Driveway's End

The theme for Wide Wednesday was "something you love," which meant I could have taken a photo just about anywhere around here, because I really do think it's beautiful and get a lot of enjoyment out of the scenery. So I don't exactly know why I went with this shot for my main photo today, except that it felt humorously "meta" and documents a certain slice of my life, which is one reason I'm doing this whole project in the first place. 

So, these are people enjoying the sunset by the marsh near the end of our driveway, which is why I took a photo at this spot back in May before there was anybody around. I stopped to take this particular photo while pulling into my driveway after a little jaunt a few minutes down the road where I was taking my own photos of the sunset over at Mitchell Cove, which I've posted in the extras.

It was much quieter where I was, and safer too. One of the things that can be jarring about scenes like the one above is knowing that for so much of the year people are driving through here at some speed, and you can't tell in the photo, but there is not a lot of visibility on either side of this small bridge. A man was struck by a car and killed at this location some years back, and every Halloween jack-o-lanterns are left on the railing as a sort of memorial to him. So when you come across people strolling across the road and lining up along the guardrail, it betrays a little disconnect between the idealized vision of the area visitors come to experience, and the actual lived experience of people who spend their lives here. 

It's the accumulation of little discrepancies like this that crop up all summer long which makes fall such a relief when it comes. Now when I travel I find myself considering the difference between what I think I'm seeing, versus what might really be there in front of me, which is not always going to be the same thing. 

In short, today's theme should've been "meta" I guess.