Golf Course | Richland, WA | June 2019
Golf is laden now with high fees and heavy gear. But as a young man, I played cheap rounds in early mornings with a single hybrid club — a five-iron/putter combo — and balls scavenged from the pond. At sunrise, it was mostly just me and the rabbits, who shared their ninja survival techniques. Sample: Seek breakfast at the edge of deep shadow. You can (more…)
21 Poplars | Moses Lake, WA | June 2019
We seem earthbound nowadays, weighted daily by new scares and scandals. So I’ve come to appreciate anything that points the way skyward — bean plants curling to the sun, birders with binoculars angled up, poplars not as windbreaks but guideposts to (more…)
Pelican | West Richland, WA | June 2019
Strangers often rouse suspicion. Where do they come from? What do they want? A fisherman near Horn Rapids on the Yakima River spit chew and jutted his chin at the flock of white pelicans perched midstream. “What the hell are they doing here?” he asked. “They eat our fish. More than their share.” On cue, the big bird (some have 8-foot wingspans) gulped down a (more…)
Pelican | West Richland, WA | June 2019
Strangers often rouse suspicion. Where do they come from? What do they want? A fisherman near Horn Rapids on the Yakima River spit chew and jutted his chin at the flock of white pelicans perched midstream. “What the hell are they doing here?” he asked. “They eat our fish. More than their share.” On cue, the big bird (some have 8-foot wingspans) gulped down a (more…)
Mountain | Prosser, WA | June 2019
Sunrise burns away haze, lights up the mountaintop. The peak is actually quite distant — more than 100 miles — but clear air and a telephoto lens allow western and eastern Washington to merge with no trouble. That’s rare, since the state’s two regions (urban vs. rural) squabble over differing values, priorities and politics. All that fades, thankfully, as we (more…)
Construction | West Richland, WA | June 2019
How the world is made continues to fascinate. I recently stood mesmerized by a tortilla machine that used a conveyor belt to introduce dough balls to their fate (flattened, seared, stacked). The crane in this photo hoisted joists 12 stories for assembly, said the guy next to me, of the world’s largest (more…)
Strawberry | Pasco, WA | June 2019
Small things reflect big things. Spiral shell = spiral galaxy. Leaf veins = river delta. Strawberry = supernova. “To see a world in a grain of sand … hold infinity in the palm of your hand,” wrote poet William Blake. The more we wander, the more we (more…)
LIGO | Hanford, WA | June 2019
Black holes and neutron stars collided long ago to produce gravity waves that ripple through the fabric of the universe. Which means the Earth, your body and that breakfast burrito you ate in the car were all crinkled for an instant by distant cataclysms. Me? I hardly noticed. But scientists here at LIGO (Laser Interferometer Gravitational-wave Observatory) have lasers tuned to detect (more…)
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