I always know when the lawn crew has stepped onto our property. Sometimes it’s the tell-tale sounds of lawn mowers or leaf blowers that clues me in. More often than not though, it’s George barking at them in his trademarked blend of faux-ferocity and anxiety that he’s not going to get the chance to actually sniff the lawn guys’ shoes, a proper doggy hello.

This is George (who desperately needs to go to the groomer) just a few minutes ago, deflated after the lawn guys made a really abbreviated appearance this morning. They weren’t even here long enough for George to get all his barking out.

I’m pretty convinced he sees it as a competition: They have machines; he has a God-gifted voicebox that can produce approximately the same decibels as a supersonic jet. George likes to prove to those trespassers that, even when they’re invading his front porch with their scarier-than-a-vacuum-cleaner machines that make leaves and grass swirl through the air, he can drown their noises out. He is dog, hear him bark! That kind of thing.

Because I spent my childhood reading novels and my college career dissecting them, I’m prone to finding analogies wherever I look, and I saw an analogy in this that applies particularly well to photographers. George likes to drown out the lawn guys, to prove he’s the loudest. Business people, and especially photographers, like to drown the competition out, to prove they’re the most unique/have the most creative vision/shoot at the most high end venues/bought the newest equipment.

It’s easy to get caught up in the hype, since promoting a business is kind of the way photographers, you know, get business. But it’s occurred to me — just as I wrote earlier this week — that we photographers don’t necessarily have to be “better” than all the other photographers in order to do our own very best at our job. We need to do the best that we can serving our own clients. We need to do the best that we can at producing work we’re proud of, work that makes us realize anew why we loved photography in the first place. We need to do the best that we can in shaping our business into a mold that benefits our families and our clients.

We don’t need to compete for clients who are actually better suited to another photographer; we don’t need to hop on the latest fad in photography if isn’t a style we actually like; we don’t need to copy someone else’s business methods if that business isn’t going to get us to the destination we’re pursuing.

As a kid one summer in Pennsylvania, my friends and I found a black lab mix that had gotten lost. We took care of him for two days, until one of the neighbors drove him to the local shelter — where he was immediately recognized as an habitual runaway and reunited with his owners. I was devastated to see him go. Back in Florida, I had my own dog, but he wasn’t like this one: Obedient, loving, wanting nothing more than to be close to his new friends and let them know he was happier being with them than being anywhere else in the world. He was enthusiastic, and his tail rarely stopped wagging. But he never barked. Not once. Not when another dog bullied him. Not when I saw him, some weeks later, out on a walk with his owners. He never barked. But he still left an indellible impression. That dog is one of the pivotal memories of my childhood.

So, see? Literally, it’s not always about who barks the loudest. It’s only about who leaves the meaningful, lasting impression.

~ Laura