How predictable is life?

Yesterday I was looking at some of our family photos, and I found that I had photographed the same subjects two years apart on our family trips to Monticello. The first time we stopped at the Needles Overlook it was in the evening at Thanksgiving time in 2009. The second time we stopped in the morning after our recent campout.

It's common to want to take a picture twice of a nice mesa, but notice the rock with the crack in the foreground is also in both pictures.

2009

2011

More foreground rock.

2009

2011

Posing in front of the same fence.

2009

2011

I've decided that it isn't life that's predictable; it's how we look at life that's predictable. If we encounter the same situation multiple times without remembering the first experience, we are likely to react in the same way each time. I know am that way. I'm also sure I'll go to the same overlook in ten years and take the same pictures. Hopefully Jonathan won't still be holding Autumn then!