Hoping for Spring, Hoping for Earth

April’s reputation as a changeable, capricious month is well established, but it seems to have been particularly fickle this year. Each suggestion of spring was followed by a wintry interlude. Our early garden bloomers—hyacinths and daffodils—spent more time weighed down by snow or encrusted by frost than with their cheerful heads held high. After admiring … Continue reading Hoping for Spring, Hoping for Earth

Barn Art

I’m always touched by “random acts of art,” never more so than when they are committed in out-of-the-way places. I happened across such an artistic act in the eastern reaches of El Paso County in February. While driving along a little-traveled county road (the Peyton Highway just north of the town of Hanover, for those … Continue reading Barn Art

A Weaselly Surprise

When I noticed something bright in my peripheral field of vision and my eyes afterward focused on this sleek creature, I felt slightly disoriented. The animal seemed out of its element, at least in my mind. It was October 2020 and I was birding along a paved path in a well-developed suburban subdivision. A weasel … Continue reading A Weaselly Surprise

My Greek Year

Rather than discuss a year I spent in Greece (how I wish) or my membership in a sorority (which sounds like a nightmare), I will tell you about the completion of an odyssey started a couple of years ago. Whatever else 2020 might have been, it also was the year in which I finally reached … Continue reading My Greek Year

Winter’s Pageant

This winter has brought several bouts of much-needed moisture in the form of snow to Colorado Springs, and as I'm scheduling this post, portions of the Rocky Mountains are waiting with bated breath for the next wintry wave predicted to drop two-plus feet of the white stuff. The brutal arctic blast that swept through North … Continue reading Winter’s Pageant