For many years, most of my vacation time was spent with camping, primarily with the summer and family camping trips with my troop. Most of the days left over were spent going caving with Bob and his family. Norm was also an occasional camper as we would get together and take a trip as well.

During a lot of my camping, I devoted the time to nature photography, which usually meant I would be doing more work on less sleep than in my employment. In fact anything nature photography-wise was not only brutal, but required a puzzle-solving wit.

At Assateague Island, our troop camped in the group area and everybody went to Ocean City. I caught up with a herd of horses and started to photograph them. It was easy to pick out the mares and foals, but easiest of all, the stallion who didn't really like my presence. Talk about herd mentality, these were wild horses and I saw them almost bite off the fingers of a woman who wasn't supposed to be feeding the animals.

It seemed all the stallion wanted was recognition, and it worked well. With him looking on, I was able to photograph the mares and catch a foal rolling in the sand to fight off the flies. On lookers had a blast, as he would roll, then I would roll as the flies landed and bit me. The foal took this as a sort of game.

No matter the animal, they all seemed to have some kind of a quirk to have to get around. Whether feast or fowl, insect or other pest. In addition, there was always a side issue, either with the weather, equipment or some technique of detection that you were working on.

Going Native American had its price as well. In shorts and moccasins, it only took till about 1:00pm, the first day out to realize I was getting red splotches all on my skin. I pretty much figured it was a scent killing hunting product I was using, but by 3:00pm the tell tale signs of poison ivy blistering were beginning to show.

I decided to go back to camp and make full use of the free swim, so I could wash myself off with poison ivy soap. It did the trick and the blisters immediately disappeared, but it would become a daily event, which I didn't want to get locked into. However, it kept my mind occupied while I was stuck in the river blind waiting for a King Fisher to come back to his favorite area.

I could only ponder, Poison ivy is such a tenderfoot mistake, you know that plant from a mile away, so how are you getting it? You have to be stationary and maybe it is dropping on you from above, but there are no vines going up the trees ... After about the fourth day at my river blind, Oh, the vine is behind the forth tree from you and crossing the canopy, it figures. See Mike, you have your own storm cloud over you once again. Figures! It just added to the mountain man temperament people could detect from me.


I was well accustomed to the side adventures, and figured I was prepared for any of them, but life has a way of pointing out the opposite. At Flint Ridge, which was where we normally camped, there was an all black troop that was wigging the entire camp out. They were very heavy handed with their guys, not to mention very isolative with the other troops. The adults also walked around with a full communications system, essentially dogging the boys, something you didn't see every day.

What made this worse was the camp staff was refusing to answer questions about them or their presence. The Scoutmaster being employed as my father was, in Juvenile Justice, wondered if they were from the Hickey School for Boys, a correctional institution for juvenile boys. I expressed my opinion that I felt that they were from one of the projects in the city, because their communications sounded like the one's I tapped into with my scanner at home. Project security was provided under contract by NOI (Nation Of Islam).

The first thing that I did was to insult and offend them, though not intentional. I walked through their camp several times a day to get to the stream area I was working in and at least eight times by noon, I had picked ticks off of me. In my tree stand, I felt more like an ape then human and even carved a notch in my fingernail to make it easier to remove those buggers.

It was at vespers the second night, when I spied the black group sitting across from our troop. The leader immediately walked into the area and screamed out about four names. Those boys instantly jumped up, went into the isles and started doing pushups. The leader said, "Forget it! You're going back to camp and packing up your gear; you're going home."

Once the leader was seated, I walked up to him and said, "Hi, I'm Mike Kohlman and I am doing nature photography below your camp. I am picking at least eight ticks off of me every day, and I recommend that you check your guys for ticks. I suggest that you use a flashlight with a xenon bulb as it will give your skin a bluish hue and the tick will stand out nice, black and shiny."

He looked at me as if to say, Come just call me nigger you son of a bitch. The confrontational look he gave me was a bit of a shock, but I felt that I said what I had to, and meant no offense.

The next day, I was in the adult changing area at the pool and was squatting over a mirror when he walked in on me.

His mouth dropped and he said, "Ah, Ah, Ee, Ee, Ee," and ran back out. He shortly came back in laughing and said, "Well I thought you were ... Shit, you're serious about things."

"Yea, like I said, I'm working below you and picking off ticks like crazy." I stopped myself just in time not to make any ape references.

Then it was off to the showers you had to take before you go swimming and found him amused at me washing off with poison ivy soap. All the worlds my stage, "I also have a problem as I am walking around there like an Indian and I'm picking up poison ivy like crazy. If I get it off now, it won't turn into a problem."

It was the next day that I discovered I was the camps racial emissary. He walked up and stated, "I'm beginning to get the idea that people don't really like us around here."

How could I lie? I knew he would pick up on that. "Well I'll tell you the truth, people don't, but it not because of the reason that you're thinking of, because you're black. First your troop is a big mystery and people have a lot of questions that everyone is refusing to answer. Next it is the fact you're walking around with your groups escorting them, and your use of a communications system. Also you're keeping your kids isolated from the rest of the camp, even kicking other groups off the basketball court and not allowing them to play with your boys."

"Dare I mention your troop yell, 'We're the best damned troop around and we'll rub whitey into the ground!' "

He became embarrassed and said, "We'll the boys came up with that and we didn't want to hurt their feelings."

"Well, I understand their sentiments, but as adult leaders, you need to use something like that to make the boys think. That sense of competition could be put into a much better use, with better language."

I continued, "I keep an eye on things, and you're not the only black people here. The others seem to fit in well and don't have any problems. Perhaps you should look at them. An easy way is to tie a string around your coffee cup, put it on your belt loop and walk around the camp like all the other scoutmasters do. Then if you see something that interests you, you simply walk up to them and inquire. Hell, it's a great way to get free coffee."

I loved the shock their troop yell had on the 850 people that heard it at the flag lowering. First they held things up as they were late; then they came in, yelling, banging and blowing musical instruments. When all was quiet, they did their troop yell, which included, "We're the best damned troop around, we'll rub whitey into the ground."

I did what any good white person should do, I pointed to an innocent black man across from them until I got his attention and made gestures that indicated, I'll be watching you and we'll be going at it.

The black man was as much a scouter as I and simply laughed, pointed to the all black troop and knocked his knees together, as if in fear. He caught up with me the next day and said, "Now, I'm going to be honest with you. I consider myself a black man, but that group is a hell of a lot blacker then me. Who the hell are those guys?"

I gave my best assessment and that seemed to satisfy him, then he said, "You're one scary mother yourself and everyone should be asking, 'Who the hell are you and what are YOU doing in camp?'" I answered that one too.

The next day, I had an issue along with our troop, as well the troop on the other side of us, and since I was seen talking with the black troop's leader, I was volunteered to talk to him. I told the scoutmaster that I didn't want their boys using our camp latrine. Though he knew exactly what I was talking about, but his pride got the best of him. "I just have to know, why you don't want our boys to use your latrine?"

"Remember, I am working below you and I had to use your latrine and found shit on the floor from one end to the other. I dug a hole instead, but that compromises the area for me. I have to be honest, I am only in camp a few hours a day and don't appreciate taking twenty minutes each day, scrubbing crap off of the seat. I have already used six pairs of surgical gloves."

"I know, I just don't know what to do about that problem."

"Well, make them clean it; you're going to have to do that anyway. My suggestion is that after they clean it, you make sure they're sitting on the seat by inspecting the latrine every time they use it. Believe it or not, this is a common problem for all troops, but if you nip it in the bud, then it ceases to be a problem."

With the temperature in the hundreds, high humidity, the extra duties, and the fact that nature wasn't cooperating, it was grueling to start with. But something always happened to make me not get very much rest. I got caught out in a storm and had to spend a night cleaning my camera equipment, caught an extra card game, or one night a thunderstorm rolled through that devastated camp.

Where was I? Buck naked photographing the storm, with an air bulb attached so I wouldn't be struck by lightning. I didn't see this as a problem because everyone was huddled in their tents trying to sleep. The scoutmaster put his head out of the tent and with a flash of lightning, he said, "Hey, Mike?"

"Yea."

"Wait a minute, that's not you, where are you?" With the next flash of lightning; "You're naked! Why aren't you wearing your storm gear?"

"It's simple, my camera set-up costs about $8,000.00 and needs protection and I am worthless."

With the storm finally over, I was in my tent and about to go to sleep, when the scoutmaster woke me up saying, "You know Mike, we lost power and I think it is a good idea I check up on our friends at Flint Ridge. I know they haven't been camping and might be pretty upset." I wished him well.

I didn't expect to get woken up again with the scoutmaster saying, "Mike, you know how I am a history buff and love the harshness of it all. I went to their cabin and shined a light in. It made me feel like a slave trapper who just discovered the Underground Railroad. You know, white bugged eyes and chattering teeth. They're OK, I shared all of our stories about Flint Ridge. They didn't know about the copperheads."

The black troop had a woman that made an impression on me as well. I saw one of their six foot boys get into a dispute with her and then he yelled, "Fuck you bi-" She slapped the boy across his face so hard, he cart wheeled, which instantly put me in an excited state of arousal. I turned my fanny pack around, though I believed it was already noted by her.

There was other fun to be had with the troop, as I walked through their camp area at first, most troop members and adults had a fear of me. But one time a boy ran up and said they needed help with a merit badge requirement. There was an elderly black man trying to help them with survival merit badge and was not doing too good at starting fires without matches. In short order, I had successfully demonstrated four different methods.

I used flint and steal, magnifying glass, and with batteries and steel wool. To them I was now more like a God. But I actually believed that it was God's hand behind me since it was the first time in my life all the fires were started flawlessly. The elderly black man thanked me and said, "I think you're the first white person I would want with me if something happened. You'd keep me fat and happy." I told him he was the wrong sex to be thinking like that.

The remembrance of the black woman cart wheeling the boy provided me with much amusement as I couldn't figure out how she could have done that. The next day, I was invited into the cabin to have a cup of much needed coffee. We sat around the table and chatted. Then I saw the black woman stretch and again, became excited, but couldn't believe that her arms were larger than mine, her stomach was gracefully ribbed and she was very attractive with her hair in Swedish braids.

I couldn't help but think, Mike, what you love in a black woman will get you killed, but what joy in your life until that happened. Which would be quick because you know you couldn't resist saying something." I thought it best to try to relax with another cup of coffee. I now knew why I was a fan of Grace Jones.

Another night misadventure occurred the next evening as I was finally heading for a little sleep, a fly flew into my eye. In severe pain, I got some of it out, but in the morning, it was obvious that some was still in. With about a half-hours sleep, I woke up and got ready for my day, but my eye was in severe pain. I was looking in the mirror with my eyeball half puffed out of my lid.

Luckily amongst my EMS gear was an eye loop and I was able to painfully use to get the rest of the fly out of my eye, followed by a long rinse. I knew I should have opted for an eye doctor, but figured it would become much more painful if it was still getting worse, so I headed for the backcountry and planned to reevaluate the eye when I got back. Luckily the swelling was reduced by half its size when I returned and forgotten about by that evening.

The animals each had their own behaviors and schedules; I was more or less like a fool in trying to fit them into my photographic schedule of my world. I had a series of blinds that revolved around the movement of the sun through picturesque areas, which required a bit of leg work and adjustment to set up. It was almost like the animals had the instinct to mess with me.

In addition to the blinds, I patrolled for photo-opportunities and had other planned assignments such as the capture of a copperhead snake so I could photograph him; having the equipment to safely do it too. But whereas we were tripping over the poisonous beasts the year before at Flint Ridge, there weren't any to be found. There were plenty of hawks though.

Sometimes in addition to the poison ivy, animals not slated for shooting provided some interesting problems. Walking one day, I noticed a vague itchy, scratchy, pricking feeling on my shoulder blade, but just as I noticed, it went away. About ten minutes later, my whole arm flew in front of my face.

What the hell was that? A few minutes later, it did it again. Now me being a man, I decided to get things under control by willing this illegal movement away. But my armed waved in front of my face again. No way, something's wrong! Next my wrist started to uncontrollably twitch. I remembered that itchy, scratchy, prickly feeling and looked back and saw the tiniest of green spiders chomping away on my shoulder.

The scant eighth inch by quarter inch beast with a body the thickness of a pencil lead, was doing a number on my arm. Something the books, be it medical or nature, would consider impossible. A quick, "Get off of me bastard," and a flick of the finger got me my arm back in control in about ten minutes.

The worst of the animals turned out to be human, who somehow had roam of an expanse of 1,700 acres, but always seemed to get lost right around me. The first day, I was in my tree stand away from any marked trail. Along comes two adults and their group of scouts, I figured they are taking a short cut and will just pass through, which was fine for me.

They got to my tree, stopped, "We're lost!" and pulled out their maps and it took them twenty minutes to figure out what they did wrong, while the kids were goofing off. I couldn't believe that I went unnoticed, because I was only three feet above their heads. The kids were looking everywhere and didn't see me, nor had they noticed the spikes going up the tree trunk.

The next day I was at a spot looking down the trail, basically disguised as part of a bush. The light was really highlighting the area the way that I needed and I could hear the deer walking down the trail to go to their bedding area. Damn if another group didn't stop right in front of me and was lost again.

Out came the maps and while the adults where figuring things out, the kids were allowed to goof off. I almost put a hand through the bush, as I wanted to strangle one of them. After they were gone, I only had about ten minutes of light left for the area, but I could hear the deer were now walking around me.

What's another shoot?  In the afternoon, I was literally in the middle of the stream, sitting in a chair about forty feet from where I was shooting. I had put out some anchovy on a rock which brought in a group of circling vultures, until they just made it into the scene that I wanted to shoot. Then another group of scouts came and in that very spot, decided they were lost. I thought to myself, Come on, there's orange blazes showing you the trail dummies!

The adults were still insistent in getting out the map to figure things out while the boys threw rocks everywhere. After much debate, they made a huge discovery, "Hey they painted blazes for the trail!" Not once did they see me in the middle of the river, yet they managed to throw rocks in my direction.

The rest of the week had lousy lighting due to the clouds and my blind in the middle of the river was rained out; it was a half-mile trek to recover my blind material and chair, but since I had to bug out fast, my French army hat made a hasty retreat and washed away to somewhere unknown.

Friday morning, the only place that had lighting was the blind up river and I decided to see if I could capture a shot of the Kingfisher in his favorite area, It was 9:00am and I was really tired and for fear of drifting off, I downed my entire thermos of coffee and 5,000 calories of food.

I knew something wasn't right as the only thing that I could think of was, Why are my feet so big?  I realized that I had passed out, doubled over in the blind and it was now 4:00 pm. The Kingfisher was on the top of my blind looking down at me. That rat bastard!

I accepted my lot of camp karma, but where people drove me crazy was in planning the photography and trying to sell my prints. It became a fit in planning to get the shots in the first place, Bob the scoutmaster at that time would seem to indicate that I wasn't needed so I would bring my equipment.

But when I started unpacking it, there all of a sudden seemed to be a need for me. This happened to me too many times, enough to make me wonder, but since I considered myself a scout leader first, I would shift gears to go with the troop. It wasn't fun seeing all the wild life that was kicked up by the troop including wild turkey and pheasant.

The effect of Rocky Gap putting camping restrictions on me was horrible and safety problems with the way they forced me to do things ruined my shoot with the bears. The troop was also planning to go to Fort Frederick State Park who was holding their annual reenactments. It was a combination French and Indian, Revolutionary War and Civil War skirmishes.

Having long since admired the participating reenactors, I felt that they not only deserved of a nice article, but one to go into a National Geographic or Smithsonian issue. The realities of getting such a publication to consider a freelance photojournalistic piece were daunting; it put my stomach in knots.

Yet, I thought that I was able to accomplish such a feat. Having seen the reenactments before, I knew they used a double rope barrier to create a safety zone. I wrote the park, explained what I was doing in reference to my article and that I needed to be between the ropes to accomplish this. I also mentioned that I had six years of experience with black powder firearms, including instructing other people in their safety and use.

Though I was more of the western mountain man in regalia, I also promised to come dressed to better fit in. I even grew my goatee. I was told they couldn't grant permission for that, but to stop by to further see if something could be planned.

At first they seemed cooperative, as I was able to tend the planning meetings, but just as with Rocky Gap State Park, I drew unnecessary attention to myself. The general camp photography went extremely well, with plenty of scenes to photographically be had.

In one case I was photographing a woman cooking breakfast for her group of Rodger's Rangers at a campfire, when one of the men spotted me and hit his friend on the back. All of them men got in front of her and the cooking fire, weapons in hand and told me, "Move on! She's ours!"

Then another man whispered in his ear and he continued, "But we would consider a trade, we need horses." She made the angriest of faces.

I couldn't resist, "Gentleman, in the spirit of such royal none such, I do consider myself a man of means and with the Union Army up the road, this trade is possible. Can I check her teeth?" This resulted in the men laughing and the poor woman, yelling, cussing and throwing food at us.

The reality of my deed of asking for special permissions became evident with the photographing of the events. I ended up with rangers giving special attention to me and drawing invisible lines. They would let me set up, and then tell me that I had to be on the other side of the post. This 1 foot move wasn't really enough to affect my safety, but it did ruin many of my shots.

With the double safety barrier of ropes, I was told that nobody was allowed between them in my letter. But they decided it was OK for reenactors' families to be there, but still I wasn't permitted. In addition of the double rope, I had to photograph the skirmishes over people, between people and between their legs at times.

This wiped out much of my photography and being so far back, could only get the skirmish on a quarter of the area of my negative. Luckily, it was an area about the size of a 35mm negative, but the difference in quality clearly showed.

As soon as I got back home I immediately set about the production of the article. I had made a horrible mistake and accidentally shot my camp scenes with black and white film, but it gave me a brain storm of how to layout the article. It was off to the color lab, processing, printing and copyrighting the material instantly cost me $2,500.00.

On top of that, I decided to print and mount the nature photography I already had, which could cost anywhere from $130.00 to $380.00 per work. Within a year, I had about fifteen pieces and some were elaborate, museum quality pieces with double velvet mats, I had to hand geld the mats edges with 24 carat gold to achieve the results I wanted. With the extra work, the framer thought I was nuts, but their gelding wasn't real gold and just as expensive. No one had the look that I could get.

I was lucky and happy that I sold a photograph to a scouter in the troop, but decided it was best to try the local fair which was held on Harford Road near my house. For the public interest, I had somewhat inexpensively framed my reenactment photographs and had the ones that I wanted to sell, framed and ready to go. The fair promised to provide, A-framed stands with chicken wire to hang the prints from.

I arrived with all of my work, nicely packed in a little red wood wagon and found out the A-frames hadn't arrived and while the county worker made a trip to get them, he wasn't able to get them. My best friend wanted me to tell the fair to, "Fuck off!" and pull my display, which was also my inclination; still I attempted to make the best of things by laying my broadcloth on the road, with my prints on top.

Despite the numerous comments about the shoddy display, almost everybody loved my works and I had people wanting to purchase a print. In a good mood, I lowered the price from $30.00 to $25.00. "You're too expensive; I can have it printed at Kmart for $3.99."

"You can, but this is a custom print from a professional color lab. It cost me $15.00 to start with."

"You're still ripping me off. I like the shot so I will shoot it myself."

"With, what?" They owned a point and shoot camera. "First there is the cost of my equipment, which is many thousands, there is the professional photography training and then sitting outside hoping to capture something like that, best of luck."

The framed pieces got even greater scoffs from the people of the crowd. Why should they spend $150.00 for something they could produce and do themselves for about $20.00? They also complained about the fact they heard that photographic prints fade. But they wanted to argue more than listen.

The most expensive piece of the finished work was the Demglass, which was specifically designed to prevent fading from light exposure, and even unprotected actually took a decade to start fading anyway. The framer I used had a particular skill on putting the whole thing together and each piece had my chosen frame to fit in as many decors as possible and still do the print justice.

It was driving me nuts to receive such compliments and accolades for my work and to be arguing over the cost of it, which was only part of the negative activity. I had the dickens of a time, as I also had to keep people from walking over my framed works. Luckily the one's that got trampled were the ones in the inexpensive frames, which had Lexan instead of glass.

One elderly woman, fell in love with one of the large framed prints, and told me she would pay anything for it. On a hunch, I quoted $175.000. "Oh honey, that's too expensive. You're not going to sell anything at the exorbitant prices that you charge."

Well, I showed her the print and framing costs, told her how many gold leaves went into the border and the amount of time it took to geld it. My costs alone added up to $380.00. Funny how life is, she started to write me a check for $175.00. I told her to keep it, "No honey, I'm not going to let YOU rip me off. I don't want one of your checks unless you're willing to pay me an honest price, $425.00."

It seemed that many people who really admired my work actually knew a couple of highly successful nature photographers. The one thing they had in common was they had magic money, such as winning the lottery or parents that supported them, which gave them the time and money needed to gain that popularity, publish their works and open up doors.

In the fair's afternoon, protecting the display became a major problem as the beer started flowing. Around 1:00pm, it was obvious that a man with a beer in each hand was heading to walk right through my display. Not only did I yell for him to stop, the entire crowd was yelling for him to stop as well, which he yelled back, "Fuck you all!"

One foot hit that $380.00 print and another one an even more expensive $450.00 one and he fell on his ass, scooting my framed prints into each other, but he saved his beers. He got up and wanted to start a fight, but I put that notion to rest telling him after his first punch, mine will though will be to his throat, other people in the crowd pushed him along. I packed everything away and went home, by this time; I had a full blown migraine.

A terrible setback was losing my framer, due to her mother dying and the business wrapped up in the estate. I searched for another and found myself at Kenilworth Mall in Towson. I had brought my portfolio with me. I noticed that she sold lithographic prints, and inquired if she would consider selling my photographic ones.

She refused saying that they fade. Most of her lithographic prints were in the neighborhood of $145.00 and I felt that she could sell the actual photographs comparably priced. I pointed out two of her prints and mentioned that the print shop that I worked for printed them. "You talk about fading, most of these are offset printed and within two years, they have faded on our walls. It takes a decade for photographic prints to fade, and with the proper protections, won't fade at all."

I tried to sell myself on the value that they could get people in her store, also offering her a larger commission that she is receiving with her lithographic prints. She told me that she didn't know the photographic market. I seriously tried to convince her to not worry about the photographic market and simply to sell them as a product, which is reasonably priced.

That seemed to spark a little interest, but she told me that she had to approach what she sells with a proper gallery attitude and business sense. She wouldn't even try to sell my works on even a test basis, so I decided not to give her my framing business and instead, worked with Towson Artists Supply. Having to go back to DNV in Kenilworth Mall a couple of months later, I noticed that her gallery was out of business.

I only had so much time to put into exploring the business end, but it was common for galleries wanting me to be published first, and for the publishers to want to know about my following to increase their business. I felt more like a person seeking to become a movie star, seeking their big break, which was totally ridiculous in my mind. I felt that I was realistic about my pursuit, but others that could help me, weren't.

My father had retired from his job at Juvenile Services from the State of Maryland, which gave him a pension that was rather good to live by, but he was constantly pining that he didn't have anything to fill his time. So a light went off in my head, "Hey Dad, I have something that you can do! You can help me sell my photographs; I'll give you a twenty-five percent commission!"

Dad exploded, "God damn it Mike! That is the most foolish thing that I can do; attach myself to your failing endeavor. You're a fool to be getting into it, and I won't be a fool to help you fail!"

"Ah Dad, the purpose of you helping to sell my works was to help generate income so I could be more successful."

Dad stormed out of the house, and I fell into the chair he always sat in when he lived there. I couldn't believe it; he had all of the faith in the world as he freely talked about it in reference to God, but not the slightest for me.

Most suggested that I go into wedding photography, but I knew so many nature photographers that did that and had to give up their dream. With wedding photography, you have to devote all of your time to arranging to be at weddings. You can make good money, and if you are a good photographer, the business will grow substantially and you get locked into the dates of the wedding. While you can plan around it, you miss being able to go when the opportunity presents itself.

I continued to plod on with nature photography, but soon the failures would come from my friends as well. Not having the best in reenactment battle scenes, I decided once again to contact Fort Frederick State Park and see if I could get between the barriers. I detected a bit of shame with the guy who was the same person I contacted the year before.

"Well, ah, we did agree to let a production company from the Discovery Channel shoot like you wanted, but they backed out as their assignment changed. I guess that we can let you do it, but they promised to purchase for us, a gas powered weed-wacker. We'll let you on the field if you purchase if for us."

"Even though, I didn't have the money, I agreed to buy the exact model that they wanted." I found a coworker at work, that I asked to be hired for transportation and as an assistant. Also, Bob the scoutmaster always goes and agreed to be a back up.

While this would have cost me a couple of hundred bucks to have an assistant, I looked forward to this. The problem was the park still wouldn't let me be in front of the guns, even if I knew I was in a safe area. I had to immediately, next day air about another $3,500 of equipment; namely another Bronica camera system.

What drove me crazy was I needed another air release bulb to gain the 100ft I would need to remotely trigger the cameras. It is amazing when a particular item is needed, it can't be found anywhere. It took me four days to procure the two $7.00 devices.

As hard as it was, I was extremely thankful for this blessed opportunity, but the night before this event, my coworker and assistant simply walked up to me and said, "Mikey, look my grandmother's not feeling well, so I am cancelling out of going to Fort Frederick." What could I say?

I talked with the scoutmaster and he agreed to take me with him and to be ready by a certain time. He was late, so I called him and he seemed irritated at me and said, "Look Mike ... I have diarrhea and don't feel like going."

Had I had a days notice, I would have rented a car and drove to Fort Frederick myself. Not only was I heartbroken about not going, I was bank broken as well. I informed the park and still promised to send them the weed-wacker, but they instead reduced my price and requested a hammer drill. I immediately made good on my promise to keep that door open and hopefully be remembered.

The next Monday drove me nuts, because I heard the coworker talking on the phone, "Grandma's doing better. Hey the party was great!" No matter where I was, I ended up hearing every detail about the party and the fun he had. I wasn't confrontational with him, but I had to mention all that I put into the project and with better notice, could have found another assistant. A simple, I'm sorry, doesn't put the money back into the wallet.

On the last cave trip to our unreported cave, I expressed the possibilities of getting the equipment and doing a photographic survey. Both Bob and Bill, declined so I broached the idea of letting the kids participate. This prompted a question and answer session about the affair and with being able to answer them all it seemed that Bob, Bill and the kids were enthused.

Since I wanted to approach things like a commercial photography shoot, it not only meant a tremendous effort would be needed to move the gear throughout the cave. It would also mean camping in the cave for two days. That was the sticking point.

In time, I was informed by Bob, "We have another caving trip in the works, you'll have about a months' notice." Several months later, I got the telephone call, "Mike, where going caving Friday, be ready by 6:00am."

With my desire of the cave photography to be of commercial quality, I needed at least three very powerful flashes that were lightweight and fit into, its own camera bag. I chose the Sunpak flash system as I could purchase a variety of heads, such as a zoom one, diffuse flash and a ring flash of very close up objects.

I also needed a variety of flash umbrellas and stands, which I chose small, lightweight tripods for. But I had to use custom flash and stand mounts. The local photography suppliers couldn't help me and had to rummage through just about all the New York companies to get it all, in the next day. The equipment set me back another $1,500 but the next day air shipping amounted to $350.00.

For the rest of the week, there was absolutely not a moments sleep as I had to prepare the equipment to successfully go through a caving expedition of crawling though dust and mud, climbing and to keep the amount of fairing trips down to the absolute minimum. Not to mention the specialized camping gear.

By 5:30am, I was packed and ready for the trip with all of my gear outside to be loaded. I waited, and I waited. I was hoping to catch up on sleep during the eight hour trip to the area that we cave in.

It wasn't until about 10:00am that I finally got hold of Bob and all he said was;"Well the caving trip is cancelled. I just bought a new house and don't have any money for the trip."

"I wished that I had more notice, because I had to next day air all of the gear for the photographic survey."

"Well, we decided that we didn't want you to do that anyway. It's just too dangerous for our kids." One sucker punch wasn't enough, now he added one involving a complete lack of faith in me.

My scouting friend Norm pulled one of these also. One park we wanted to revisit was Ricketts Glen State Park in Pennsylvania, which is a winter wonderland with a trail of frozen waterfalls, one topping out at ninety-four feet. He told me he wanted to do a trip and we worked one out. I had all of the camera equipment that I could ever need, but to pull off this shoot would require technical mountaineering gear.

This too was a next day air affair, and I had to buy twice the amount I needed, since I wouldn't expect Norman to purchase his own gear that he would likely never use again. This involved ropes, ice stakes, saws etc. Also snow shoes for the increased pack loads and crampons that are spikes you put on your boots for ice.

He too canceled out at the last minute and it was obvious that his life was changing as well. Though the last few camping trips with Norm, I noticed a calming down of his adventurous spirit and in many areas; I had taken the lead, which I never would have expected with him.

I knew I was a fool for living my life this way, but felt that I had no choice given the considerations. Had other people done what they promised, my portfolio would have been expanded enough to impress the gallery owners or publishers. Though financially brutal on me, I had to give this opportunity in my life the best that I could.

But soon a problem was occurring with the troop itself. One can only be scoutmaster for so long, and so often, to try to keep the troop going, the scoutmaster took that role on for much longer than they agreed upon. Bob the scoutmaster and history buff, had finally found a replacement, Tim.

He was a sort of quirky person who tended to take the opposite direction that you told him, but he was a good guy and we still continued on with our high adventure program; something that I was extremely thankful for.

In 1994 I had just finished up with a rappelling activity when the moms came to camp and informed us that a scout had died while on a canoeing trip with troop 124. The scuttlebutt was they were traveling down Deer Creek and the canoe with the scoutmaster's son, hit a tree that was down in the stream and capsized.

The scoutmaster's son went under the log and washed out, and the adults went to retrieve him. The other scout was told to stay where he was but people felt he panicked and tried to find the boy he thought was under the log drowning and he too, was sucked under, but he didn't wash out from under the log.

The small creek immediately rose and quickly covered the boy up. The adults immediately went to rescue him and also to go for help. They freed the boy, but it was too late, though they revived him a few times, he didn't make it. Among the adults was a paramedic, natural resources police officer and a canoeing/lifesaving instructor and still they failed.

Everyone was upset and felt bad, but my troop decided to put our high adventure programs under scrutiny and make sure they follow scouting policies. They have scouting policies? I immediately did just that and found out just how much common sense played a role with the policies, what I created, matched the scouting policy just about perfectly.

Pretty much, we were right in line, but they continued to hold off my program to see if the lost scout's parents were going to sue. It was fairly positive that they weren't as we were hearing talk that the parents of the lost boy was being supported by the other troop members. But just before the statute of limitations was up, they decided to sue the adults involved, the Baltimore Area Council and Boy Scouts of America.

That not only stopped all of the high adventure activities of the troop, it put the fear of God, or in my opinion the Devil in all of us. Now it was demanded that I demonstrate to the committee just all that I do. Still seeing the value and willing to accept the liability, I agreed to do just that. Bob, the ex-scoutmaster that I went caving with was working harder than ever, but was always around when it came to the high adventure.

He seemingly quit the troop, and now I was forced with providing the burden in buying the gear that he always supplied. I arranged to do the demonstration and the entire committee agreed to show up. I was finally greeted with two members, who informed me that the troop decided to drop all high adventure and didn't want anything that I did, "To get them sued."

I continued camping, but was more or less a bump on the log that went out myself and adventured. I freely made myself available to both the troop and the boys, but was rarely taken up on any offer, except when it came to washing a few dishes.

I seemed to be allowed to do my own activities, unless it involved using my camera, then they found something for me to do. Yet, they were very happy to have my photography in their display case to get more boys to join up. I found out from Bob many years later why he quit the troop.

"Mike, you didn't hear what Nancy said? You know how Tim is, Nancy told him at that committee meeting, 'I don't like the activities Mike and Bob do and don't want our sons to participate in it; nor, the rest of the troop for that matter." I didn't realize that had occurred and afterwards, slowly watched the troop die as we lost many older boys.

I was slowly heading away from scouts; still I could find activities to enjoy and adventures to be had. Steve, a coworker, had a sailboat and though there was always talk about me going, I never seemed to get the invitation. Still we talked about a trip.

He also introduced me to Rita, his sister-in-law. Everyone joked that he had enough of her and wanted to pawn her off on me. I first met her when he started working at the shop, as she had two children and was walking them outside of work with Steve's wife. Well I joked about the women's skinny chicken-like legs, I did have feelings for Rita, but dismissed them as they were fantasies.

Through the years, I learned a lot about Rita including all of the problems; the main one was that she came from an argumentative family. How she had a relationship that created her children and how it was wrecked by drugs and a father that didn't care. The jobs she took on to make ends meet , which didn't appeal to me in a partner that I would like to have, and how dedicated she was towards raising her children.

While things may have clicked on a visceral level, I wanted to marry someone without children, as I sort of waited in hopes of starting a family myself. I heard that occasionally Rita expressed an interest, but declined any invitation to meet her.

I finally made it to Steve's boat, the Moonlighter and did pretty well for not knowing a damn thing about sailing. With a wonderful weekend trip behind us, another trip was on the slate being planned. Not only was Steve there, but Jim from work as well. It was these planning sessions with Steve that I would catch Rita coming and going and chat from time to time. She let it be known, that while she enjoyed Indian food; she didn't enjoy the mention that the food was my dates sloppy seconds afterwards.

I was still not considering to get to know Rita any more than small conversations, though they were positive and the next sailing trip planned was to be a vacation weekend, and we would try to go past the Bay Bridge and to Saint Michael's in Maryland.

With Steve's trips, I could only silently laugh and make a direct comparison of sailing to nature photography. The night before, the tides looked great, but when we were to shove off, the wind was blowing in the opposite direction and we were delayed departing by four hours.

We still made it to our first destination, which was a cove in Rocky Point on Back River, which put us to the mouth opening up to the Chesapeake Bay and even got a few short hours of sleep before setting out to St. Michaels. Unfortunately, under sail, I was the first to need to use the cabin and became horribly seasick.

Being a lifelong scouter, I didn't want to end up that greenhorn, so I jumped back out on deck, but I didn't mention my seasickness until Steve and Jim went into the cabin to make sandwiches for lunch, and became seasick themselves. Soon there were three incapacitated people about passed out on deck and sail boat on autopilot.

We had a couple of good runs, but the choppiness created a bucking bronco situation. When I was on the bow, I watched it drop out from under me by four feet. Things weren't adding up time wise so we turned about and tacked up the bay, considering a new destination an improvement.

After a couple of unexpected adventures like almost getting in a head on collision with another sailboat, fighting with crappers who were worried that our keel grabbed a couple of lines and running aground trying to go left, we landed at Worton Creek, which had a restaurant on the top of the hill above the marina. We were amazed at the psychic abilities of the Matre d as he accurately guessed about our trip. We didn't realize how he knew until we sat down and realized we had our sea legs.

As soon as we sat down, the whole room started rocking back and forth, and we were now getting sea sick on land. That marked the first time in my life that a Manhattan as a drink straightened anything out, but the effect only lasted only a few minutes. It was a great trip and provided me with many opportunities for nature photography.

But with six years and no vacation, the fact that people wanted to buy my works, but not at a reasonable price; I was considering putting down my camera. I understood that things change and even with another trip with Steve and further talk, he eventually sold his sailboat.


My Grandmother finally asked for help around her house as the outside needed some painting and I always admired her for being ninety-one. But it was during the painting that I realized that she wasn't doing as well as she told everyone. The symptoms were adding up to me to be heart failure, which was bolstered as she was falling down as well. I also noticed some edema on her ankles which she said was strain. I felt that she would pass the next spring.

Through the years since my mother had her cardiac arrest, My relationship with my grandmother was awkward and strained, as she wanted me to place Mom in a nursing home close by and I had to keep her where she was. Also, when I supported Dad's marriage, she was so taken aback that he informed me that she was going to leave the house to my mother and her money was transferred over to other family members.

I did talk her out of giving Mom the house, informing her that if she does, it will become the property of the state of Maryland, because Mom was in a nursing home. No matter any misgivings or bad feelings, I stayed out of the money issue, because she was free to do whatever she wanted to with that.

She also informed she changed up powers of attorney, who will come forward should something happen. In early October, she wanted me to go over to her house, and when I was at the back door, for whatever reason, she decided to start walking backwards.

I was screaming for her to stop and struggling to get the key out, when she toppled over. I immediately fumbled through the keys, and got myself in. Though visibly upset, she laughed it off and simply asked for help to get seated in the kitchen chair. Considering she fell across her cane, I tried to get her to stay still as I felt that she had a broken hip.

She became angry, refused the idea of calling 911 and insisted that I help her get seated. I did, which wasn't easy as I had to keep in mind that she had a broken hip. Once seated, she told me to leave, even saying, "I am at my phone now and will call 911 if I have to ... To kick you out of the house!"

I left to hurry home and felt like shit, because I did believe that Grandma had broken her hip. I knew what was holding her together, was her muscles which contracted because of the break, I also knew that it would be a short amount of time this effect would fail and the pain would set in and I planned to go back in a short amount of time. I found myself in a life changing situation and with a broken hip at her age; it was a life threatening condition for her. I was going to get hold of my sister, Cindy to help me.

As soon as I opened the door, the phone was ringing and knew chances were, it was my grandmother. I picked it up and it was my sister, "Hi Mike, how are you doing?"

"I'm doing fine, but I just left Grandma's and she has a broken hip."

"What? You didn't do anything?"

"I tried, but she kicked me out. I was just going to get hold of you to help me."

"I'm going over there right now."

"I figured as much and will meet you there."

The second I put the phone back on the hook, it rang again. This time it was Grandma, "Mike, the kitchen chair is making me uncomfortable and need you to come over to get me to the living room couch." She still insisted that she didn't have a broken hip.

I went over and tried to time it to get there at the same time as my sister. I was a bit early and argued with her to call 911, but she insisted that I put her on the couch and leave. She was very surprised to see Cindy and I figured we will have our way in getting her to the hospital. We called 911 anyway and they were there within minutes.

Still, she refused but with an entire group of people, she was having more trouble saying no. Finally she relented and gave the paramedics permission to treat and transport her. The only reason that she decided to go, was to prove us wrong.

At the hospital, she was happy as a lark, still in the belief that we are wasting her time. For an emergency room visit, she was taken care of in short order. But the increasing problem was the emergency room visit wasn't going to Grandma's plan. The x-ray revealed that she had a clean break on the neck of her femur.

If that didn't cause enough of a problem with Grandma, they did an EKG and the diagnosing printout stated, "Inconclusive, cannot rule out MI;" myocardial Infarction or heart attack in most known terms.

Personally, I didn't believe that one, but it sure made sense and fit in with a person who is having congestive heart failure. This would not only keep her in the hospital for a while, it seemed to put me at odds with everyone; which drove me nuts as I was devoting my time in trying to care for her and her affairs.

This meant that I would be making constant trips back and forth to her house from mine. Steve's sister-in-law, Rita was working on Harford Road just down Grandma's street. I was constantly running into her and started to develop feelings for her. Ironically, both events would hold a relation to each other.

I knew Grandma's situation would be taking up all of the time I could provide, and figured that nature photography would be out of the question and even wondered if I would be eventually giving up my endeavor. With feelings coming on, it seemed that it would be a good time to change up on dreams, not seeing what was to be ahead for me.