I think I reached the pinnacle of my career last week. That's right, you guessed it. I was asked to speak in front of kindergartners and second graders at Ruder Elementary about photography.

I was flattered. What do I know about photography? I was an English major. I got an A in Shakespeare and a D in the Film Star.

The nice thing about kids is they know none of your history. They just think as long as you bring in a bunch of cameras and ease yourself into a rocking chair like you have a sore on your back, that you actually know something.

So I rambled on about apertures and depth of field and the rule of thirds and they gobbled it up with wonder like I was Mr. Ansel Adams.

Or at least I was thinking they did, until I asked if there were any questions, which was a mistake. I've come to find out that 5-year-olds don't have any questions. They just blurt out statements of fact.

To wit:

One little girl raised her hand and said, "On the way to school today my mom was driving and we were going 16 and the car behind us was going 17 and my mom said they would hit us if they kept driving like that."

Then I showed them a picture of a deer and a young boy raised his hand and said this: "Randy missed my birthday party because he was out hunting instead."

He never explained who Randy was, exactly, but by the look on the boy's face Randy was a pretty important person and he shouldn't have been out hunting, he should have been at this young man's birthday party.

And then another little boy raised his hand and informed me that once when he was on a trip they hit a deer with a car and it took it awhile to die and the police had to come and shoot it.

There you have it.

I also showed them some pictures I liked. One in particular was a man holding a garden hose in front of his garden. He'd been gardening for 41 years an d had sold the place.

Is this picture interesting? I asked the kids.

"No!" they said.

Kids these days.

The next day the second-graders took a red bus ride up to Logan Pass to take pictures and I met them up there. They were happy to see me and wanted me to show them the ropes, so to speak.

There was just one problem with that. Logan Pass was socked in with clouds and a rather nasty wind. You could see maybe 20 feet, tops.

So we did the next best thing: We had lunch in the Visitor's Center next to the fireplace. The Park bent the rules a little, because on the door in great big letters, it says Absolutely No Food or Drink.

And believe me, a 7-year-old child on a field trip is all about food and drink. One young man packed what looked like the last supper: A big sandwich, a fruit cup, a yogurt, some pudding, a big old cupcake (he ate half) and a jug of what appeared to be piping hot tea. He spread it all out on the floor and began sampling each item a little at a time. When last we spoke he was gnawing on two pieces of licorice. He squinted one eye at me and said, matter-of-factly, "It's my dessert."

We did get outside and went for a brisk walk up the boardwalk just long enough to give every bright-eyed youngster at least one booger-filled nostril, which I'm sure will show up in plenty of photos because the fog was so thick the kids just resorted to either taking pictures of one another or, simply, taking pictures of me.

I just hope I wiped my nose.

Have a good week.

Chris Peterson is the editor and photographer (honest) of the Hungry Horse News.