Back in 1990 my parents took me and my twin on a trip to the west coast. We flew into the San Francisco area and then planned to drive down through yellow stone, visit Las Vegas, and end up in Phoenix to fly home to the Buffalo area. We actually got to see a lot of interesting sites such as the large sequoia trees, half dome, borax mines, bad water (lowest point in the continental USA), experience 120 degrees in the desert, the lights and sounds of Vegas, and much, much more.

While visiting with our uncle Paul, I had one of my most memorable experiences. We went to see the Golden Gate Bridge and Pier 49. While on the Pier we did a lot of fun things. My uncle and I went onto the Bounty, no one else wanted to for some odd reason. Then my mom and I went off and found this gentleman with this cute little dog dressed up as a pirate.

For the low price of a dollar you too could have the dog sit on your shoulder and even take your picture. My mom agreed that I could do this, so I handed her my camera and the gentleman the dollar.

Once perched on my shoulder the dog started to growl in my ear. The man informed me that he just growls and would not bite. I actually was not worried about this miniature dog biting me, but when I looked at my mom with the camera, she was holding it backwards.

If you look the wrong way through a camera view it magnifies the things you look at. Now I have my mom backing away from me, trying to get me to fit into the view. As I watch her doing this I am very conscious of the dog and the fact that I find my mommy struggling to back far enough away to fit all of me into the view as quite hilarious. This seemed to be an impossible situation because I wanted to bend over into a belly splitting fit of laughter, which would then drop the poor little pirate dog.

All this time the dog’s owner is still reassuring me that the dog will not bite, probably unable to interpret the look on my face. When he finally looked at my mom I think he realized that I was trying hard not to laugh. He then was able to tell my mom to turn the camera around.

Luckily, or maybe not so luckily, the shutter was still closed. This meant that my mom could not accidentally take a close up photo of her face, but it also meant that my problem was not yet solved. Now instead of backing away to try and fit me into the view, my mom can not figure out why the camera will not let her snap the picture.

I was finally able to control myself enough to tell her to open the shutter. As I watched all the other passers-by looking at us, I could only imagine what we all looked like, especially me with the growling pirate dog on my shoulder. I must admit, it is one of the best pictures I have ever had taken of me though, with one huge, genuine smile.