February 9th, 2010 § 0
This twenty-mile adventure loop was worthy of a few shots. The tree damage is incredible—it looks like a hurricane has been through and we won’t even know the extent of the damage until spring. But when the sun shines, man, it’s pretty out here.
February 7, 2:08 p.m. Driving up to the house to plow the driveway with the tractor. Again.
January 31st, 2010 § 0
January 31, 2:34 p.m. Headed up to the farm to check out road conditions after yesterday’s storm. So not impressed with this county’s plowing efforts.
This is one of my favorite views while driving up to the house. It’s the first glimpse you get of the farm—if you look closely, you can see some familiar orange safety fencing midframe and to the right. Even though I don’t live there yet, to me this view already means I’m almost home.
January 3rd, 2010 § 0
January 3, 5:08 p.m. Lenticular cloud over the little mountain in that’s visible out my front door, seen from afar.
December 10th, 2009 § 0
December 10, 11:36 a.m. Headed to the farm at lunchtime to check out the exterior window trim mock-up.
Full-frame image, shot from the moving car. Best viewed large. I love everything that’s going on in this totally random grab.
October 25th, 2009 § 0
October 25, 6:45 p.m. Leaving the farm, headed home for dinner.
October 20th, 2009 § 0
October 20, 7:13 p.m. Driving from the farm to my parents’ house under a fingernail moon.
Minutes after I took this shot, I was shocked to see a huge coiled black snake in the middle of the road, reared up like a cobra looking right at me as I flashed by. He was a thick oily puddle and his upright white belly reflected my lights. The split-second shock of recognition stays with me.
October 18th, 2009 § 0
October 18, 12:38 p.m. Headed to the farm to plant two Hinoki Cypress.
Shot from the car.
One of the reasons I left D.C. was to reintroduce more beauty into my everyday life. Sure, there’s beauty to be found in an urban metropolis, and I did. In the streak of red light as the Metro train disappears down a tunnel and in the one bright umbrella among dozens of black brethren bobbing down a dirty grey street. In how the lit-up Washington Monument shocked me with the wonder of my city situation each time it popped up on the blue-black horizon as I drove east on Route 50, coming home from a grocery run.
Having grown up surrounded by natural beauty, I loved the challenge of finding visual joy in a place so easy to dismiss as ugly. And yet, after five years, I yearned to return to trees and mountains and curved country roads. So the Daily Commute is my tribute to my new home, a valediction of my choice to leave behind the beauty of the city and start again in a very different place. It is, quite simply, how I see my world as I move through it everyday.