Resilience
The cold weather and snow have put a damper on my outdoor activities for the last six weeks. And I've had to hang around the house while we had our master bathroom renovated. So I haven't been outside photographing much since the last blog post.
While I've been stuck inside, I have been updating the Ocean City NJ Gallery on my website (check it out at the link). The gallery has images spanning twelve years and I thought I would use this month's post to share one of my favorite photos ever - the 59th Street Pier from OCNJ.
Over the years the pier has been a favorite subject of mine. I’d go to the old abandoned pier in different seasons and different weather - whenever we visited OCNJ - and it was always there, always the same. I'd get up early and spend a few hours there before our beach activities for the day. On the day I made the image above, the light was incredible. It started off very cloudy, but as the morning grew later, the clouds thinned, the sun started to peek out, and the water seemed to glow with the light.
It’s a good lesson in making time to observe and photograph special places that interest you, since things change over time and nothing lasts forever. The pier was built in 1913 and stood up to many challenges over its one hundred years. I made this photo almost ten years ago in 2011, only four years before the old pier was completely washed away when Hurricane Sandy came ashore. But while it no longer physically exists, I'll remember the many mornings I spent at the pier and it will exist in photographs and memories.