post, however.

The Meaning

In my reference to "path's have branches", I am referring to that grand thing called "life". Many people believe that a journey through life is a "path". Branches are like the forks in the road - not forks that you eat with, forks like a river.

My path in life did not begin with being an aspiring photographer, I'll be very honest.

The History (MY History)

I wanted to be a lot of things when I was growing up - an actress, a DJ, a karate wiz - but it wasn't until several years ago that I aspired to be a photographer as a life goal. That's not to say that there weren't probably signs - there were.

Growing up, one of my hobbies was running around with a disposable 35MM camera taking pictures of family trips, events, or just whatever felt right. Usually, my finger was the subject for a while. Pesky thing... I remember that out of all the photographs I took with my 35mm disposable camera when my parents brought me to Marine Land, a solid 60% of them ended up being my fingers in front of the lens, or they were so blurry that you'd have to squint to see, like your life depended on it.

I didn't know this until the pictures were developed, at our local CVS, about a week later. A litttttttle too late to get better pictures, sadly.

I eventually got better, and after a few years, I really wanted a camcorder. I wanted to record all of my families memories. Being early in the 90's, camcorders were not cheap, and I never ended up obtaining one, only dreaming of owning one, which was enhanced by watching television shows where kids would run around filming their families and friends doing fun, silly, cool, and memorable stuff. I really wanted that. I wanted to visually document my life.

I lost my zest for photography for several of my teenage years. Life happened, like it tends to do. Several years later, I found a small digital camera on clearance at Wal-mart, and I adored it for about a year. It took the most crisp, clear photographs out of any camera I had up to this point. I want to say that it was MAYBE 12 or 15 megapixels, I brought it everywhere. It was even better that I didn't need to develop film for this one!

Unfortunately, I had an ex-boyfriend who didn't want to work, and one day while I was at work, he found and took my camera to a pawn shop to make a few bucks, but wouldn't admit it. I only found out months later when I became friends with one of the local pawn stores owners, who told me he knew my ex-boyfriend from when he used to bring stuff in to sell, weekly, including the camera that I had described. I also found out that's where a lot of my electronics went to without my knowing, but that's neither here nor there.

About this time, cell phones had been gaining in popularity. Many of them now had simple cameras on them, making photographs much easier and accessible wherever we went.

By the time I got to my mid 30's, I decided that I wanted to persue further education and signed up for online schooling to obtain my Bachelor's degree in Environmental Science. I have always loved nature, but I decided that I wanted to do my part in helping to conserve and preserve it, and the closest I could find online to get me down that "branch" was a degree in environmental sciences. My biggest goal after obtaining my degree? That was to swim with sea turtles. Still haven't made it yet...

Early on in school, I had been told by my academic advisor that I could choose to have my major in chemistry or biology. After taking an intro chemistry class that I failed at miserably - I think primarily because I needed to teach myself how to mix chemicals in our garage instead of being in a controlled classroom environment with someone to assist when necessary - I decided that chemistry wasn't for me. I love animals, I love life - all of it - so biology would be better suited to be my major. Due to failing my chemistry class, getting married, taking on a role as stepmom to a 10 year old, and trying to juggle my full time job, however, I decided I needed to take a break for a while to get my mind in the right place again to continue.

I exited school with almost half of my credits completed that were required for my degree. A few years later, I decided to change schools, online still, and pick back up with my environmental science degree. I had already invested so much money into it, I really wanted to see it through to the end.

Not all of my credits were accepted at the new school, so I had to back track a little. I made it half way through my degree at this point and got a little excited. I wanted to see what jobs were out there to keep myself motivated as to why I was doing all of this work. I was pretty disappointed when most of the jobs I was finding were lab technicians, or something similar. I wanted to see the world and make a difference, which I could do from a lab, but in my head, I froze, because I knew these jobs weren't really what I wanted.

Being a little more than 50% done with my degree, I had to make a decision. Keep going, or branch off the path. After a lot of thought, I decided to branch off. I gravitated to digital photography. I remembered some of my favorite photographers from the past, like Ansel Adams, who, due to his contributions as a photographer, helped to bring conservation and environmental protections into effect. His work displayed the beauty of nature in a way that helped to conserve it. That's what I wanted to do. I didn't want to sit in a lab being told what to do, I wanted to invoke change in my own way. Shortly after realizing this, I changed degree programs. Now, I have 1 class left until I graduate with my Bachelor's degree of the Arts, with a focus on digital photography.

This is what I mean about branching off the path. I pretty much shoved myself off of my own.

My Mission

My mission is to not only capture nature in all of her beauty, but to also help others to see the emotion and heart within nature. I sell my photography prints as a means to be able to keep my equipment up to date, ensuring that I can bring new content and new moments as they arise. By purchasing my photography prints, you are helping me to continue sharing the life and emotions that I see within all of nature.

Conclusion

Path's have branches. Falling off of your known path is not always a bad thing. Mine, brings me a lot of joy. Whether I am capturing an image for my viewers or for myself, taking the photograph reminds me that there are many ways to see something, and so many perspectives to choose from. The best one? Well, that's in the eye of the beholder.