I love this picture of my dad at 23, fishing, and smiling with the wind in his hair. I found this among the collection of family photos that my cousin Bob Fitterman put together a few years ago, and it is dated August 5, 1941. I have often thought doing more with the photo but the original version was very badly tilted. (Mind you, my father seems to be standing in a rowboat, and so was the unknown photographer, but still. . .) My father was born on August 28 in 1918, so I decided his birthday was a good day to try to rescue this snapshot. When I rotated the photo to straighten the background, too much of the figure would be cut off if I cropped it. I used Painter to add pixels to make the digital canvas bigger on the left side, and then used enough cut-and-paste to create more background on the left and also slightly increased the line of the shoulder by drawing into the photo. Then I was able to straighten and crop the photo without cutting off the figure. The result as not perfect, but much better. Then I used iPhoto to do some basic cleanup, and here it is. (I also used Painter to create a digitally modified version with color, and I plan to post that tomorrow). Anyway, I am glad to have this image. It's the only picture I have seen of my dad fishing (although that years later he sometimes went fishing with my Uncle Bob in San Isabel and sometimes my cousin and I would tag along). I would love to know more about the 1941 photo. A companion photo shows him in a rowboat with a friend, and a third person took the photo Who were these friends, and where were they fishing? This is just a year before my dad enlisted, so I would guess maybe somewhere in Brooklyn or Long Island? Maybe Central Park? There is a lot I don't know. But what I can clearly recognize in that photo are his smile, his easy temperament, and his sense of fun. He was ready to laugh and always willing to have fun. Once, at Pueblo City Park (I was maybe 8 or 10) he showed me how he could do a flip on acrobatic rings, and wearing a sport coat and tie, turned completely upside-down, not worried about his car keys falling on the ground. He kept his sense of enjoyment throughout his life, whether he was fishing, rollerskating, or later, just taking a walk. His memory is a blessing, as was his life.
