Tall Trees and Big Skies

On this last day of the second month of the year, I awoke in Montana and will fall asleep in North Dakota, my second day aboard Amtrak’s Empire Builder. Cruising the United States by rail has been relaxing, inspiring, breathtaking, and eye-opening. I’ve always been someone who has loved looking out the window during car rides and always gets a window seat while flying—but this, this is entirely different. I’ve been glued to the varied landscapes as they drift past my windows, and I’m trying to pay attention to it all—to color, elevation, weather, rivers, trees, and mountains—and capture it all as best I can.

When you live in a small state and region like I do, it’s easy to forget how vast some states are. Living in New Hampshire, I can travel through multiple states in just a few hours’ time. I could have breakfast in Vermont, travel through Massachusetts to grab lunch, then cross into New Hampshire and hit Maine for an early dinner—and barely register a few hundred miles on the odometer. On the train, though, is, as we made our way across Montana over a 12-hour period, I realize just how big the rest of the country is and how limited my view has been, both literally and figuratively.

I find such inspiration in the nature and in the landscape, and I’m sure the photos I’ve taken on this trip will provide many, many projects’ worth of reference photos. As I scan through, I’m noticing the patterns: hundreds of photos of trees, mountains, and water. No surprises there; they’re the same subjects I’m drawn to everywhere I am. The main surprise has been my affinity for (and obsession with) the open landscape. I didn’t expect to love the wide open expanses as much as I do, but it makes sense: I’m loving what I don’t normally see. I probably take seeing the ocean for granted, for I can be at the beach in 45 minutes and travel the coast for hours in either direction, north into Maine or south into Massachusetts and beyond. But flat landscapes where I feel like I can see for miles? Yeah, totally new to me.

Today’s art: a selection of my introduction to Montana. Tall trees and big skies.  I can’t wait to return.