Shock and awe

One thing I love about Minnesota, and maybe the Midwest in general, is the definition of the seasons. Although each may not last an equal three months you always know where you stand. Winter is snowy and cold. The snow shovel gets regular use and handy work it is not. That slowly passes and a month of rainy weather announces spring. The countless trees burst into full foliage until a quilt of green is all you can see when you fly over the twin cities. Enter summer. Sticky, hot, brutally humid days confine me to underwear and frustration. Autumn fixes that and things cool down. The leaves phase to red and fall in great numbers. You can actually listen to them swoosh through the air in the same way that rainfall becomes audibly noticeable.

The sun is setting earlier with every evening these days. The race to get home and out on the bike with a camera before it goes to bed is almost a losing battle. This evening I won. Traffic on the highway was light. All the lights turned green for me. I rummaged up a hasty dinner, drank a cup of tea and free wheeled my hole across University Avenue to the grain elevators and freight yard, a place where I am always free from anxiety, composed and in awe. Buildings, colors, textures, rust, sounds and smells take my breath away, every time. I know the light is a photographers dream. I am a rookie but I know when I am witness to perfection. Words will never do any justice to what I’ve seen but perhaps these photos ((LINK), (LINK)) will fill the void.

Perhaps not, you decide.

Humble men

"I wasn't really a writer. I had seen a strange beautiful light on the hills and that was all."
Patrick Kavanagh

"The highway's a story teller. I just write it down."
Buck65

Wisconsin

We fled to Waupaca for Labor Day weekend. Fran asked for my help to put windows into his shed/cabin in the woods. I loyally assisted for a short time, then blended into the background and sucked on a few early afternoon bottles of Heineken. Fran momentarily downed tools to refresh his liver. He said to me "this is how a carpenter opens a beer" and with swan-like grace used a claw hammer to pop off the cap. A true joy to watch the man work.

I rambled through his woods, envisioning owning my own land someday on which I could build a dream home, perhaps constructed entirely from Titanium or other exotic alloys, or perhaps not. These fleeting thoughts of rural living are more grounded than one would think. A mere $130,000 will net a man a five bedroom house with a barn (LINK) and other outbuildings on a 20 acre site.