Photo for My Thoughts

Sometimes, in pursuit of one thing, we discover something else that is unexpected and extraordinary. I finished up a week on a project in Salt Lake City, Utah and was supposed to fly home on Friday night. Instead, I extended my stay and drove down to Bryce Canyon National Park. I couldn't leave until 5pm and it was a four hour drive. The sun set over the mountains as I drove, a hazy pink and orange, and then I was surrounded by total darkness. The last hour and a half of the journey consisted of a narrow view of road that was lit by my headlights, and a black sky pierced by a million stars. As I neared the hotel I would stay in for the night, I caught quick flashes of large rocks near the road, illuminated briefly by the beams. There was almost a total absence of color - the world rolling by in black and white. I made it to the hotel and found my room. After a quick meal at the restaurant in the main building, I called my brother on the walk back to my room, which was in a bu...

This photo was taken on a wildlife tour in Ketchikan, Alaska. You know, the kind where you go out on a boat and float around hoping to catch a glimpse of a bear or a seal or a moose. We saw a few bears and seals during the rainy ride, but I liked this shot best of all. As I peered across the water, I wondered whether the place was abandoned. It didn't really look like a house. Being back in Alaska reminded me of the first time I was there. A little less glamorous than this trip with its wildlife tours and indoor plumbing, the first time had been for an Outward Bound mountaineering course the summer before my freshman year of college. I was required to attend an OB course as part of my scholarship curriculum and thought I should choose the most extreme course I could find in the catalog since I'd probably never have a chance to do something like that again. And while I had gone camping with my family when I was younger, I wouldn't exactly say I was an outdoors-woman. But I...

I remember the first time I wakeboarded. It was on Griggs Reservoir (Scioto River) in Columbus, Ohio with my friends Amy and Gerrie. Gerrie was driving the boat while Amy sat on the back, guiding me through the process of strapping myself to the board and giving me a tutorial on the handle grip, posture, and probably a few other things I didn't understand and don't remember. "You ready?" she asked me. "As I'll ever be!" I responded, trying to process what she had told me and feeling sure I was going to stand up on my first try. Whenever Amy strapped in and got into the water to ride, she did a cool shuffle off the platform on the back of the boat and seemed to just step out (impossible of course, because both feet were on the wakeboard) into the lake, facing the boat. Slowly, she'd sink into the water with posture straight and confident as the receding boat reached a distance equal to the rope length and gave her a little tug, pulling taut. Ver...