March of 2020 hit us all with the impact of a paper airplane on solid brick wall. Suddenly everything changed, and life as we knew it abruptly and completely stopped.
I was laid off from my job in the oilfield on March 26, and told to stay home and avoid human contact as much as possible. I was fortunate to have two roommates in a house large enough for all of us and a furniture refinishing project in the garage, but by mid-April, the novelty of lazing around the house in my pajamas (read: being a socially responsible adult) was wearing off.
I decided to take a solo drive out to the mountains: far from people, and even further from any possible thought of Covid-19. I figured it would be easy to avoid people even in the tourist trap that is the Rockies out of season. As it turns out, there was nary another human being for miles and social distancing has never looked so beautiful.
Clearly someone had been here. There were footprints, and the roads had been plowed.
But at this moment? Literally not another person as far as the eye could see.
I looped around and made my way to Abraham Lake - having shot the lake in summer, fall, and winter, I figured it was next to necessary to get a few shots of spring... even though "spring" looks an awful lot like winter when you're in the mountains.
Abraham Lake, April 13, 2020
I returned home feeling refreshed and content with what I had accomplished:
fresh air, an adventure, and the final season of four at one of my favourite places in the west. And mostly I was reminded that in this new world we were all venturing into at 6 feet distances, we weren't the only things best left untouched.
