Health and Service — Volunteer Trail Docent
A faux heart attack — that moment when the ER doctor said that it was time to lighten the loads that […]
Milkweed for Migrating Monarchs
This story can also be read in The Cambrian Embedded just over my right eye is a one-inch scar. I was a tad […]
Do Not Use Dynamite to Blowup Garden Gophers
Like the Middle East, this garden vs. gophers is a historical war. My next door neighbor just nukes the furry beasts when he finds them. But, I, Ms. Organic, won’t bait them with poison, so they tunnel under our property lines and into paradise—my garden.
I Can’t Save the World—But I Can Reduce My Carbon Footprint
Not everyone agrees that your or my collective carbon footprint amounts to a hill of beans. Others shiver at the thought of another law or more government. And those who profit greatly from fossil fuels are the first to challenge any notion of the need to reduce one’s carbon footprint.
Planted Face Sprouts Purple Eye
It was a gardening-perfect day. The sun poured light like glistened milk from heaven into my garden lot. Towering spouts of gray […]
Rachel Carson’s Relevancy Fifty Years Later
I read Silent Spring in 1968. It changed my view of the natural world and was more than incidental in my personal growth. Carson’s plea for moderation and close observance to what and how we walk upon this earth speaks louder today than it did 50 years ago. Her opponents live on and rally against anything that smirks of environmentalism. To my point of view their arguments remain shallow and manipulated.
429 Anti-Inflammatory Flames of Good
This floodgate of what I now call “sparks of light from the prism” amaze me. It is everywhere. I find good deeds in my newspaper’s letters to the editor, on Facebook, in books I’m given, and from random discoveries. A heightened awareness of good seems to foster more good. It also spins my Irish temper into an Irish toast. What would once have given me cause to jump all over some nincompoop now coerce me into smiles and humor.
August Sunflowers and Tainted Turkeys
Clearly, this is not the bird our ancestors deemed perfect for a day of thanks and giving.
The Gift: A Handful of Purple Berries
Today this wildly off-balance pendulum struck my personal life. Oh, there was no catastrophic tragedy, just a realization that things aren’t like they were or how I want them. Yes, I’m one of those former middle class Americans trying to find my way through the maze. I feel like Jack in the Jack in The Box commercial who whines, “I am so tired of this recession.”
Then I received a gift. An absolutely free gift—probably from bird poop.
“Superior Intelligence…and Firepower” in the Garden
I’m agitated. I’m feeling like I want to go all Carl Spackler and build exploding clay varmints. While current politicians and news events still send me to a very large glass of wine at night, that’s not what makes me struggle with thoughts of sharp or explosive objects and chemical warfare.
