Since I'm blessed with a husband who is a private pilot, I get to see some of the west's beautiful small-town airstrips from a unique vantage point; as we're taking off or landing, I'm frequently bouncing from side to side, shooting pictures out the windows. This was a hole in a layer of incipient thunderstorm activity in Wyoming, and I thought a golden eagle would provide the right anchor for this unusual perspective.

The piece was juried into the 2006 Birds in Art international competition (whoohoo!) and spent the year on tour after that.