apparition

This winter has been so unusually mild thanks to El Nino. One of the benefits was that I was able to meet some photographer friends old and new for some fun and photo walking in downtown Chicago – in January! Normally we’d be hibernating under snow in subzero temps and waiting for spring until our next photo safari adventure. But this particular day was partly sunny and in the 30’s, which to us was good enough to give it a go. Warm enough to hit the pavement and take some photographs anyhow, dodging into buildings whenever we got cold.

So as I’m in my own little world, shooting down at a puddle in an alley…I popped up to change my lens, and got startled by this woman who walked right past us in the alley. There really is no reason I can think of why she’d be walking down into this alley, and she was such a striking figure, very tall, older, and dressed head to toe in black. It was as if the photography gods told her to walk down the alley just for me. I had my Lensbaby on my camera and it’s a finicky, manually focusing lens. I tried to adjust it and focus as fast as I could to capture her as she walked away off into nowhere. I’m still not convinced she was real 😉

The aforementioned puddle: