Junior's First Ride (or Why I Love My Job.)

As a photographer for a daily newspaper, my assignments run the gamut, from the mundane to the exciting. One job could be a grip-and-grin, the next, a raging fire. You never know when an assignment is going to produce an image that makes you glad to be a newspaper photographer. This image was one that made me feel good.

Every other week, we do a two-page photo story. This week will be one I worked on about the local carnivals. I shot two carnivals last week. The first was the Earleigh Heights Volunteer Firefighters Carnival. I invited my wife Jennifer along to keep me company and get some tasty carnival food. I love pit beef and funnel cakes.

Jennifer and I were walking around when she pointed out a father showing his son the controls of a kiddie ride that they were on. I said that she was right and that would make a good shot for the story, so I started to shoot them on the ride. The child did not look like he was having a good time. He was crying part of the time, but I kept on shooting. He was not crying in all of the shots and I picked one that did not look too bad.

After they got off the ride I introduced myself. I said I was from the paper and asked for their names and the child's age. When the father said eighteen months, I asked if it was his first time on a ride. The father said yes, it was his first ride.

When I got back to the office, the editors wanted one of my images for the next day's paper and I chose that one. I thought how cool it would be the next day when the family got up and opened the paper. They would see junior and his father, on the front page, on the boy's very first carnival ride. Odds are they would go out and buy several copies of that paper, perhaps a print, and save them for the rest of that child's life. They would send copies to family and friends for them to cherish.

I have shot plenty of children, doing plenty of things, in my 12-year career. Many of them better images than this. I am sure that parents have clipped many of my images of their children to save. I think that what makes this one extra special to me is the fact that this was his first carnival ride and I had the privilege of capturing that moment. To me that is the ultimate goal of being a photojournalist, to capture pure moments, such as this.