The Creek Runs All Night

It has always been a happy thought to me that the creek runs on all night, new every minute, whether I wish it or know it or care, as a closed book on a shelf continues to whisper to itself its own inexhaustible tale.
Annie Dillard

This series, a section of my project Mining Operation, was photographed in the spring of 2026, on Vashon Island, almost entirely at Shinglemill Creek. Mining Operation is about how the process of recovery from trauma is similar in land and in people, and this section of the project is about living, aliveness, and returning to the same place again and again, finding something new each time, why it is worth the effort to be.

It was not inspired by the Annie Dillard quote, but during the time period when I was photographing this series I was rereading Pilgrim at Tinker Creek, and it fit too well to ignore.

An especially exciting part of the series was working with my favorite creek, and favorite cameras, to photograph things I can’t quite see with my eyes, that can be seen with a camera.