"Juniper light at Arches," Utah, March 2010

Juniper light

This became one of my favorite photos from out weeklong trip through northern Arizona and southeastern Utah. It was the end of a long day of hiking at Arches and we hoped to get one more loop in, out at the end of the park road near the big campground, hiking to Broken Arch and back to the car. But as we made our way along the path, we found ourselves alternating between dense sand and snow drifts up to our shins, even our knees. We grew tired quickly and decided to double back to the car, rather than finish the circuit.

But at least it got me this shot of the late-afternoon sunlight on the arches in the distance and the top of the tree in the foreground. If only I could drop everything now and go back out there ...

Day 226 of 365

Friday afternoon in the universe

Quite the light on all the iron as we pull into the terminal.

Day 182 of 365

Late afternoon

The late-afternoon sun casts a shadow on our back yard gate.

"Manhattan from Sandy Hook," Sept. 2, 2001

I don't get to the beach nearly as much as I used to these days. It used to be a regular summer ritual, considering I grew up about five miles from the nearest one, in Sea Bright, and a mere 15 minutes from one of the most beautiful, Sandy Hook. So into the archives I go for this shot, and deep "into the vault," as the DJs used to say on WNEW, back when it was a classic rock station with Scott Muni and some of New York's best throwback jockeys. I've only begun scanning in the negatives from 13 years of photographs I took with my film SLR and I haven't uploaded any of them to Flickr yet, figuring I'll wait until I can do them in chunks, either by year or month or something. It's a time-sucking project to be sure, just one of several I have lined up these days. It may have to wait for winter and conditions more suitable to spending an entire day in front of the computer.

So this shot was taken on my birthday, Sept. 2, 2001, just nine days before those towers in the background fell down. It's the last picture I have of the World Trade Center as we knew it. My sister, my friend Mia and I were out at Sandy Hook enjoying a summer-like day on Labor Day Weekend before attending that night's Lakewood BlueClaws game and stopping by a bar in Belmar on the way home. Despite the apparent haze, it was actually a clear day by comparison to what we might normally get when we look toward Manhattan from the Jersey Shore. If I recall correctly, I left my camera in the car -- a somewhat arduous trek across the hot sand and the parking lot, at least a good 5-10 minutes -- and went back to get it once I saw just how clear the view was and how close the Twin Towers appeared.

I'm glad I did.

"Village view," New York, October 2007

Lunch in the Village

When I took this shot, I did so because of the crystal-clear afternoon, the strong light on the buildings and tree, the blue sky, the illumination of the window and the colors coming through the transparent lettering in the name. The post in the center of the frame was an imperfection I'd have to live with. I didn't look at this photo as anything outstanding; it was just a moment of an afternoon.

And then I noticed the jagged top of the photo, the roof of the corner entry to the restaurant, and the M.C. Escher-like effect it has on the scene, particularly the building on the left, and I love it a little more.

"On the old highways of America"

The road to myself

"On the old highway maps of America, the main routes were red and the back roads blue. Now even the colors are changing. But in those brevities just before dawn and a little after dusk -- times neither day nor night -- the old roads return to the sky some of its color. Then, in truth, they carry a mysterious cast of blue, and it's that time when the pull of the blue highway is strongest, when the open road is a beckoning, a strangeness, a place where a man can lose himself."

-- William Least Heat-Moon, Blue Highways

"Morning light, Florida," February 2006

Morning light

The morning was as warm as it looks. The blinds were drawn to within two feet of the floor on this floor-to-ceiling window, and as I knelt to pack my bag for the flight home, I noticed the light coming through the leaves on the plant. They weren't even necessarily that pink, but they came across that way at this time of day. It was among the last photos I took on that trip, getting in a few more shots before the drive to the airport and a few hours confined to the plane. It's one of those shots that, to me, doesn't show anything of note, yet I still remember the mood and the feeling of that morning.

It's been nearly a month since I've taken the camera out and captured anything fresh, and I'm growing restless, itching to do so again. Today would've been perfect had I had more time when I headed down by my parents, where they got more ice than we did and the trees were encased in ice and glistened in the sun as if they were glass. With the light at the right angle, the trees twinkled as if strung with lights at Christmas. Gorgeous.

"New Jersey sunset," Sept. 11, 2006

New Jersey sunset, 9/11/06

So in America when the sun goes down and I sit on the old broken-down river pier watching the long, long skies over New Jersey and sense all that raw land that rolls in one unbelievable huge bulge over to the West Coast, and all that road going, all the people dreaming in the immensity of it, and in Iowa I know by now the children must be crying in the land where they let the children cry, and tonight the stars’ll be out, and don’t you know that God is Pooh Bear? The evening star must be drooping and shedding her sparkler dims on the prairie, which is just before the coming of complete night that blesses the earth, darkens all rivers, cups the peaks and folds the final shore in, and nobody, nobody knows what’s going to happen to anybody besides the forlorn rags of growing old, I think of Dean Moriarty, I even think of Old Dean Moriarty the father we never found. I think of Dean Moriarty.

-- final lines of On The Road by Jack Kerouac

Beneath the Big Sky

"On the road in Big Sky Country," Montana, May 2006

"Sky high, Colorado," May 2006

It's not just Montana that deserves the "Big Sky" moniker. Sure, the wide, open vistas allow for the huge blue sky to stretch across the horizon. But Colorado has some big sky of its own, even with the peaks of the Rocky Mountains around you. Only something as big as the sky could dwarf the peaks in your view.

The sky is great for photography. It changes colors, it brings in accessories, it strips itself bare and leaves you nothing but a monochromatic canvas. It casts shadows or opens everything up to the light. It's usually seen as the background, but it can sometimes be the subject on its own.

Gates series

Gates reflection, Central Park, February 2005


Atop Great Hill, Central Park, February 2005


Near the Great Lawn, Central Park, February 2005

If there's one thing that meant "orange" this winter in New York, it was Christo's The Gates. I took close to 200 photographs in four different trips to Central Park during the installations three-week run. I went into the city on two consecutive mid-week off-days and treked from Columbus Circle in the southwest corner (at 59th St.) of the park up to around 100th St. and then east, over to Central Park East and down to the 80s. My plans were more ambitious than I'd expected, and I didn't get to explore the northern edge of the park, which now remains the last great section I've yet to explore.