I grew up on the east coast, and more or less figured that I'd stick around until I was old and grey. As luck would have it, I instead moved out to California in 2019. After a few months, I started to notice that the cities, landscapes, sights, and sounds around me were eerily familiar, despite their apparent novelty.

From the Pacific coastline to the Eastern Sierra and the Haight in San Francisco to Griffith Observatory above Los Angeles, something of each had hitched a ride from coast to coast and installed an aspect of its physical, visual, and natural identity into my aesthetic experience.

How else did I recognize the shapes of the mountains, the quality of the light, and the crash of the waves if not from the movies, photos, and novels that those same phenomena inspired? I found that it was most rewarding to lean in to this feeling of wonder, in hopes that I might catch a glimpse of the qualities that rendered my new home a touchstone of the imagined landscape of the North American West.