After three Columbia River tribes decided to stop pushing for the breaching of four federal dams on the Snake River, many critics spoke the ugly word “sellout.” The tribes will receive $900 million in new salmon projects in exchange for halting their court battle for the next decade. However, the Warm Springs, Yakama and Umatilla […]
Essays
Posted inWotr
These are the West’s good old days
When I was younger, I was sure I’d been born into the wrong century. Everything I read about America in the 1800s made me wish I’d lived along that expanding Western frontier where people lived adventurous lives. My life seemed stale and predictable in comparison, with all the excitement sapped out of the West, buried […]
Posted inApril 14, 2008: Taking to the Trees
Plowing under the fields of shame
Under a brain-scorching heat, a group of farmworkers harvests melons from a vast field near Huron, Calif. There is only one woman among the dozen or so workers; she leans into the task, her arms outstretched, her body itself a tool. The bandana around her face and her baggy long-sleeved T-shirt offer a thin protection […]
Posted inWotr
The secret of Los Angeles’ great-tasting water
Los Angeles has done it again — topping the list for the World’s tastiest tap water. “Good water rises to the top,” said producer Jill Klein Rone of the 18th annual “academy awards” of water held in Berkeley Springs, West Va. “Our tasting process is vindicated when the same waters are rated by a completely […]
Posted inWotr
Can I lose 20 pounds before my 50th high school reunion?
My 50th high school reunion is this summer. I’d love to go. But vanity and I long ago parted company and while I probably don’t look any worse than most women my age, I no longer have to whip out my ID to get the senior discount. I tell myself that it is a long […]
Posted inApril 14, 2008: Taking to the Trees
A hard winter makes you think
After more than a decade of mild winters, we residents of this high-altitude town in southern Colorado finally got a dose of the genuine article. Not since “Remember December,” when it snowed every day in December 1983, had anyone seen this much snow. But stories told by old-timers, those former miners who stayed on here […]
Posted inApril 14, 2008: Taking to the Trees
Tough sledding
A few weeks ago, after a party, my son Truman, who is 7, asked me, “You know when I was outside yesterday with Danny?” “Did you have fun?” I asked. “Yeah,” Truman said. “Except Danny said he was going to kick me in the head because I don’t believe in God.” This is the kind […]
Posted inWotr
Don’t be afraid of the big bad bears
Ah, spring: The bloom of flowers, the song of birds, the paranoia of the National Park Service. I have come to expect it just as I expect muddy boots at the door and crowded pews at Easter: If you live in the same part of the world as Glacier or Yellowstone national parks, you will […]
Posted inWotr
Home, home on the cyber-range
A different kind of neighborhood news now serves parts of Colorado’s Front Range, those high-altitude communities “up the hill” from Denver. It’s paperless, free-form, relentlessly local and increasingly popular. It’s a Web site called Pinecam.com, and for people living in the towns of Conifer, Pine, Bailey and Evergreen, it has become a fact of life […]
Posted inWotr
Push, whack, shove, wallop and pound
I started with hard red wheat. Our pioneer ancestors mostly ate bread made of cornmeal until the wheat began to thrive in the arid climate and thin soil. Hand grinders like mine pulverized it fine enough for bread, even cakes. Kneading, I could see my grandmother’s strong arms working the dough on the cupboard by […]
Posted inWotr
A hard winter makes you think
After more than a decade of mild winters, we residents of this high-altitude town in southern Colorado got a dose of the genuine article. Not since “Remember December,” when it snowed every day in December 1983, had anyone seen this much snow. But stories from old-timers, those remnant miners who stayed on here long after […]
Posted inWotr
The loneliness of the redneck environmentalist
I don’t have that many friends. I’m not a bad guy; I call my mother, eat my broccoli, and pay my taxes. But I’m a country-music-listening, PBR-drinking, rusty-Jeep-driving good ol’ boy — and I love the environment. I grew up rural in the Rocky Mountain West and Midwest, where farming and ranching still reign. It […]
Posted inWotr
An empty canyon full of everything
Lamoille Canyon doesn’t attract many tourists. It’s in Nevada’s remote northeastern corner, and that’s just fine with me. I’ve come to the Ruby Mountains for something that’s becoming rare in America: a starry sky and a generous helping of Western birds. Even the drive to Lamoille Canyon is wonderful. Telephone poles on the deserted state […]
Posted inMarch 31, 2008: My Crazy Brother
Wyoming’s day in the spin
Talk about surprising: The Democratic presidential candidates actually paid some attention to Wyoming. With only 522,830 residents, according to last summer’s Census Bureau estimate, Wyoming has the smallest population of all 50 states. Furthermore, no Democratic presidential candidate has carried the Equality State in 44 years, not since the Lyndon B. Johnson landslide of 1964, […]
Posted inMarch 31, 2008: My Crazy Brother
A message to our grandchildren
‘The lifetime crusade of your days must be to develop a new energy ethic to sustain life on earth.’
Posted inMarch 31, 2008: My Crazy Brother
The loneliness of the redneck environmentalist
I don’t have that many friends. I’m not a bad guy; I call my mother, eat my broccoli, and pay my taxes. But I’m a country-music-listening, PBR-drinking, rusty-Jeep-driving good ol’ boy – and I love the environment. I grew up rural in the Rocky Mountain West and Midwest, where farming and ranching still reign. It […]
Posted inMarch 31, 2008: My Crazy Brother
The legacy of the 10th Mountain men
South of Vail, Colo., in a mountain meadow framed by 14,000-foot peaks, deep snow hides the ruined foundations of Camp Hale. In the winters of 1943 and 1944, 15,000 men equipped with rifles and skis swarmed the surrounding terrain, training for alpine combat in the Army’s 10th Mountain Division. When I drove by in February, […]
Posted inArticles
Surviving a friend’s suicide
‘I know something about black holes now—because there was one inside of him.’
Posted inWotr
Easter and the urban farmer
If she’d lived, this Easter would have been the fourth birthday of my eldest hen, Annabelle. She was the last of a tribe all named Annabelle, all of whom arrived as day-old chicks on Easter Sunday 2004. In the intervening years, various Annabelles fell prey to dogs, skunks and finally, last week, raccoons. Such is […]
Posted inWotr
The energy we take for granted is becoming scarce
A modern snowmobile is more powerful than any machine that existed on the planet 200 years ago. In an hour you can be 20 miles from the nearest road, high-marking a corniced ridge. But if the engine breaks or you run out of gas, how quickly the tables can turn. One minute you are omnipotent, […]