Moon over Yates Mill Pond Park

Sometime pre-2012, in the middle of the new millennium’s first decade, while I was still living in Indianapolis (and working full time), I was out for a very early morning run through Garfield Park, which was very close to where my house was. 

And on the tail end of the run, as I was climbing the hill on Pagoda Drive, I noticed off to my right that the moon was perched perfectly over the campus of Emmerich Manual High School, which sat on the park’s western border. The visual excited me, and for 30 seconds, I gave thought to sprinting home, grabbing my DSLR camera (I did not have a cell phone at that time), and running back to capture pictures. I even quickly came up with an alliterative headline on the blog post bearing the resulting photos: Moon over Manual.  

I was deterred, however, by the thought of possibly missing the moment in the time it would take me to run home and run back. But I also worried that doing so would make me late for work. 

So instead of throwing caution to the wind, I sighed and told myself I would get it the next time it happened. 

As you might guess, there was no next time. 

I later did some Internet research to try and learn how often the moon could land in the exact same visual position like I had seen that morning. And the response was demoralizing. Today, I don’t remember exactly what the answer was, but it basically foretold that years of waiting would be involved. 

On Aug. 31, when I arrived at Yates Mill Pond Park for my regular walk, I had my iPhone with me ... and an angel nudging me in the form of the man you see in the lower right corner of the photo leading off this post. 

I wasn’t looking up at the sky as I made my way down the main boardwalk over the pond, taking pictures of reflections on the perfectly still pond. But the man saw I was a picture-taker and directed my attention to the placement of the moon right over the short overhang on the boardwalk. I looked up, and there it was. I took three pictures integrating the moon into the landscape (the two others are the first two photos below). Below those are the reflection shots.

Twelve days later, on Sept. 11, I was again in the park for my walk and nearing an end when I came across the striking colors on a tree growing from the pond (first photo below). I took the other pictures closer to the tree. I wasn’t as impressed with those, but ... for the sake of wrapping up the story, I present them here, too.

Check out my traveling photographer blog, Travelin’ Shutterbug