Our current state of humanity paranoia – I returned on Easter Sunday to a more populated Singer Park carnival with the intention of getting what I had sought after on a previous visit, a series of photographs. Though I didn't get the series which I would have proudly displayed for anyone that would see them, I learned something about the fears that our society is suffering from due to terrorism and other equally atrocious crimes on many peoples minds these days.

As I walked through the grounds, or more accurately. parking lot, where this temporary carnival had set it's vagabond roots, I couldn't help but feel I wasn't exactly welcomed with open arms. Since I am a 40 something male walking alone with only a camera in hand stopping at every ride to snap a few shots, I sensed some discomfort on the faces of passers by. Who is this person? Where are his kids and wife? Why is he taking pictures of my kids? Should I be concerned? At least this is what I perceived they were thinking based solely on there outward expressions. Of course not everyone seemed to me to feel this way, but there were certainly a few.

Now, being a photographer, I truly wanted to get some usable images from this excursion. Anyone that is a photographer or knows one can vouch for me when I say sometimes it's best to shoot multiple images of the same subject in order to guarantee or at least improve the chances of getting a single photograph worth keeping. So with that in mind, I walked over every inch of the carnival grounds several times looking for that illusive image as I photographed each ride.

After several complete passes around the carnival grounds, I found myself once again at the kitty dragon roller coaster. I was hoping there would be several kids riding this attraction, but there only seemed to be one or two, if any, each time I passed by. This time there were two kids onboard, and getting impatient I positioned myself at one end of the track looking through the viewfinder of my camera and attempted to compose my image. At this point, the young 20 something carnival ride operator yelled over at me asking what I was doing. I shouted back... "taking pictures, thinking to myself, what the hell else stupid... see the camera in my hands". Then he kept talking to me, though I couldn't hear him over the loud noise of the engine which powered this ride, I signaled that I couldn't hear what he was saying and walked over to him to get the scoop. He asked again, "what are you doing". So I told him, "taking pictures... I'm a photographer". He then said why was I standing by the motor taking pictures, (thinking to myself as he was speaking, is he thinking I'm scoping out the ride in order to plant a bomb at a later time?), and I responded, "I'm taking pictures of the ride and focusing on and composing my image, showing him the LCD screen on my digital camera while I was speaking, hoping he could comprehend the process of taking photographs. He had a blank stare on his face and I promptly got impatient with him and said, " look... I'm just taking pictures, and perhaps you may appear in one of them on my website tomorrow". Well, that did it, and he shut up returning to his carnival duties appearing somewhat unsatisfied with my response, though giving up on his misguided quest of exposing someone who in his mind could do harm to his dragon roller coaster amusement ride. As I walked away I thought of many responses I could have said (I won't mention them here) that might have pissed him off even further purely to put him in his place for suspecting me to be someone that would cause such harm to others. I mean, who is this guy to question me about my presence at this carnival that he is only an employee of. But then I realized he is just a symptom of this paranoid society we live in and he probably thought he was doing some good by showing me he wasn't going to stand for a "suspicious" (in his mind) looking person taking pictures of his carnival ride.

So... I learned a few things today. And in response, I will try to be more sympathetic toward encounters with people who are acting out of fear. Perhaps I'll get a tee-shirt printed up with the words "photographer at large" along with my web site address. Then I can point to my chest and say, "look me up... pal".

I also discovered the approach I am going to take next time in hopes of getting the type of photographs I am wanting to capture at a carnival. Stay tuned!

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