I first drove across the United States during the summer of 1982. My mother and I loaded up our family’s 1970s-era American station wagon — you know the kind: huge V-8 engine, body big enough to land planes on, trunk/jump seats in the back..the kind of station wagon the Griswolds drove to WallyWorld — and headed west to my brother’s wedding in Utah. I was 16 years old and my mother had insisted I get my driver’s license as soon…
I try to mark the solstices whenever possible. It’s the pagan in me, I guess, but among the ingredients in my personal gumbo of a spiritual life, observing the concrete astronomical and natural forces at work in the universe seems to me like a pretty good hedge. Edward Abbey said, “I stand for what I stand on.” To Ed’s sage wisdom I would add: “and also what I stand below.” And by that I mean the sun, the moon, the…
19 June1020For the first time on this trip — so, just over a month in — melancholy has set in. I’m really missing Alaska this morning. The feeling was undoubtedly set off by our morning motorsail northeast from Å. There, the mountains along the coastline rise steeply from the sea, with a narrow strip of land at the base that provides just enough room for a road and several small villages scattered along that road. The mountains themselves taper from…