Texas is so flat. Maybe it shouldn't surprise me -- but it does. My boyfriend asked me last night why I didn't just fly to and from Vegas. It would've been cheaper. Shorter traveling time. Certainly it would have been safer. But I've been to Texas twice -- flying both times -- and somehow I never understood just how flat it is. Or how the landscape changes somewhere between Fort Worth and Vernon. Color dissipates and the trees get shorter, like they're crouching to protect themselves from the wind roaring over the plains. I also saw my first oil fields. I pulled over to the shoulder to watch the machines pumping away.

I like this country. I like the people I've met. ...I like that I haven't gotten a speeding ticket yet. And I'm not photographing as much as I should, except for work. Sometimes I get so caught up in documenting that I miss the moment. I'm not willing to let that happen this time. I just want to drive and listen and marvel.

Dallas is somewhere behind me. Albuquerque lies ahead. But I'm just here, lost in Texas, watching a train roar by an empty field.