When I was a child we did the road trip of the west pretty much every year. I've been to Yellowstone National Park more times than I can count and I've probably stopped at every cheap tourist trap between Houston and L.A., and between Phoenix and Seattle. Sounds fabulous now, but not to a child in the 80s with no Nintendo to take along, no portable DVD player and no minivan with plenty of room. Nope we traveled in style in a Ford Escort with a kayak strapped to the roof, sleeping in primitive campgrounds and eating soggy lunch meat and cheese in a can.I was determined to do things right by my kids and provide them with plenty of activities along the way. They were hooked up with D.S. games out the wazoo, DVDs, books, and only the finest junk food HEB had to offer. They had plenty of room to spread out in our spacious minivan and enjoy each other's company. Yeah right.
Times will change but the only thing that stays the same is children will never be happy with being stuck in a car with their parents for 3,000 miles.
Case in point, my father loved fishing. He packed his fishing poles and licenses and studied where all the best fishing spots were along our way. He'd find a fish-worthy stream of water and put everything else on hold while he pulled out that pole and set to work. Fishing, as most of you know, is not much of a spectator sport. Imagine if you will the scene. My daddy in his cowboy hat and fishing vest standing aside a stream in the deepest parts of Yellowstone National Park with his trusty Ford Escort parked nearby, kayak still strapped to the roof, and his wife and three children still sitting inside, waiting patiently (sometimes for hours) for him to decide that this particular stream of water was not the one he'd heard about after all -- where the trout jump out of the water begging you to feed them your game warden-approved bait so they can be humanely released back into the stream. Yes I spent many hours sitting in that car -- not allowed to get out because my mother was certain bears were within shouting distance and if anyone was going to be eaten by a bear, gosh darn-it it wasn't going to be us.
So I swore to not repeat the boredom of the fishing holes with my children. Easy, you might say -- Lisa doesn't like to fish. That's what I thought too. Until Sedona, that is. As I stood behind my tripod, aimed at the setting sun on a cliff overlooking this quaint Arizona town. I looked back at my children, sitting on the rocks, chins resting in their palms, shuffling their feet in the dirt and playing with the pebbles. They were bored out of their minds. Had the camera to them become what was the fishing pole to me? I was stopping an awful lot to shoot little images along the way. How many times had I said "I'll be just a minute." And I usually did take just a minute. I could have shot so much more. I held back, Jayme held back (although not as much as I did).
I put the camera and the tripod in the car and returned to the hotel with my children. I guess history is doomed to repeat itself each generation. No amount of D.S. games and DVDs will cure the boredom of the parental passtime on vacation. Our kids just don't get us. My hope is that they'll some day appreciate the photos I took and the places we saw on this trip.
And as I write this on Father's Day, I can't help but think about all those hours spent watching my daddy fish. He's been gone for a little over 3 years now, and I think I'd pay just about anything to spend a few more hours in that Escort with him in Yellowstone National Park. Watching him cast that line in the water, as the buffalo grazed in the field on the other side.
Lisa On Location Photography
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