Anglin Lake

For my first post, I thought that I would start with explaining my choice of background for the blog.
As of september first 2011, I have been in Saskatchewan for one year. More precisely, I have been in its capital, Regina. As impressive as the Plains are they don't feel like home. I come from a region in Quebec that is full of small mountains. Each mountain is covered with majestic trees. I never feel better than when I am in a forest. I simply love trees. In my childhood, I have spent hours at a time observing the thick bark of a tree.
This summer I was lucky enough to become friend with a young singer who was raised in the same region than me but whose parents are originally from Saskatchewan. His father's side of the family owns a farm near Willow Bunch. In this way I had the privilege of exploring "the land of the coulees" like his family calls it. It is a very beautiful land. I like what Connie Kaldor wrote about this specific region in her song A Long, Long way: "where the trees aren't majestic, they leave that to the sky." I think that it is a very fitting description. All this to say that despite of how much I liked that place, it didn't bring that feeling of home, the feeling of being where you should be.
That same friend also has family at Anglin Lake. This is a lake about an hour north of the city of  Prince-Albert. We went there at the end of the summer. And there they were... the trees. I was overjoyed to walk in between them and to smell their bark.  I told my friend how happy I was to be around trees but that they didn't have the same beauty and majesty than those in Quebec.
During a walk we came where that background picture was taken. I tried to take a picture. I will be honest, my attempts did not look good. I was annoyed. I have that problem ever since I came to Saskatchewan. My landscapes look awful. This is the first time that happens to me. I love photography and have always been proud of my results. So far in Saskatchewan I concentrated my efforts on portraits because landscapes just didn't work.
Seeing my frustration, my friend simply said: "Why don't you change your perspective. Sometimes that's all it takes." I listened to his advice and at the cost of getting wet I lied down on the dock and took a picture. That is the one I chose for my blog. Changing perspective just suddenly made everything in the landscape work.
I realized that maybe it is not only with photography that I have to change my perspective to make things work. Anglin Lake has taught me to accept my presence in Saskatchewan's landscapes.