State park trail entry point.

Journey Home

Tales from the pilgrimage.

  • The Climate Crisis — Who to Read

    Long-time followers of this blog know I joined The Climate Reality Project, a non-profit organization founded by former U.S. Vice President Al Gore that educates the public about climate change and advocates for urgent global action. Chairman Gore seldom speaks outside the context of the project, so who else do I follow to stay up… Read more

  • Summer Reorganizing

    The last leg of my summer reorganization is about scheduling time so I get the most important things done. I don’t want to be a slave to a to-do list, yet there are things I want to accomplish in life. Importantly, these are my book A Working Life, reducing the number of possessions, and helping… Read more

  • Last Days of August

    On Friday, I received a second set of comments on the second part of my autobiography, A Working Life. Two more copies are out to early readers who are close family members, yet I’m ready to move forward with the second big edit. I expect this work to begin as the garden winds down. There… Read more

  • Dreaming of First Settlers

    I hadn’t realized the fall migration had begun. I saw a Monarch butterfly land on a milkweed plant that had already flowered, and was thankful because it had been a couple of years since I saw one. Later, I saw a couple of them flying across the road when I drove to town. This weekend,… Read more

  • Assessing Storm Damage and Change

    A family member had two trees damaged during a storm and my spouse and I got talking about it. I decided to go there and see if I could help. That became my Monday. I organized my trip better than most. If I hadn’t gone to Des Moines, I could have traveled to the Karakoram… Read more

  • We’re Going Home — Dave Morice

    Dave Morice died at peace in a West Branch nursing home on Friday, Aug. 21, 2026. I did not know him in his later years, although everyone knew him as Dr. Alphabet. While writing my autobiography, I wrote about time I spent with him and other members of the Actualist Poetry Movement. Some of us… Read more

  • Tomato-geddon has Begun

    I posted this photo on Bluesky and it got more than 900 likes. The timing must have been perfect. We are on the cusp of the Midwestern tomato harvest, which was what I tried to capture. Note there were 40 comments at the time of this screen shot. I read them all, and learned something… Read more

  • A Rustic Soup

    It began with the first wave of tomato harvest. Because of the rain, a number of themburst their seams. I only knew to cut off the bad spots and store them in a stainless steel mixing bowl with a dinner plate as a lid. I put the bowl in the refrigerator overnight. Read more

  • Tacos with Guajillo Chili Sauce

    When I got to 6:30 p.m. I couldn’t account for how I spent my day. I literally could not remember what I did after returning from the grocer in the county seat. I tried reconstructing events. When did, I received phone calls, wrote emails, Ate food, and the like. It was no help… the afternoon… Read more

  • Return to Journaling

    In January I began a new journal using an inexpensive, spiral-bound notebook. It is a place to write without public eyes. I need that. The pages have been slow to fill, yet when I do write there, I find a place to express something personal. I am glad to be back in that habit. I… Read more