I inherited an interest in photography from my father.

A lifelong photo hobbyist himself, he gave me a Kodak Pony 135 camera as a birthday gift while I was still in high school. Since then I’ve shot thousands of pictures, sometimes for pay as a freelancer or as part of my job.

But mostly, it’s been a pastime, a way of getting something creative, even artistic, into my life. It’s been well worth the effort and dollars invested.

The philosopher Nietzsche once said humans are most likely to waste their time when they “get interested” in something. He got that right.

Lately, I’ve been thinking about my favorite photos, with a tentative goal of doing another book. A couple of years ago, I self-published “Paris in Monochrome,” based on a show I did at the now-closed Dakota Harvest Gallery in Grand Forks, N.D.

So what’s the deal with this particular photograph (above)?

One day in 2010, I met a young woman, Natasha Terry, who was stationed at Grand Forks Air Force Base. She had done some part-time modeling. Would I be willing to take a few pictures of her? The shoot, she said, would include a “special friend.”

It turned out to be Natasha’s pet rat.

Later, I displayed the photograph at the Dakota Harvest Gallery. Viewers responded to it enthusiastically. I even sold a few prints.

It’s one of my best pictures and will be in the new book.

If I do one.