rose colored glasses

Sometimes I make it too difficult, too complex

     Sometimes a circle is a circle.  I forget that.  I tend to make something relatively easy, into something relatively hard.
     When I was in photo class at NIU I had an assignment to create a picture board of 6-8 photos.
     That meant I had to take the pictures, develop the film, size and print the pictures.
      I opted to take a trip to Lincoln Park Zoo.  So over spring break, I took my (actually NIU's camera... a 2 and 1/4 by 2 and 1/4 Yashica D...heck of a camera) to the zoo and spent the day taking pictures.
     I took pictures of animals, kids with cotton candy, a juggler, statues, and a homeless man sleeping on a bench.
      He was a symbol, that even in the greatest nation in the world, and the greatest city in the world, there were still people below the fringe.
      Back at NIU, I went to work, under the watchful eyes of Halle Hamilton.  A great teacher, he never gave an answer.  But he guided you, by questioning you, so that you would reach a solution.
     All went well until I printed the picture of the man on the bench.  There was a smudge in the middle of the picture.
     I did everything I was taught....I dodged (fun little technique where you waved a piece of paper or something over the area of the picture you may want lighter).  The blur was still there.  I thought it might be a light leak, but no, the room was dark.  The negative had the smudge, so I washed it again.
      I spent at least an hour on that one print.  No matter what I did, that smudge would not go away.
      I went over to Halle  and slumped in the chair in front of his desk.  He looked at me and said,
"Dickow, what's the problem.  You look down."
      I showed him the print, told him everything I had done, explained the smudge was not on any other negative, and I was lost.
      He put his pipe in his mouth and nodded.
      "Was it sunny?" he asked.
       Obviously not, I thought, but I said no, it was cloudy.
      "Just cloudy?  What other weather was happening?"
        I thought for a few seconds, then I remembered.  I told him it was foggy.
       "Foggy.  Where did you take these pictures?"
       Lincoln Park Zoo, I replied.
       "Where's that at?" he asked, still with his pipe in hand.
       I knew he knew all the answers.  I could not see where he was going.
       In Chicago.  Near downtown.  I told him the obvious.
      "Huh......are there tall buildings downtown?" he asked, grinning.
       I looked at the picture.
       Oh damn, I said, that's a building in the fog!
       He smiled.  "No matter what you do, that building isn't going away."
       Then he added, "That's what you get when you look at the world through rose colored glasses."
       I bet 15 years passed before I saw him again.  It was at a journalist of the year banquet at NIU, the first and only one I went to.  He was being honored.
       I went up to him and said, "Hello, Dr. Hamilton.  Remember me?
       He gave his gentle, knowing smile and said, "Terry Dickow.  Still looking at the world through rose colored glasses?"
      The last time I saw him was in a grocery store in DeKalb.....probably 30 years after I was in his class.  He still remembered my name.
      He had the uncanny talent of teaching through discovery and thought.  He remembered people, and names.
      I thought of him today when I got my NIU alumni magazine.
     He was listed in the in memoriam section, having died last December.  He was 89.
     I wish I had taken the time to look him up in the last five or six years, just to say thank you.
     So, thanks Halle for all you did for me and hundreds of other j students at NIU.  Rest in Peace, friend.