The entire Chicago area gets its water from Lake Michigan, of course, from cribs like this a couple of miles out into the lake. What I learned only recently was that while there are seven cribs like this, this and four others aren’t in operation, so all the millions of gallons of water we consume in this city come from just two holes in the lake’s bed. That feels optimistic, but I’m not the one who makes these decisions.

Fun fact: I’m allergic to seafood, of all kinds, and when I moved here from Boston in ’97, I couldn’t drink the water, because there are colonies of mussels and other filter feeders all around these cribs grabbing whatever chow they can before the water enters Chicago’s pipes. It took nearly a year of slowly acclimating before I could reliably and confidently drink tap water.

July 15, 2012. Nikon D90 (DX sensor), 70–300mm Nikon zoom lens at 300mm (35mm equivalent: 450mm), f/16, 1/500, ISO 500.