The Drive Home

After spending an entire day alone together on the other side of the mountains, Wes and I decided to take the long way home. I love the long way.

We get to drive through a wind farm--a truly amazing marriage of art and technology. Really, I'm so glad Wes usually drives this stretch so that I can just sit in wonder at the incredible power and grace of these turbines. They are huge!

Also, I think my Dutch ancestors would be proud.

I'm surprised these photos turned out so well. I had my doubts as I aimed my point-and-shoot camera through our bug-spattered windshield. 

 Step aside, East Coast. We've got some beautiful old barns here, too.

Mount Stuart in the background.

The state of Washington just bought up 50,000 acres of this beautiful valley, curbing any further development. Fish will be saved, water supplies boosted, habitat restored and its breathtaking scenery spared from countless future vacation homes...like the one I was dreaming of building. Well, more like a family cabin. You know, the kind where I could picture our posterity gathering years from now. They'd tell their children how grateful they should be for their great-great grandparent's sacrifice so they could spend summers there fishing and riding horses in the Teanaway River Valley. How many winters had cousins come inside from snowmobiling to warm up by the fireplace with hot chocolate and wool blankets? When hard times came, they always knew they could count on the family cabin.

Poof. Bye-bye, dream.

Of course my dream didn't include all the hundreds of other people with the same idea. I do hate to think of this lovely place speckled with other people's vacation homes.

And I do actually care about the salmon run. You can't live in Western Washington and not care about the salmon run.

Maybe I'll just frame this last photo and hang it in our front room.