Hurry up and wait

My grandmother was always good at summing up tenets of life into little phrases or sayings and one of her favorites — and one that she lived by — was "Hurry up and wait."
I remember first hearing this when I was maybe 10 or so when we were getting ready to be picked up to go somewhere by a family member. The person wasn't to arrive for another 20 minutes, yet there we were in the living room, ready and waiting. The idea behind "Hurry up and wait" was that you were prepared ahead of time for something in case it or they arrives earlier than you expected, you were ready. This also works for people or things arriving later than you originally though. This is kind of like the Boy Scout motto of "Be prepared," which also has also made an impression on my shooting mindset, but I'll get into that at another time.
Last Tuesday the Lady Washington, a replica tall ship, was to arrive at the Port of Ilwaco for the start of their now annual Nautical Rennaisance week. It was to be met by the Chinook Indian tribe in their canoes at the mouth of Baker Bay to greet them and perform a reenactment of historical trades between Native Americans and sailing ships from hundreds of years ago. I decided to get there around 1:30 pm, still plenty of time before things were really suposed to get going at 2 pm. Around 75 people were on hand for the event. Tribal drummers were drumming and handing out gifts of beaded necklaces and small trees. Soon enough 2 pm arrived — the time the reenactment was supposed to start — and no sign of the boats. 2:30 came and went, still no boats. A man wearing replica captains gear came walking up and he was quickly drafted by State Parks Ranger Aaron Webster to speak and tell stories to the evermore impatient crowd.



FInally the boats arrived at a couple minutes after 3 pm. I had gone through about half a bag of David's sunflower seeds, but I had also gotten a chance to look around a bit. I was originally going to just shoot from above, on the viewing platform at the park but after a closer look around (hey, I had the time) I found a rocky area below there that was right on water level, allowing me a better vantage of the trade reenactment.



The extra time also got my mind wondering where else may be a good place to view the ship as it sailed into port. From up on the road I found a nice grouping of tree branches that created an interesting border that the ship was travleing through. I really wanted to find something different this year from an event that I've now shot three years in a row.

By hurrying up and waiting, I think I got what I was looking for.



-DKM