The Anxiety of Evidence

An unsubstantiated experience can be a good thing.

In taking up photography—focusing on birds—I have in a sense cursed myself. I have hobbled my ability to enjoy birds without documenting them.

I don’t photograph every bird I see, and it is lucky that people in my life keep me in check. Watching a red-breasted merganser fly low over a tranquil pond, its mirror-image duplicated on the placid, sunlit water…