Autumn is the season of dying and death – but life, as in our own experience, carries on. Winter, to me, is the first season of life. In temperate zones, perennial plants, most notably trees, are asleep in winter. Thing is, a lot of infant vegetative color appears throughout theContinue Reading

Our evening was cooler than expected. A quick but fierce thunderstorm moved through our late July afternoon that day, complete with loud rolling booms, cracks of lightning, and a torrent of falling water. On the northern Appalachian Trail, among the beech, maple, and birch-covered Green Mountains of Vermont, our campingContinue Reading

Freedom, consciousness, and wildness are all around and ever present as our feet lightly jog across an old, wooden dock. We move gently in the golden light of an aging afternoon sun. With each stride, I sense everything. Blushing coral clouds travel like vessels across a cerulean sky. Brilliant flowers,Continue Reading

Our river is the Obed River in southeastern Appalachia. There are five of us. We’re all good friends. We work at the same restaurant and watering hole, the old Sunspot, on the old strip – otherwise known as Cumberland Avenue in Knoxville, Tennessee. We are coming of age, living inContinue Reading