When John Muir wrote, “The mountains are calling, and I must go,” he didn’t realize how deeply I’d feel that call in my bones. There is something about the crisp air at elevation, the vast silence interrupted only by the wind, the way the world stretches...
I didn’t see it coming – but then I did. The forgotten passwords. Her TV began to go on the blink intermittently, never an explanation. She began to iterate on topics previously discussed, not just repeating herself but fixating. It’s hard to say she really forgot...
Done something really hard lately? Recently, I did. Before 30, every “first” seemed challenging. College. Jobs. Marriage. First mortgage. Fatherhood. Bigger mortgages. 🙂 It isn’t hard to see how these were all great stretch opportunities, sweet enhancements to my...
I skied yesterday. Earliest day I can remember free-heeling in the back country. November 9th. We hiked it very early that morning—7:00 a.m.—myself and two of my sons. I eyed the snow depth every half mile or so, and tracked six inches at the trailhead, eight at what...
Dad was 24 and single when he got his first boat—a new, 1956 StarCraft—15 feet long, burgundy and white, with a 30-horsepower hand-cranked motor. “It was a fishing boat,” he told me. “One of only two boats in Rigby. I got it to take my dad fishing out on the lake.” It...
Here I sit, practicing a solo version of “You Are My Sunshine” on my harmonica—the same instrument that my grandfather taught me to play. His was a unique style, a combination of single notes offset by a lower beat that traced the music but didn’t define it. A back...
