unquiet spirits

Some photographers would probably have taken a tripod on their after-dark stroll through downtown Santa Fe.

I am not one of them. And I’m not even the least bit apologetic.

Santa Fe, New Mexico
photographed 8.31.2024

trail

A couple of years ago, I needed to go from Lubbock, Texas, to Oklahoma City, Oklahoma, which is about a 360 mile drive. And the drive goes through two states: Texas and Oklahoma.

But also we’d heard about a good restaurant in a little town in Colorado and added that into the trip. And then we added a swing through Tesuque, New Mexico, just for the hell of it. That expanded the trip to about 1600 miles* and included five states.

Anyway, this is something that we saw along the way that we’d’ve missed going the regular way.

near Cheyenne Wells, Colorado
photographed 9.4.24

*Not counting all the u-turns that photography seems to demand.

it all comes down to nothing

The great poet/philosopher Dave Matthews wrote “it all comes down to nothing” – and really, sometimes that is exactly what happens. You thought maybe things were headed one way, and all of a sudden you look and it’s all just an empty beer bottle and some plastic knives on the ground behind a closed-down bar.

Lubbock, Texas
photographed 1.17.2026

one’s a perfect number

Here’s some junk I saw on the ground the other day – it’s in front of a street-side memorial across from the police station in downtown Lubbock, if you’re looking for it…

Lubbock, Texas
photographed 1.17.2026

sun/fish

Fish and a wedge of sun in a street market in Palermo.

When I was a kid, my family took several long road trips to Mexico; we used a Sanborn’s guidebook that noted all the things of interest along the way. And if there was a note about a town (even if it was off our route) that was having a market on the day we’d be there, my dad would turn off the highway for a visit. It was always interesting to see all the things that were for sale, from an entire dead-but-not-butchered-pig, to a few meters of embroidery thread wrapped around a piece of cardboard, to plastic shoes, to jewel-toned soft drinks in glass bottles, to books.

It seemed like the details of our visits to Mexican markets had been lost in my memory. But only a few steps into their Sicilian cousins those memories came back; I was once again a shy blonde kid on the cusp of being grown seeing things that felt mysterious and enticing.

Palermo, Sicily
photographed 1.17.2025