One peg at a time...

Alright, picture it:
A giant mountain in the middle of a big city. Two novice mountain climbers dangerously trying to scale it's hilly side. They come in search of great photos, and with their feet clad solely in cheap sneakers and orthopedic insoles they almost find it, until one of them suddenly asks the other,
"Hey, can you get filters on your camera?"
Head held high, the other, self confessed, 'more experienced' one, confidently states, "no, I can't. It is your newer model camera that has that feature, but my slightly older model does not."
To which the first one replies, "Uh,.. have you read your camera manuel lately... or ever?"

Now, I wish I could tell you that this little parable was just that, a parable, a complete work of fiction but, sadly, I can not.
This was my very own experience a few weeks ago. Imagine me standing on top of a mountain with a freind ready for a day of shooting when this little question popped up into his head. And even more sad, this was not the first time that this question was put to me. About two months before I had another friend ask me the same question and I, very confidently, gave the same answer!
When I first got my camera I remember reading every page of my manuel but I just don't remember reading this page. I don't know how that could have happened!? My only explination is that there is some sort of black hole between it's pages that even the scientist at NASA haven't discovered yet! I could be sitting on a Nobel wining gold-mine here!!!

That aside,the whole experience was a little more than humbling, to say the least.. I thought that I knew quite a bit about photography. I thought that I had come farther than this in my photographic career, that I was smarter than tripping over these tiny, little hiccups.
But, no, it's clear that I'm not, and I haven't.
The sting from this experience has not gone away as yet, and I doubt that it will anytime soon. Oh, it may have lessened a tad, but I feel that it's true purpose is to always be there to remind me that I am not bigger than my whole. I don't always know everything. There is always room to go back and relearn.
Humility... it's a funny thing.. it's always teaching..

Did I mention that I also have a tone feature on my camera?
Sepia, purple, green, and blue. They are displayed here in that exact order.