Okay, so every once in a while I google myself. Don’t tell me you haven’t done it before, it’s a natural thing to do.
Anyway, right near the top of the search was a page from the only photo contest I’ve ever entered. In 2000, after returning from a year studying at Trinity College in Dublin, I submitted photos for a photo contest at The Office of International Study at Notre Dame. There were nine categories and I won with this photo for the category called Curiosities.
The photo was taken in Amsterdam in March of 2000. I was walking down one of the main streets in town with my friend Erin and we noticed some commotion. The gentlemen in the tree had chained himself to a branch in protest of the cities decision to cut the trees down in order to widen the road. The police were called in and a fire ladder was used to cut him out while police horses were used to keep the crowd at bay.
Did winning a category have an impact on my career decision… well, I guess it must have somehow.
I would be in the direst of dire straits, facing a bleak future, when some small thing, some detail, would transform itself and appear in my mind in a new light. It would no longer be the small thing it was before, but the most important thing in the world, the thing that would save my life.
Yann Martel, Life of Pi, pg. 139
