When the Spanish arrived in California centuries ago with their quest for gold and domination, did they look at the arid landscape and the puzzled faces of the American Indian families, and think “And just how do we make THIS work?” After all, no one wants to disappoint a benefactor, especially when it’s a royal…
Author: katrina
Do Museums Inspire You to Change?
An estimated 2.4 million pounds of plastic enter the world’s oceans every hour, so Seattle-based artist Chris Jordan took 2.4 million pieces of plastic from toothbrushes, combs and all the other junk that fills modern life and created a recreation of the famous Japanese painting “The Great Wave Off Kanagawa” by Hokusai. We’re drowning in…
Summer of the Wee Beasties
In three weeks, I’ve been on two different antibiotics for two different infections. After avoiding antibiotics for years, believing my green smoothies and regular jogging protected me from almost everything, my summer embracing the outdoors has led to two trips to the doctor’s office and an afternoon cracking jokes in the emergency room. It was…
Two Very Different Sides of Lake Champlain
Lake Champlain is America’s sixth largest freshwater lake, and was once a hot spot of colonial military activity. Amid bear carving shops, ski resorts, and cafes serving fluffy flapjacks with thick bacon are forts and other nods to the region’s colonial past. Could 18th century northeastern Americans settling here have predicted that the lake would…
Sharing My Rocky Mountain High
Mike and I were in the Adirondack Mountains in upstate New York last week, looking out on to the blue mountains, which can fall in the range of 4,000-plus feet, and thinking about Lewis and Clark (because that is what geeky, literary couples do). The Adirondacks are moving in their own right, blue peaks undulating…