Introduction:

The Aero Lakes in the Absaroka-Beartooth Wilderness have been described as 'alpine oceans' rather than alpine lakes. Both Upper and Lower Aero Lakes are nearly a mile wide both directions, and they sit near each other on the rugged alpine rocky plateau of the Beartooth Mountains at just over 10,000 ft in elevation.

Outside my window on a Friday afternoon the clouds are clashing together into a giant ball of anger. Any signs of a blue sky is fading away. Far away from my neighborhood. The kids outside are cleaning and gathering all their belongings at the sight of the incoming storm. It hasn't touch down yet, but anyone with nerve damage can probably predict that we're about to have a pretty nasty storm. The apartments are made of brick and very close together. Each neighbor has porch to share their own share of grass on the side of each house. Everyone has a different but small garden and collection of plants. We just a have a skeleton from last Halloween sitting on our stairs in front of the apartment. Today it still looks as dead as ever.

2019 was an eventful year for me; travelling to eight countries, two mental breakdowns, moving out, and seeing two of my favourite singers; Christina Aguilera and Björk in concert. A lot of bad stuff happened, but a lot of good things happened as well. If I could describe last year in one image it would be this one: a picture of a sunset in Manila.

I still remember this day. I don't like the beach but this photo was so inviting. And it turned out better than I had hoped.

I have lived in Reno, Nevada since I was just a little kid, and I always wanted to leave. Nevada was too much with it's oppressive dry heat, open expanses of multi-hued brown, and the people with whom I never quite seemed to belong. I spent my childhood running away to sunny beaches and mountains and forests, and always longed to live in a place that felt like those places did to me.

If there's one aspect of my style of writing that I like to believe stands out, it's the attribute of honesty. As I begin to pen down one of the most organic experiences of my life, one that I was lucky enough to capture, I think it's imperative to be genuine about it.

This photo was taken while traveling to the quaint, mountain town of Anapoima, Colombia. Using my iPhone, I was able to capture the beauty that is this hidden lagoon nestled here in the Andes Mountains.

I left my hotel in Bodrum, Turkey, in the early hours of the morning on the 12th of July, 2019. I couldn't sleep, so I got dressed and stepped out into the dark city. I wandered the empty streets in the quiet zone between the bars closing and early morning shops opening. I walked through the back streets and trekked up the hillside to the ruins carved into the rock. My experience has often been that a peaceful mind is easier to find in a deserted place that is usually full of people.

I snapped this photo at the end of summer in 2016 on my iPhone. My mom, dad and I were heading towards the beach. Which beach? I don’t know. All I remember is that we made a spontaneous stop on our road trip home to check in with one of my mom’s relatives.

If I were to choose one picture from the thousands taken on my IPhone and Camera on my trip to Italy to be my favourite, it would be this one. This photo captures a perfect frame of what we as tourists associate as the essence of Venice and tourism. This man has been working with his Gondola boat for his entire life, paddling families, to tourists, to lovebirds on a romantic date down the very channels of the city surrounded by water. His boat was passed on down from his father, which had come from his grandfather. These boats pass on for generations, and may undergo some fine tuning and upgrading for durability, they remain as important heirloom through the generations of Venice residents. These gondoliers line up at the ant docks situated across the city, and wait for the next guests to board the boat and take on this journey they have set sail many times over in their lives, making a decent living from it, and reproducing the very Venetian lives their fathers lived.