Letter from Home | A collection of essays originally written for Flagstaff Live!

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Dear Sam and Rose,

Dear Sam and Rose,

Posted by on Dec 18, 2014

Greetings from the Global Warming Research Zone #10 where we received our first measurable snow since last May this past weekend. It was only a dusting but now the San Francisco Peaks look like the optimistic winter scenes that have been flocked on store windows since early November. Sue turned her chickens loose in the spent garden and they are faithfully...

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Proverbs woman

Proverbs woman

Posted by on Oct 9, 2014

She considereth a field and buyeth it, with the fruit of her hands she planteth a vineyard.  She looketh well to the ways of her household and eateth not the bread of idleness. Her children arise up and call her blessed; her husband also, and he praiseth her. — Proverbs 31:16, 27, 28 I dream. I’m sitting on wicker furniture with a friend in an apple...

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Searching for the White Buffalo; Poetry as medicine

Searching for the White Buffalo; Poetry as medicine

Posted by on Sep 4, 2014

The storm clouds boil up the eastern sky until a wall of gunmetal gray curls over and above me. A westering sun fires up the corn and pole beans and the tall shaggy pines that border the over-achieving garden. They stand like cardboard cutouts against the backdrop of the approaching monsoon storm. Blunt fingers strum the strings of my pensive heart. I get...

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Waiting for the harvest

Waiting for the harvest

Posted by on Jul 31, 2014

It was a hunt to remember. Ken Ralston and I had muzzle loader permits for elk on the North Rim. Ken had been my companion for many adventures through the years and I looked forward to his company and the scenery almost as much as the hunt. I was not familiar with this territory, but Ken assured me he knew the deep canyons and ridges like his own mama’s...

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Outlaw etiquette; Muley and life on the train

Outlaw etiquette;  Muley and life on the train

Posted by on Jul 10, 2014

My mug of coffee steams like a sentient being and hums between my palms. The clerk smiles when I place a dollar tip in the jar. She has a purple streak in her hair. I wait my turn at the fixings table. The woman in front of me adds one Sweet’N Low and a shake of non-dairy chemicals to her cup and selects a wooden stirring stick from the open container....

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