The Story Behind the Photos

On the morning of Saturday, May 12, 2007, I was in my kitchen eating breakfast. The window in the upper-level kitchen looks out onto overgrown, undeveloped property to the east of my lot (away from the ocean view side). My lot line has become (or probably was before the house was even built) a path for wildlife that ventures out of the undeveloped land (which goes on for miles into the hills). By far the most common sightings are deer, but I've also seen foxes and the resident squirrels (new to this area) and rabbits. Raccoons own the night, and I hear coyotes nearby from time to time.

On this Saturday morning, I happened to see movement out of the corner of my eye. It was the bobcat strolling slowly along that path. I've seen bobcats on only very rare occasions in the more than 20 years I've lived here, so each sighting is very exciting.

As this cat made its way along the path past my house, it caught a glimpse of its reflection in a lower level window. Because the ridge where the path is located rises away from the house, he was looking at the very top of the downstairs window. He was initially startled enough to stop dead in his tracks, just like a kitten who sees its first reflection in a household mirror. Next came what I can only assume was a threat assessment. More curious than hostile, the bobcat observed, advanced slightly, retreated, and so on.

I so much wanted to capture this encounter, but my camera was downstairs. I feared that in the time it took me to get the camera and get back upstairs, my little friend will have moved on. But, I took the chance and ran for my trusty Sony F-707, trying to avoid making boom-boom noises that might frighten the cat.

A bedroom window is located directly above the one in which the bobcat was playing Narcissus. Fearing that he might see movement in the upstairs window and flee, I crept up slowly to the window (whose bottom edge is about three feet high), and found that I was directly in front of the cat and only slightly above it. Because he could get spooked at any second, I chose the largely automatic setting for my camera, maxed out the optical zoom, and took a couple of shots with the wrong white balance setting. Don't you just hate that? Ideally, I'd have my subject hold a grey card, but that wasn't going to happen here. I set the white balance to daylight and crossed my fingers.

I next realized that because I keep my camera hard-wired to ISO 100, there wasn't enough light to get a sufficiently fast exposure for handheld shots. As I was already shooting through double-paned glass, I couldn't have additional fuzziness from shaking. I also didn't want to risk taking the time for yet another trip downstairs for the tripod (and subsequent fumbling to get it set up).

The answer was to do what any quasi-photographer would do: find something solid against which to anchor the camera. The window and window sill would be my best bet, but I had to be careful to move slowly so as not to attract attention, and also not to tap the window glass with the camera. Moving the lens right up to the window would also minimize the distorting effect of the window glass. I was finally ready.

Much to my delight, my visitor continued to be mesmerized by his doppelganger in the window. He occasionally made a move toward the window to engage his "friend," but no screaming, yowling, scratching attack ever occurred. I once accidentally tapped my viewing glass with the camera. He looked up for a second, but apparently didn't see me (probably due to reflection of the sky). His total obsession lasted about 20 minutes, after which he stood up and started to move off slowly, giving me a great standing profile.

I find that I can't stop looking at this cat in all its poses, and want to share this experience with others. I hope you enjoy the photos.