Stolen Goods

Strasen Lane near Marine, Illinois
January 21, 2011
Photograph by Tom Atwood

This is the coldest picture I've ever taken. After I took it, the thermometer in my van (a scientific instrument) read minus one degree Fahrenheit. What's interesting to me this morning, though, is not the cold, but the phrase "take a picture." To take a picture sounds like stealing, or at least removing something. I wonder, who did I take this picture from? Am I a thief? Or maybe I am just addled by the cold, a kind of frostbite of the mind. All I know is I can't give it back.

Shutter: 1/50; Aperture: f/7.1; ISO: 100; Focal length: 18 mm