Lay of the Land
The Last Cricket
BLAME IT ON OCTOBER. A nor’easter blows rain for three straight days and the gleam of blackened tree trunks lifts every summer thought from my head. Then one night I find Continue reading
Lay of the Land
Lay of the Land
The Pill Bugs of Federal Plaza
EVERY MORNING , my young daughter and I walk from our apartment just above ground zero in Lower Manhattan to her school in the shadow of the Brooklyn Bridge. We cut Continue reading
Lay of the Land
The Poet and the Scientist
MY FATHER has collected the most substantial body of fish-based Index of Biotic Integrity data for a watershed of its size anywhere in the world. This is an accomplishment he can Continue reading
Lay of the Land
Brilliant Forests, Burning
British Columbia is burning, like so much of the West — and like so much of the West, Seattle is smoky, streets dim and Victorian, mountains hazy, particulate levels exceedingly high. Continue reading
Lay of the Land
Ferreting Out the Plague
AS I SWERVE OFF the exit toward the Grand Canyon corridor on AZ-64, I talk with my wife, who has called me from home, on the hands-free. We debate which would Continue reading