Not every juicy morsel works in every recipe. As a writer, I often come across something meaty, think, HUH! and then drag the link to a rarely visited desktop folder because, you know, I’m not writing a piece about using a dildo in zero gravity. (This time.) (Note to self: Pitch story on space-appropriate sex […]
Animals
Whales are great. You can get a bunch of people who you thought were grumpy and walking by themselves along the sidewalk, and suddenly there’s a whale and you are all shouting and grinning at each other and most of the people have even hung up their phones or stopped texting or tweeting about how […]
There are approximately 50 American robins in my front yard, a noisy, colorful flock centered around my crabapple tree. They have been partying for at least 24 hours, gorging themselves on the fruit and singling lustily. These festive aggregations are a common feature of spring throughout the United States as the birds migrate. Robins are […]
A few nights ago, my golden retriever puppy did a weird thing on the kitchen chair. I was standing at the counter island, where I always stand, and my daughter was in her chair across from me. Sunshine tried to climb on the chair next to my daughter, but then she kind of stopped halfway. […]
Fog is like water, in the valley where I live. As dusk approaches, rivulets of cold air flow down the slopes and gullies of the surrounding mountains. They pool in the flats, the horizon line where dark brush rises from snow blurring as if smudged, the softness blending up, beginning to erase the world. Leaves […]
My dog died this week. It was entirely without warning; she was fine Saturday and on Sunday she collapsed, and then she was gone. I am shattered. I am in a state of constant saudade, a Portuguese word meaning the feeling of longing for something or someone you love that has been lost forever. I […]
I am turning 40 on the day I am supposed to write this, so instead, I am re-running my favorite LWON essay–one suited to summiting the peak of midlife and looking out towards the horizon of death (ideally still just at the limit of one’s vision). Enjoy!
The Svalbard archipelago, midway between continental Norway and the North Pole, is famous for its polar bears, but it is also home to the distinctive (and distinctively adorable) Svalbard reindeer. Shaggy-haired and stubby-legged, the Svalbard reindeer is not only the world’s smallest subspecies of reindeer but also the world’s northernmost herbivorous mammal, and its survival […]