Alternative Reality

There is always an alternative — or almost always at any rate, At a base level, we choose what to wear today and what to make for dinner. At a high level, it's what you choose to make the world a better place, whether it be the world at large, the world around you, or your own personal world.

Aside: Of course, there is a growing conviction among scientists that no one has a real choice and that each supposed decision is predetermined by the combination of our genetic makeup plus our experiences. But I am not sure that I agree with that, and, anyway, it certainly feels like we have choices and alternatives.

That all sounds cerebral, but it was just a wayfaring preamble to showing alternatives in photos.

You may remember this photo although it certainly isn't very memorable. I really shot it for the HHT (Happy Truck Thursday) meme on Flickr.

In taking the shot, my vantage wasn't great as I peered down from the road. So I shot it from several alternative angles and chose to post the one that looked best to me. (There is a lesson there; don't just take one shot, but try a few angles, but that's a digression).

After posting that, though, I wanted to see what it would look like with an alternative crop as well as in alternate monochrome.

I don't like one any better than the other, but I enjoyed processing and looking at both. Alternatives enrich our lives.

Here's another example. I posted the kids dancing in my previous post.

But, alternately, for yet another Flickr meme — HSS or Happy Slider Sunday — I walked on the wild side and came up with this sort of alternate reality rendition.

Alternatives can be fun, or at least mildly amusing.