Is a Photo Worth Your Life?

The Interrupted Fern that nearly interrupted my life.

Yellow Iris

Indian Paintbrush

Dwarf Iris

Iron tainted stream

The wife and I were out photographing wildflowers this afternoon. I see Interrupted Fern on a road bank and want to add it to the count for this year, but there are ditches on either side of the road. We drove about 50 yards down and pulled into a driveway, far enough so that the back of the truck was not sticking out into the road.



Kris stays in the truck as I walk down to get the picture. On the walk back here is a man screaming at my wife in the driveway, dropping lots of f-bombs. I get to the truck and he starts screaming at me, "You're trespassing. Didn't you see the no trespassing sign?"


I tell Kris to get in the truck, and tell the man I will get my truck out of his driveway. "You're not going anywhere," he shouts as he pulls out a gun from under his sweatshirt.


"Kris get in the truck."
"I'll shoot out your f-in tires if you try to leave."


Kris gets in the truck, I get in the truck and I start the engine. He stands directly behind my truck and calls the sheriff. I start to back-up. He doesn't move. I wait. I now call 9-1-1. He is still waving his gun around. After a couple minutes he steps to the side and I back out onto the road. "You're not going anywhere!" he shouts as he tries to get back behind the truck.


I drive down the road about 50 yards, next to the Interrupted Fern, and pull off. 9-1-1 tells me to sit and wait for sheriff. My truck is sitting halfway in the road on the side of a hill. Not the most comforting place to be. I keep the truck running in case the guy starts walking toward us. Soon two sheriff's deputies and a state parks cop shows up. As the state parks cop starts walking down to the now infamous driveway, the man tosses his gun into the weeds and walks down to meet the cop. The cop then pushes the guy up against the guard rail and frisks the him.


When it was all said and done, the man walks down to my truck, introduces himself, apologizes and shakes my hand. He does the same with Kris. My wife invites him to our church (glad I don't have to compete with her to get into heaven!). I explain that I am a Methodist pastor and the man looks genuinely embarrassed and walks back to his driveway.


As I reflect on that chain of events I come to the conclusion that the fear-mongering in this country HAS TO END! Not everybody is a bad guy, yet there is this movement in our nation to assume everyone is. "I'm going to defend my property!" From people taking pictures of wildflowers on public right-of-way? This gun extremism saturating our nation about got me killed today. Just think, what if I had a gun, and had the same extremist mentality as this guy had? There would be two dead people laying at the side of Big Pine Road right now. All because someone pulled into the end of a driveway to take a picture of a fern.


Earlier in the day though, we did have some very exciting wildflower finds (some while parked in people's driveways!). Two different irises; Yellow Iris in a swampy section of OH56 near Carbondale, and Dwarf Iris at Ash Cave. Also saw some very striking Indian Paintbrush along SR56, a few miles east of Ash Cave. Also saw Doll's Eyes at Ash Cave.


I wanted to include a picture of the stream that runs parallel to OH56. The color of the water is not caused by mud. It is caused by iron in the water, a common problem throughout the Appalachian region of Ohio. I had a cousin once who showed me his water filtration system. The filter was bright orange. When he bought the filter it was white. The iron content of his water had stained the filter that color. Despite being a land that is plentiful with water, not all of the water is fit for use.