How do we measure value?

Several days ago getting out of the car to go in the house my hands and arms were full of books, lunch bag, PDA, water bottle, notes, mug and camera. This is not all that unusual as after an hour commute even having to make 2 trips back the 25 feet to the garage to bring things in seems like too much. Sometimes, though not often, something drops and I end up putting everything down on the other car to again get everything balanced and still have a couple of fingers available to open the door to the house. Hey, we all have are quirks. Balancing as many things as I can carry is one of mine.

On this one day it was my camera that slipped and crashed down hitting this two inch concrete strip at the base of the door. CRAP.

As I have written many times this camera is a cheap one, one of many bargains I have found along the way. It usually lives in my car or pocket and, as you’ve seen, I take pictures of whatever grabs me- even if it’s a view at 70mph (I never take my eyes off the road and just point the camera in the direction and click many times. The end product when I get home and upload (cheap cameras don’t have view screens) are sometimes interesting, great, blurred in some interesting way or just ready for the delete button. The pure joy of digital – no cost of processed film to feel guilty about deleting and starting over. But where was I going with this?

Quickly checking the camera out after dinner nothing rattled differently than before but no lights came on. It was dead! My initial reaction was sadness. This very basic thing had become an outlet for a new form of creativity, an opportunity to play with a different art form and be free of making mistakes. Plus I have to say that I like the challenges of having to work with such a basic camera and accompanying editing software that really only lets you crop the photo but not touch it up or manipulate it. My second reaction was to put it away until I had time to think about it and figure out how it worked while at the same time scanning e-bay for something similar.

For the next few days, picking it up and putting it down, I pulled the batteries out to understand more how it worked, which is extremely basic. The button pushes down and makes contact with the batteries and activates the shutter. That’s it. So playing with the switch and pulling out the batteries and recharging them (this thing eats up batteries which is why I bought a set of rechargeable ones) and the light when on. Adjusting the contacts on the inside, the shot counter lit up. YEAH!!

So it works again. The touch of the button is different (from me playing with the contacts and it will take some readjusting of me to get used to how long I hold the button down to wake the thing up and then to get the flash on and then to click a picture. But one the first pictures out of it is this one and it made me smile.

So what is the purpose of this entry other than to ramble? Easy!

My camera has become a creative extension to me even though it was cheap and is so very basic. That really doesn’t matter because when I play with the pictures and add words to them, it gives me happiness.

We all seem to juggle and pile on so many things in life that occasionally something very basic that we have come to rely on or enjoy falls off the pile and crashes. When it does it makes us almost as sad as if it was something more important or expensive. And then there is tenacity in not just giving up and tossing something aside because it was cheap and is basic.

Value is measured in so many different ways and some of the most valuable things to us cost the least.