Recently, walking at dusk, residents of a suburban neighborhood near the Ronald Reagan Freeway on the northern edges of the Los Angeles Basin spotted a bear. What? At the edge of highly urbanized Los Angeles county? This is what the landscape looks like on a map. Likely, the bear had been born and raised in […]
Landscapes
Swimming with the Salmon
I recently followed the Salmon Spirit to the upper Columbia River region, my literary homeland. The first time I felt that spirit’s power was in 2019, when I attended a tribal ceremony marking the release of several dozen ocean Chinook into Lake Roosevelt Reservoir. With the 500+ foot Grand Coulee Dam blocking their ancient pathway, […]
Salmon River Dreams
In June, I explored the Snake River system of central and southern Idaho for an upcoming book with Braided River Press. The 2024 book will also feature the beautiful photography of David Moskowitz, which you can see here. The Salmon and its cousin the Clearwater are tributaries to the great Snake, a waterway nearly as […]
Emergence Takes Time
Nearly a year ago, I posted about the remarkable yucca species known as Our Lord’s Candle, or, Hesperoyucca whipplei. I have been busy with writing projects since then – too busy for blog posts. On a recent walk in the dry canyon where I live, I came across another yucca plant, this one preparing to […]
Lighting a Flame
In April, 2021, the Supreme Court of Canada confirmed that the Sinixt/Arrow Lakes tribe are Aboriginal People of Canada. It was the end of a long legal road travelled by this transboundary tribe, to reverse a 1956 Canadian government declaration that they were “extinct.” The word “extinct” descends through English from the Latin word extinctus, […]
The Sense of an Ending
It’s nearly the equinox, when day and night are equal in length, often called the first day of autumn. For several weeks, creeks in the upper Columbia River region have hosted anadromous sockeye salmon, returning home to spawn and die. Chemical changes transform the silver scales of the adults into vivid red. After they spawn […]