This was my first guest post for LWON, in 2015. I’m reposting it because there’s yet another update: A few days ago, my mother revealed that, CONTRARY TO ALL HER PREVIOUS CLAIMS, it was the cat. … This week, while working on a little story for Science about hamster emotions, I decided to do some […]
Guest Post
In rural central Pennsylvania, in a long narrow valley originally named Kishacoquillas, now nicknamed Big Valley, the Amish buggies are not black and grey but white and yellow. You might think these unusually bright buggies might signal a more laid-back Amish population, but it’s just the opposite: the two sects represented by the two buggy […]
As I put today’s fifth pot of water on the stove to boil, I think about how this has become part of my daily routine. Bring 5 quarts of water to a boil, set the timer for 3 minutes, pour some in the French press to brew coffee, use some to wash out the dog […]
My husband and I went to Scotland to celebrate our 25th wedding anniversary. We walked on footpaths in the Highlands and noticed all the ways the landscape differed from our favorite hiking trails in New York. My naturalist skills extend to birds and plants. It was hard to ignore the rocks, but I did my best. I […]
Every science journalist has a mixed portfolio. Some stories go viral. Others feel as if they’re read by five people including your parents. Our pieces also have a spectrum of meaningfulness. I’ve published articles to pay the bills that I hardly remember writing — I stumble across them sometimes, years later, and am shocked to […]
A few weeks ago, I started a long-anticipated, summer-long camping trip, with my dog Frances, my cat Lao, and my husband John joining us part of the time. One evening, we were in our camper van in an enormous meadow filled with wildflowers overlooking the Sangre de Cristo mountains. John had just rejoined us after […]
On November 14, 2017, about 25 women gathered in a large white community center in Morazon, a remote district in eastern El Salvador along the country’s border with Honduras. The meeting was in second floor room with a polished wood ceiling and windows overlooking tiled roofs and trees, some full of flowers. The women sat […]
When Kentwood Wells was 12 years old, he and his parents stumbled across a magic lantern in an antique shop during a Maine vacation. The instrument, an old image projector that used a kerosene lamp for illumination, came with beautiful German glass slides depicting scenes of hunters, soldiers, and children. Wells’ family became fascinated by […]
