Environment

  • I’m writing a book. My daughter is baking and selling bread. My brother runs a wood shop, making wooden blocks for children.

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  • Seven Hills

    I’ve always wanted to write a novel. The working title is Seven Hills (but may change as the arc of the story changes) I’m posting a chapter or two or three to see if anyone loves it or hates it or has advice. This is chapter one. My father grew up near the Tri-State mining…

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  • Digging Daily Dirt: A Garden Story

    I’ve always wanted to be a famous writer, not prolific like John Grisham, but rather famously obscure, like J.D. Salinger, only with less baggage and regrets. Being famous seems like a lot of trouble. Fortunately, like most people, I’m famously not famous, not unlike another writer, Flora Macdonald Mayor, who wrote The Rector’s Daughter 100…

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  • The Real Light of Day

    The Real Light of Day

    “What you see in a total eclipse is entirely different from what you know.” Annie Dillard

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  • April 11, 2020

    2020 April 5     I left for college my freshman year driving a Pontiac crammed with Advent stereo speakers and a Yamaha receiver. I was wearing my uniform of the times, Nike sneakers with a sky blue swoosh, a polo shirt and Lee jeans. Elvis had just left the building, he died in August…

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  • The Tiny Home in Our Driveway

    There are two kinds of people in the world. (there are more than that, but let’s not nitpick) People who love to stay home and people who love to wander. Home people nest and settle in for the long haul as nostalgia rules the day. Wanderers are restless horizon watchers who understand that to be a…

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  • Running with Lightning

    Running with Lightning

    Tuesday we hiked up to St. Mary’s waterfall. After a 3 mile hike including 1,000 feet of vertical rise, we drank cold water pouring down the face of the granite. That was right after Lauren and Karen startled two young men and a young woman who had built a sort of cold water mountain pool…

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  • Le Temps

    Le Temps

    Certain languages, including French and Bulgarian, have one word for both“time” and “weather.” The French is rendered Le Temps. One of my treasured moments as a Dad combined weather, time, and beauty. I was sitting on a peak in Arkansas with my son on a Sunday morning singing while watching a thunderstorm roll in not…

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  • Toronto journal 4: King Lear and the Subterranean Underground

    “We are going to Hyde Park to see King Lear,” Brandon said. Turns out he said High Park. Which is where we sat, perched high on a hill overlooking the outdoor stage at High Park in north Toronto. My expectations were low but I did carry high expectations in a picnic bag, a sub sandwich…

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  • Fly Fishing with Bob

    Fly Fishing with Bob

    Last summer my friend Bob and I were in Denver at a fly fishing outfitter admiring the gear and clothing. It was in that moment of idealistic longing that we decided to go trout fishing. Neither of us fish much. But the river called to us like the sirens singing to Delmar and Pete in…

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