Thanks for that, sorry the thrill isn't there for you now. Maybe that 13 year old will whisper in your ear again someday. Afterall, it can't be completely gone or you wouldn't be here.

For now I'll plead th' Fifth.

...but I can yet navigate around most places in the dark.

And few folks have experienced the TOTAL darkness of a photo lab, much less the ability to do complex functions in one.

Often thought if I were for some catastrophic reason to become blind, I'd have a "leg up" so-to-speak.

Count me out. B&W allowed me a safe light. I had to load and pull IR film from the camera in a changing bag, but that was the extent of blind fumbling.

Before I could afford both 100' of Panatomic-X ~and~ a bulk loader I had a finishing nail in the doorframe of my darkroom at about 6' and two down lower... one at 36-frame length and one at 24 frames. Would attach the end thru a sprocket hole at the highest one and spool out the length I wanted. Several at a time. Then tape the free end to the spools of a cassettes and hand wind the film into 'em. All in total darkness. Got really adept (and fast) at loading film onto the developing tank spools, too.

When working for the newspaper I carried a changing bag and a single 35mm spool tank in the trunk. Along with enough chemistry and water to process. Nothin' like gettin' a ready neg into the darkroom of the paper to make the deadline for the next run. Printed it with wet negs!

ahhh...th'good ol' days.

I'm taking that as you didn't even print a contact sheet. Look at the negs. through a loupe to decide which frame would go into print?

With the news stuff, yep. Usually the "money shot" was fairly obvious. One time I got a front page, full width shot of two football teams in a ten-yard-line DOGPILE during a State Champ playoff game. Funny bit was: the hometown Q-back was the only one standing and with the flash on camera his eyes were "glowing"

Hometown won. Big news for the area.