“Let me take your picture”

November 30, 2017 on 7:14 pm by Michael Grey | In Humour, Photographs, Pipe Bands, Stories | Comments Off on “Let me take your picture”

Here’s a classic example of one of those forced picture-taking moments (FPTMs). It’s not often anything good comes of it (see exhibit A below). Here, with my eldest sister, Jane (Campbell) is the 17 year-old me in my 48th Highlanders of Canada number ones (minus feather bonnet but still, with impressive head of hair, I must say … in those days it was always said to the barber, “just thin it out”).

I can hear my mum now saying, “let me take your picture” (see number ones) and, this time, my sister dragged in for posterity. Posterity: me posting this on a blog in 2017. But then, I flatter my bekilted, big-haired self. It could’ve been that my mum (or dad – but that’s unlikely. He never said, “let me take your picture”. If he wanted a picture, he took it) who was keen to have a photo of Jane and her fancy new boots and pre-Prince, Purple Rain jacket. Maybe it was me who was the random tartan photo bomb. It doesn’t matter. Look at the faces. They tell it all: take the effing picture … “this is sooo boring”.

As I rattle this out it comes to me that the very best picture-taker I know of FPTMs is Cape Breton’s Ryan MacDonald. Now there’s a photographer. With no disrespect meant to Joan Grey.

M.