An Ode To My Canon Rebel XT
Last month I made a big move (for me). I listed some of my old cameras for sale. There was a whole lot of them priced to sell, and I received offers within the hour of posting my ad.
One of those cameras that was immediately sought after was my Canon Rebel XT that I purchased about ten years ago. I loved that camera. It was a milestone in my life in many ways. After working years in retail at Canadian lingerie company la Senza for a mere $8 an hour, I saved up to buy it as my first DSLR without any financial aid from my parents.
… However, when I purchased it, I barely used it in the first year of owning it. I was scared to use it because I was afraid I’d break it.
One night I went to a Girl Talk concert at UBC and I was right up at the front. Another guy was right up there and also had his Nikon DSLR. He asked a couple of girls next to me to take a photo of him but they didn’t know how to use his camera. He quickly eyed me and I nodded and grabbed his camera to get the shot.
After the show, I found him and said, “I wish I brought my camera but I’m afraid I’d wreck it!” It was then where a simple response changed my life forever. He told me: “Cameras are just things. Capturing the moment is more important!”
And for whatever reason, something clicked — from that point on, I brought my Canon Rebel XT with me everywhere.
As someone who always felt like they never quite fit in, having my camera made me feel like I finally had a place in the world. I could participate and belong. The relationship I had with my camera became an anchor: photography kept me grounded and it made me feel like me. It was the perfect mesh of a creative and technical mindset. I always had something at times where I felt like I didn’t have anything, or when a relationship didn’t work out, or when one of my best friends moved from Vancouver.
But I moved on, of course.
I went from shooting digitally with Canon to Nikon. I went from cropped sensor to full frame. I went from shooting for fun to freelancing. I was always upgrading and it was only until my recent stint with KonMari that I found my old Canon Rebel XT underneath piles of old camera equipment.
I had forgotten all about that Rebel XT.
Now that I was selling it and had a taker so quickly, a part of me regretted it immediately. I wanted to tell the person it had already been sold and it was no longer available. So quickly after finding my Rebel XT, I romanticized this nostalgic feeling with my old camera — one that I had forgotten that existed until a few weeks ago.
I opened up a reply email and thought about taking back the whole ad and keeping my old cameras but then I thought about what my old friend told me: cameras are just things. The truth and reality is that my Canon Rebel XT is just a thing.
It served me very well.
I took amazing photos with it, photos that remain on my portfolio to this day but in the end, and as each day passes, it becomes more and more obsolete. What I do today compared to what I did back then — my Canon Rebel XT cannot keep up with me.
When I first picked up a camera, I took photos of whatever amused me. I forced myself to learn how to use the camera as second nature. But today my eye is quicker and more demanding: I need low light performance, speed, resolution.
Regardless, that old Canon Rebel XT was doing exactly what it was doing when I had first purchased it: it was sitting in my room, unused — not doing what it was made for: taking photos.
I spent the morning taking photos of my first digital SLR — I even recorded a video on my iPhone 6 of its whiny unique shutter sound. Later that afternoon, I skipped down the stairs of my workplace’s concourse and my heart beat fast with anxiety. A woman at my work approached me with a smile. She bought my camera and explained that she wouldn’t have to keep borrowing her boyfriend’s Canon Rebel T3i. She was excited that she had her own camera to put in an empty camera bag that she had purchased and was genuinely thrilled.
And just like that — I saw it again: the excitement to exercise personal passion for photography. Something I hadn’t given my Canon Rebel XT in a long time.
Godspeed. I’ll see you on the other side, friend.
And in the true spirit of KonMari: thank you.
Note: If you noticed that the camera in the first image is not the same as the camera in the last photo — good eye. The truth is my first Canon Rebel XT was a silver body but returned at Future Shop after 14 days as I wasn’t able to afford it at the time. I came back for it a year later.
