MACKINAC ATTACK

A McCheeseburger and a shot of carbonated caffeine resting on the vehicle’s picnic platform, I steer down a secret byway known mostly to the local saints of Ignace.  The point of driving on LaBarbe is that eventually a vista of the Mighty Mac appears in the windshield that's like having side-stage tickets at a Rolling Stones Concert.  Not that I’ve ever had any tickets to a Stones concert.

As the twin pinnacles of the beautiful structure rise gracefully out of the Straits, I instinctively reach for the camera.  I must capture this on film or its digital equivalent. 


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Randon tourist child under bridge. 
Not Pte. LaBarbe view--that's secret.!!

“Darn”

No camera.

I feel a compulsion to stop—I’m cruising for a good spot in between the tall weeds at roadside.   My hands grasp at empty space and my heart is bereft that I can’t capture this view. 

“Get a grip”  The voice of reason intones.

This view will still be here later today, tomorrow, and probably even next week.  At home, in cyber and paper collections, I have zillions of shots of the Mackinac Bridge.  I don’t need another.

“Steer away from the bridge.”  The voice of reason chants.

Before tearing myself away from the scene, I take a deep breath and revel in my special view of the silvery bridge rising out of the mist.

Photos of the bridge’s 54-year lifespan plus oddities of the five-year construction phase would fill a gallery stretching the whole length of I-75.  Better photographers than I have been sucked into this compulsion.  Maybe there’s a support group.

Or maybe I’ll come back by with my camera this afternoon to get just one more shot of the iron mistress of Michigan.

--Sireen