People often wonder about my trademark hands photo and ask how it came to be.

Wolf and I traveled to a village called Gimmeldingen to attend the Mandelblütenfest (Almond Blossom Festival) and to try out a dish that we heard is native to the region: Saumagen. After wandering through the fest we found a small restaurant and ordered our Saumagen. As is common here, if a restaurant is full and you have room at your table, you may be asked to share it. Since all the small tables in the restaurant were full, we sat at the end of a large empty table, expecting that we might be asked to share. A party of six entered and, seeing that we had room, asked to share our table. As their red wine arrived, the gentleman across from me cupped his hands around his glass to warm the wine.

I had to have that shot!

I asked Wolf to ask him (since I didn’t want to raise my voice too loud over the commotion) if I could take a photo of his hands. Wolf offered to have me shoot his, but there was something about this gentleman’s hands that fascinated me. Wolf finally relented and the gentleman agreed. Not wanting to use flash, I braced my elbows on the table, upped the ISO and took two shots. The man, as it turns out, was a ceramist so he didn’t think the request was too strange. We enjoyed our time with the group and left with his address should we ever be in the neighborhood again.

A couple of weeks later, I sent him a copy of the finished photo with my thanks for indulging me.