Drive By U.S.

In the winter of 2021, my partner, son, and I had to drive from California to Wisconsin and back to deal with a sudden loss in the family. We drove both for safety from COVID-19 and so we could bring our dogs for the long trip; the entire journey took six weeks including the stay in Wisconsin. 

I’ve traveled across the Lower 48 many times by car along both east-west and north-south directions, across several latitudes and longitudes. But I’ve never before done this length of trip in the winter, nor during a pandemic, nor during a family crisis. We drove through three snowstorms, including one on a 12,000+ foot mountain pass, a polar vortex, a city where we used to live, five deserts, several reservations, and a plain below sea level. 

The weather was often harsh and the route along freeways (mostly US 70 and US 80) was sometimes numbingly gray. But it also was an opportunity to do nothing but photograph the country as I saw it whipping by, as the landscape acted as a mind scrub from the past terrible year and a half. And as you can see, if you pay attention, even our modern, corporatized country isn’t all that identical from place to place. 

This Drive By is preserved in order from start to finish.