What I need when I take the camera into the upper meadow is an extra pair of eyes, or perhaps several. I can watch the path or the camera or the surroundings, but I can't watch them all at once, as I discovered today while trying to take a photo of the preying mantis that was posing photogenically in a milkweed patch beside the path. I kept my eyes pinned to the mantis while changing lenses and while stooping to get a better angle on the mantis's perky little triangular face, but then the camera bag went rolling down the hill and I looked away for half a second and when I looked back the mantis was gone. But then along came a consolation prize--a lovely big black swallowtail butterfly that shimmered in the sunlight. I started following it with the lens, shifting here and there to get the right angle, my eyes glued to the camera, which is how I finally found myself standing in the middle of a patch of poison ivy. And I didn't even get the shot.
What I need is an entrouage: one person to go ahead of me and clear out the poison ivy, another to stay by my side and carry the camera bag, another to scan the surroundings for photogenic flora and fauna, another to follow behind and pick up whatever I happen to drop. With eight extra eyes, I'd be certain to get some good shots. Of course my entourage would also bring eight extra thumbs that could wander unintentionally into great shots and eight extra feet for me to trip over, and how would I pay all their salaries? They wouldn't have to stop any bullets, but the kind of person who would take the poison ivy for me wouldn't come cheap.
So maybe an entourage is out of the question, but how about a factotum? I've always wanted a factotum, but the species is rare and difficult to spot in the wild. To find one, I'd need an extra pair of eyes--or maybe several.
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