Cancer. The word spoken aloud can pierce your heart with fear. It’s not possible to live without being touched directly by this disease or watching helplessly as it affects someone you love. My dear friend Kristin, a botanist, river guide, herbalist, healer and Hopi language activist, has been struggling with breast cancer since she was diagnosed five...
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It was two years ago that I left my job at Grand Canyon Trust and my home in Flagstaff to learn how to be an organic farmer in Santa Cruz, Calif. I spent my last month at the Trust’s Kane Ranch headquarters, a central part of the geography of my heart. This cowboy outpost cobbled from limestone in the 1870s is nestled at the foot of the Kaibab Plateau...
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The darkening days of December are a struggle for me. I should be sleeping but the process of turning inward keeps me up all night by the fire, reading and dreaming and scheming. This is the time of year to plan the next farm season. For a novice, landless, itinerant farmer this means a great deal of uncertainty and unrest. On a recent long night, I...
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This year, in Flagstaff, we were fortunate to enjoy a long, lingering autumn. I drank in the last warm days surrounded by the ripeness of the world, just as it is at its peak, before yielding to the natural cycle of rest. I relished the shock of gilded leaves falling to the ground and the pungent perfume of summer decomposing into the earth, appreciating...
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If you’ve ever started over in a later stage of life, you may relate to the challenge and frustration of humbling yourself to the daunting task of learning something entirely new. When I decided to delve into the occupation of farming in my 40s, I encountered the walls I had constructed in my own mind around learning. Because I worked in the field of...
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