On Sunday, October 23, 2005, at 09:53 AM, Shel Belinkoff wrote:
We talked for about twenty minutes - he even asked if my back was
feeling
any better - and then he got a radio call and had to take off.
Several years ago I was driving on a very remote dirt road in Nevada.
That evening there was a really spectacular sunset and I pulled off the
road and set up my tripod to try and catch some of the flaming colors
over the mountains to the west. As I was working, lost in the moment
and image, I heard a vehicle approaching. I looked back to see a big
black SUV with "Moapa Tribal Police" on the door. It worried me when
it pulled in behind my rental car and this giant of a man in uniform
got out. I didn't want to miss the fleeting moments of the sunset so I
kept on taking pictures as he walked over to me.
He said hello, asked what I was doing, and put his hands on his hips
and stretched back and said, "Yep, mighty purty sunset this ev'nin."
We got to talking and it turned out he was just sort of lonely, since
his "beat" was this big area of desert and about all he usually saw in
the evenings were a few coyotes. So I shot my photos until it got too
dark, and we chatted the whole time, and I packed up my gear, we shook
hands, and both of us drove away. Me for my hotel back at Mt.
Charleston, he on the rest of his usual patrol.
My point is that there are a lot of really nice people out there in
uniform. Most of them don't want to harass photographers, or anyone
else.
Bob
