A Return to Yosemite

I often dream of Yosemite. It's a magical place of intense beauty. Yosemite was the place where I first came to realize my life’s path. Almost 50 years ago, back in my teens, I found myself sitting on a bench in Yosemite Village, the sun streaming through the trees. It was early in the morning and I was sitting there with a cup of coffee surrounded by the palpable beauty of this incredible place, pondering how I could make a creative life for myself that could unfold in a place such as this one.

A photography workshop had brought me to Yosemite, one taught by a photographer who created magnificent photographs and was and continues to be beloved and admired. As I sat there in the beauty of it all, I became overwhelmed. I experienced a powerful flash of insight. My path became clear. In the beautiful Sierra light of that early morning I decided to become a photographer.

Of course there were many adventures and struggles that happened along the way. Working on a Chrysler assembly line to make money for tuiton. College at the University of Michigan where I studied with Phil Davis from whom I learned so much and met my wife Kathy. Graduate school at the Rochester Institute of Technology, the thesis I created at this fine school bringing me to Santa Fe. Working for photographer Paul Caponigro which brought needed clarity and refinement to my work. Teaching photography workshops with students who, when I look back, taught me as much about everything else as I taught them about photography. The birth of our lovely daughter, the passing of my good father and so much more. And there were the photographs themselves, thousands of them I made, each more amazing to me than the last, tied to some amazing moment and/or wonderful individual I met along the way. It has been lot of hard work…and I have loved every minute of it.

And so this fall, I found myself back in Yosemite, to be in that wonderful place again and share its magic with old friends and new. I went there too, to revisit places I remembered photographing sometime in my past; places that felt like old friends, their memories existing only in my dreams. I made exciting new photographs while I was in Yosemite—powerful ones— expressions of exquisite fleeting moments that I delight in having been a witness to, images that I hope will be considered among my best.

While my life would not unfold within the grandeur of Half Dome and El Capitan or along the Merced, it did so in another beautiful place, one that some might say is “the palm of God’s hand.” I “live” there with my wife Kathy, our two dogs named Steve and Brownie, a couple of old Nikon cameras, all surrounded by the most breathtaking landscape and miraculous light. I live and work in Santa Fe, New Mexico, nestled high in the Sangre de Cristo mountains.

With Thanksgiving quickly approaching I find my thoughts turning inward, considering the pictures I have made over the past year and counting so many blessings. Grateful for the life I have been given, grateful for the beauty I have received, grateful for the incredible people, family, friends and others who have become a rich part of my life, and grateful too for the work I am given the privilege to undertake.