Windfarm in White

One of the few things that break up the monotony of driving across the rural midwest is coming across a windfarm. For untold miles nothing but soybeans, and suddenly, an army of quietly spinning sentinels appears. From a distance, there is a languid grace to their movement, at dusk the synchronized blinking of their aircraft warning lights is almost hypnotic.

Last February, I happened to be driving through a windfarm in downstate Illinois. A snowstorm had passed through the night before, and the next day a fine crystalline flurry still hazed the air. My wife graciously agreed to drive and periodically creep alongside while I periodically would pop out of the car to get the shots I wanted. It likely made for a funny or absurd spectacle, a Don Quixote chasing windmills and Sancho Panza behind the wheel. In fact, a young couple in a truck did stop to ask me if everything was alright, their cautious glances at Shawna suggesting they worried a lovers’ quarrel was to leave me stranded on the road in the biting cold.

I came away with three shots that I thought were worth sharing.