Memories are Made of This

Portrait of photographer and dog

They say that human memories are tied to smells and sounds. Many of us are immediately transported back to Mother's kitchen at the smell of turkey baking in the oven, or back years before to the first time we heard Bridge Over Troubled Waters.

Photographers and painters are also visually hardwired. When I go back though my images looking for that perfect photo I want to print up for a show I immediately remember the place and who I was with and a whole cascade of memories associated with that particular photographic trip.

The wall without my sister

The photo above is my favorite out of a series I took on the 23rd of December at the Ring Ranch on the Valle Vidal. It was cold and we took the mile walk with the wind and through snow sometimes almost a foot deep in places. And every time I look at it I feel the wind and see my sister standing before the corrugated metal shed.

Locked up?

Even a complex series of locks and chains around old posts strung with wire easily cut reminds me of a morning spent at the Maxwell National Wildlife Refuge with my photographer sister and our three dogs. I do not have to have taken the picture of the dogs to remember them and their antics.

Tree with a View

Those dogs had to be on a leash if out and before this picture was taken my sister and I tried to get them on leashes and out of the car and cameras in hands to take a walk along a pond on the refuge. They got us so tangled up! We broke down in hysterical laughter, cameras forgotten but clutched tightly. No doubt we scared all the birds away. But it was us adults that were not quiet. Our dogs do not bark or chase. They have been with their photographer owners enough to know all about those things.

Here's Looking at You

So when we drove by this deer in one of the wooded areas they were totally silent as I took this picture. Or the one below.

Buffalo Bull on the Vermejo Park Ranch

So very many pictures and so very many memories. May you and yours share wonderful memories this holiday whether your record them in sounds, smells or pictures.