Winnie the Pooh is a hero of mine. He gets to spend all that time outdoors and he sees the world through the eyes of one who doesn’t overthink things, as I often do. Pooh once remarked that “people say nothing is impossible, but I do nothing every day.” Clever bear. And August is the perfect month […]
Driving the back roads of New Jersey I realize I am hopelessly lost. The directions I’ve been given are incomplete. Neither the map nor my GPS show the road I am traveling, which turns out to be a dead end. I turn around – again, and stop at a small town gas station for directions. […]
The month of March is a study in opposites. The warmth of early summer and the chill of deep winter, the calm stillness of a soft evening and the bluster of gale force winds, the vernal equinox, when hours of light equal the hours of darkness, these are all squeezed into that bottle of time […]
The variety of timepieces designed to measure the minutes of our lives is mind-blowing. Geniuses, pragmatists, and crackpots have developed devices large and small to mark the sun’s journey across the sky. Sundials, hourglasses, calibrated candles, and even elaborate incense clocks regulated daily prayers, work hours, and meal times. An Egyptian pharaoh was buried with […]
Nature presents its fair share of challenges and obstacles, but so far, the human imagination has been up to the task. We always seem to find a way up and over, through, under or around most things the natural world throws our way. Hiking the Incan trail in Bolivia I was struck how often stairs […]
A freezing cold fog has left a winter wonderland outside. Every twig and branch is covered in a shimmering coat of white. The air sparkles with frozen fairy glitter, beguiling and magical. I put on hat, boots, and coat to head out, open the door and stop short. My neighbor has sent her dog out […]
The most prominent feature on our face, our nose, precedes us wherever we go, yet seldom does this remarkable organ receive its due. Outside an abundance of smells both pleasant and otherwise awaits our often ignored proboscis. The next time you’re outside, make a mental note of the scents around you. Scientists once thought humans […]
Sometimes I don’t have to go any farther than my own backyard to be reminded of the wisdom of trees. On our urban half acre we have 22 varieties of trees. Within their branches we have catalogued over three dozen kinds of birds. These include the comical California quail, yellow breasted chats, and a pair […]
Opening the door just a crack on a winter’s day my Comfort-o-meter, aka my nose, takes a reading of the wet and the cold outside. Anything below 40 degrees and beyond a light drizzle indicates a good day to curl up by the fire, which is where the cat and the dog are already. The […]
At the equator, the surface of the earth spins at 460 meters per second, and in its journey around the sun our blue orb hurls through space at a breathless 30 kilometers per second, or 67,000 miles per hour. Within our own private spheres sometimes it can feel like we are moving even faster than […]