DARIN HAYTON

Category: Out and About

  • Imagined Histories

    Imagined Histories

    We work incredibly hard to create remnants of the past that will help us imagine what it was like: think of ghost towns and historic monuments. National and state park systems have developed strict guidelines for how to repair “historic” structures, e.g., what materials can be used for public-facing projects (stuff visitors might see) need to be or seem to be authentic to the period (whereas non-public-facing projects can use modern materials). Valley Forge is filled with such structures — fences, cabins, embankments — maintained to give visitors a sense of history.

    Landscape #220312 is a black and white photograph of a cabin at Valley Forge National Historic Park.
    Landscape #220312

    That stormy March afternoon, the quiet, lonely cabin certainly didn’t help me imagine the history of the place — 244 years earlier I suspect it was a relatively loud and lively camp with perhaps as many as 1,500 cabins and more than 10,000 soldiers scattered around the Valley Forge encampment. This cabin doesn’t help me understand what life was like for the Continental Army, but standing there in the blowing snow and listening to the ice cracking on the tree limbs as they flexed and bent in the wind I was able to conjure up an image, a fiction of what it might be like to live in such a place.

  • Small Red Door

    Small Red Door

    I don’t know why this feed door caught my eye. Maybe it was the contrast between the red door and the white wall — Why did they bother painting the door red? Does the color mean anything or serve any purpose? Seems unlikely. Maybe I was drawn to the traces of use in the worn and chipped paint — How many times has somebody grabbed the handle and opened the door? Why is there a large hole in the bottom?

    #220424.1 A color photograph of a small, red feed door at the local horse farm.
    #220424.1

    I can’t say why I liked this scene. But I did, and that’s reason enough to take a picture. Not every photograph has to mean something profound or has to tell a story.

  • Horse in Profile

    Horse in Profile

    I find something relaxing about taking photographs of horses. There’s no talking and very little effort expended to get them to pose. I tend to watch them for some time, just trying to get a sense of how they are moving in their stalls. I often wonder what they are thinking, as they look out. Sometimes, when they whinny and neigh, I assume they want to go run around with the other horses. Clearly that assumption depends on equating the noises they make with those that I think humans would make when they want out. Sometimes they seem to be restless, but again if I’m being honest I have to admit that I am interpreting their movements as analogous to human actions. Maybe they are perfectly content just gazing out into the fields.

    #220424 black and white photograph of a horse looking out the stable door.
    #220424
  • Late Winter Storm

    Late Winter Storm

    It was a miserable day. Cold and windy, and then cold, windy, and snowy. Stores closed early because the “winter storm warning.” Most people wisely chose to stay home, warm and dry. A perfect day, it seemed to me, to go for a hike. Thick leaden clouds and blowing snow created a sort of post-apocalyptic wasteland of dead trees and empty spaces. There was no palette — everything shaded from black to gray. Nearly every scene was hauntingly beautiful.

    Landscape #220312. A black and white photo of a stand of trees in a snow storm.
    Landscape #220312

    On days like this I am drawn by the sirens’ songs and venture out into the howling winds. The discomfort and physical effort compensated for by the chance to be alone and the opportunity to photograph scenes few other people will experience.

  • Morning by the Sea

    Morning by the Sea

    I struggle to recall the Before Times when I could stop into the local donut shop and get a cup of coffee and warm my hands before heading back out to enjoy the last bit of darkness. Social distancing comes naturally to me. I have always needed to be alone. Not every day, perhaps, but regularly. That morning before the town had risen and before the fishermen climbed onto boats, I spent the last hours of night wandering the docks. A gentle lapping sound of the water against the pylons, the creaking and stretching of ropes tied around cleats, and my footsteps on the wooden piers.

    Urban #181230.1. A photograph of a boat docked in the predawn gloom.
    Urban #181230.1

    I watch as the eastern sky brightens and think, soon these docks will be bustling with locals and tourists. It was the middle of winter, so probably more locals than tourists that time of year.

    Urban #181230.2. A photograph of a boat docked in the predawn gloom.
    Urban #181230.2

    I have never developed a fondness for the coast and the little towns that cling to the shore, too busy and crowded. But that morning, sitting on a bench on that pier, I understood why so many people do like these towns. They are lovely and can, at the right time of day, be peaceful.

    Looking at these photos reminds me of a time when being alone was a choice, a time of day or a place. They also remind me of not being alone, of walking away from the docks and back to have breakfast with my family.

  • Silhouette of a Horse

    Silhouette of a Horse

    A chance to spend another hour or so at Ashford Farms, a local stable, gave me the chance to take some more photos of the horses. Many of the horses were in their stables, so I tried to make the best of the strong lighting contrast. Silhouettes seemed like a good way to go. A few turned out ok. Here’s one:

    Silhouette of a horse at Ashford Farms.
    #211009
  • Can’t See the Forest

    Can’t See the Forest

    Standing here looking west, it’s easy to lose yourself in thick forest of trees. There is no path leading forward. No obvious way to the far side, if indeed there is a far side. Although the sun shines somewhere overhead, here under the canopy of branches and leaves a diffuse light seems to permeate the scene. I pause for a moment to enjoy the solitude and to imagine I’m on the edge of some vast unknown.

    A particularly wooded section of campus.

    Then the pneumatic hammer begins pounding, so close it startles me. I am not, alas, in the middle of some ancient forest but a scant few feet from a construction project. Men running jack hammers and excavating the existing parking lot presumably to replace it with a new one. I turn around and watch the workmen for a few minutes, lament the intrusion of civilization, and then head down the nature trail toward my office where, if I’m lucky, it will be quieter.

  • Horse portraits

    Horse portraits

    On a recent Saturday at the local stables I dawdled around taking photos of the horses. They were so cooperative, extending their heads and looking right at me.

    #210818.1

    It was a lovely day, and a pleasant way to spend a few minutes. I have no idea if the horses cared, they didn’t say one way or another. But I had fun and came away with a handful of striking portaits.

    #210818.2
  • Looking at the sand

    Looking at the sand

    On the beach that morning a couple walked through the water, a group of young people splayed out across the blankets where they had spent the night, and a handful of fishermen were baiting hooks and casting. The sun would come up in about 10 minutes. I scanned the horizon for the beautiful morning scene to capture with my camera. Soon that bright orange ball of fire would float slowing higher in the sky casting its warm light across the sea foam and the glistening sand. Sand.

    A photo of diamond patterns in the sand along the New Jersey coast.
    #210613.1

    In the sand were the most amazing patterns that reminded me of herringbone cloth and patterned fabrics from the early 20th century.

    A photo of diamond patterns in the sand along the New Jersey coast.
    #210613.2

    For the next hour or so I wandered the beach just looking for patterns in the sand. Triangles and diamonds played out across the wet sand. No doubt somebody could tell me how these patters are formed, but I don’t need to know. Just watching them shift and change in subtle ways was enough for me.

    A photo of diamond patterns slanting up to the left in the sand along the New Jersey coast.
    #210613.3

    I lost myself that morning in those patterns. The sunrise was, I am sure, lovely. The national bird sanctuary? No doubt filled with birds. At some point the young people picked up their stuff and headed home, as did the fishermen with tales of the big one that got away. I left with images, photographic and mental, of the sand.

  • Walk out to Winter

    Walk out to Winter

    Snow still covers the ground, lays piled by the sides of roads, and blocks the sidewalks. Ice covers the pond. This morning the world is still monochrome. But not for long.

    #210227.1

    Fog rises from the melting snow, growing thicker as the morning warms. At first the world seemed to be a circle of visibility moving along with me as I walked, no more than a few hundred yards across. But soon even that contracted. Shapes fading into existence as I approached gained faint color and texture only at the last minute, when I could nearly touch them. They lost both color and texture as they receded behind me before quickly dissolving into the whiteness.

    #210227.2

    A world shrouded in fog is a magical place, full of surprises and unknowns. You can neither see nor hear clearly — the fog seems to dampen noise as much as it obscures sight. The noises that do penetrate unsettle and unnerve because they seem to come from everywhere and nowhere at once. Every now and then, a tree with the remnants of last year’s leaves clinging to its branches emerged from the fog, water dripping from its leaves glowing golden brown against the milky scene.

    #210227.3

    Mornings like this happen rarely around here, once or twice a year. I feel sorry for all the people who missed this one, but am glad they didn’t invade my enjoyment of it.