Well, the first round of thunderstorms wasn’t nearly as impressive as they looked on Doppler radar, and the amount of rain they produced nothing like predicted. Weather forecasting has always been a crapshoot and I for one am glad it’s not my responsibility to divine the proverbial tea leaves. I’d hate to be … More Discoveries and disgust during disciplined spring cleaning
“I don’t believe in anything anymore: god, country, money or love.” – Dorianne Laux This is the life I always wanted but never knew how to dream: Rabbits in a two-acre yard with a view of the northern edge of the Flint Hills and a wide river a half mile away, a … More All that matters I hold in my hand
It seemed like another lifetime, tinted with a faint sepia tone like an old faded photograph, impossibly distant, but not so distant that its details failed to surface as we replicated each somber step of the journey. Ours was a slow and stately procession, or would have been if not for the road’s adherence to … More Consigned to this fair land
If the new metropolis is a cultural stew, rural America, at least in my neck of the prairie, is a goulash. Frankly, this surprised me. From what I’d seen over two decades of annual visits, northeast Kansas was predominantly white, Protestant, friendly and Republican. (Which proves that there’s no … More The world’s first but not the last
“They’re just a big pile of rocks,” my friend said. “What’s the big deal?” Responding to such a concept—that the Rocky Mountains were nothing more than a jumble of boulders—left me all but speechless. My friend, a man just turned 35 years of age and never having once seen a mountain or a foothill, was … More Why I’m here, why I’m not
A black cat killed a rabbit last week, my neighbor said. Did it right over there—pointing to a shallow roadside ditch abutting his garden. The ditch was a wild tangle of elms, mulberries and Osage oranges, a place of concealment and cover for predator and prey alike. I hadn’t seen it around before, he said. … More A wary and uncertain contentment
Rain turns to sleet turns to snow turns to bright sun turns to howling south winds bringing the smell of salty Gulf moisture. One afternoon I hobble through the yard plotting a garden and the next I shovel snow from the driveway. Scheduling an outdoor photo shoot is little more than a gamble because the … More Preparing for the worst
I’d like to say it was a bittersweet moment when I slipped the key from my key ring and deposited it in my boss’s inbox, said goodbye to one of the office staff working late and exited out the back door without fanfare, pealing trumpets, drum rolls or stirring soundtrack to mark the occasion. Had … More The nature of doors
Before turning southward onto a road that seemed more liquid than gravel I saw a kid barreling toward me on a four-wheeler, chunks of mud shrapneling the air and the vehicle yawing back and forth as if skating on ice. I pulled over and waited for him to pass. The nearer he came the less … More An act of violation
She is forever there, imprinted in a thin layer of emulsion, a smile on her pretty face and the West Texas wind billowing her long flowing dress. Behind her a grainy, unformed mass of what appears to be creosote or catclaw grounds her to a desert landscape that could only be Chihuahuan, … More Last of the Parkers
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