I was leaving a mayoral event uptown -- announcing the reopening of the Harlem School of the Arts -- when I caught sight of this sign for an old gas station. The lettering was unremarkable, but I loved how the vines had embedded themselves, something you don't often see in the big city.

I'd just taken my first shot, poking my camera through the chain link fence, when a voice stopped me.

'What are you doing?' the man asked. He was black, probably in his 60s, and he didn't look happy. Turns out he owned the gas station.

I explained, as cheerfully as I could, that I was quite taken with the creepers. Surely he'd relent, I thought, if I came across as a loopy nature lover, sort of like those over-enthusiastic British bird-watchers in safari hats, rather than a hard-charging journalist. I even showed him the image on the camera -- pretty, huh? Didn't work.

"This is private property," he said, for the fifth time.

"It doesn't matter if it's private property," I hardened. "I'm not trespassing. And I have the right to shoot it, just like I can shoot that building over there," I said, pointing at the apartments across the street.

"I was just asking a question about what you were doing," he said, raising his voice.

"Well, I answered you, didn't I?"

We went around in circles, making the same silly points. I knew I was right -- and confirmed it later with the folks at the New York Civil Liberties Union -- but realized pretty soon that this wasn't necessarily a legal issue so much as a cultural one.

Here I was, this guy with slick black shoes and Nehru-collared polka-dot shirt, oozing charm, yes, but also a certain camera-toting outsiderness. He, on the other hand, was about as local as they come. Maybe he felt used. Or maybe he was just a jerk.

I finally walked away, wondering if I'd lost. Then again, I did get the shot.