Coyote Crossing

Three Announcements

1) In the first hour or so of the year, as Annette and I celebrated at our local gaybar-cum-Chinese restaurant,* I suggested that 2012 is the year in which we should make it legal. She agreed. We are happy. Details regarding the wedding are

Healthcare

I have been unwell these last weeks, hence the quiet around here. I’m on the mend, it would seem: all but the coughing.  I spent the third week of June trying to focus enough to get some work done, for the most part unsuccessfully. I spent the week

Palms to Pines

We lit out for the countryside this afternoon, figuring that watching the sun set over the Valley from some vantage point up on the mountain was a good way to mark Valentine’s Day. Smart of us. There’s a road that climbs up San Jacinto from Palm

South Lykken

The shadow of Mount San Jacinto falls on Joshua Tree National Park. Photo taken from the north end of the South Lykken Trail.

It’s been an interesting week or so, perspective-wise. First came the obligatory and even trite introspection that comes

Leap

Two weeks ago, lying on my back at 7,400 feet watching the stars peer down at me through a canopy of piñon and juniper, it struck me — once again — that I have been fortunate.

I was in the White Mountains, trying to fall asleep after a day of

Jacumba

A thousand feet from the border fence. A thousand chorus frogs sing in Boundary Creek. The air is cool, a moist tang of sulphur from the spring.

A bright planet settles toward the mountains in the west. Jupiter, we guess, and we watch Orion

Cathedral Range, Thanksgiving 2007

Along the Tioga Road, Yosemite National Park

Thanksgiving was always his day. Almost two decades of a house full of people each year, him begging for snacks at the center of it. The first time the holiday rolled around after he died we couldn’t

Sheep Pass

Yesterday, around 3:00 PM. Driving on Park Boulevard, Joshua Tree National Park. We drive past a sign that says “Sheep Pass Campground.”

Me: You know, I bet you could get a really good night’s sleep there.
The Raven: [near-silent groan]
Me: You

The Raven and Red Cliffs

She told me later she’d tried to climb and a piece came off in her hand. Not surprising: this is the loose, friable rock of the Ricardo Formation, lakebed sediments that accumulated from the Miocene through the Pleistocene. My map calls it

Live Action Shot

A photo by my pal Michele: yours truly reading some of my work at the Desert Protective Council annual membership meeting last Sunday at Whitewater Canyon Preserve. (In the foreground, my favorite person in the … (continues)

Dodging the random beautiful

I have been thinking about love these days.

This is of course nothing new.

Relationships end and they begin, relationships maintain themselves and they wither. These days I am both buoyed by love and burdened by it. The last vestiges of my

Mountains, ardent

It was somewhere around Mendota that I saw the hawks, a dozen of them, in a mixed flight of ravens around a stand of eucalyptus. The hills to the west were glowing, their sculpted structure plain in the slanted light. The Raven asked why the hills

Harper Lake

It came to me on the scent of creosote, cloying and resinous, and wet dust driven before a summer desert storm. A sudden gust out of the glowering east sent the little car skittering across the lane, and as I tightened my hands on the wheel the

The Deluge

A year ago The Raven and I watched the storm.

We had come up from the river, the day’s ferocious heat still seared into our skins. A hundred fifteen in Bullhead City, and we’d staggered against it, even the sidewalks beneath our feet shimmering

Regarding the Mexican Wolf

Taking a break from educating the public at the Arizona-Sonora Desert Museum

I’ve been quiet here for a little bit. Some of the reason is that I’ve been busy with a couple of other projects, one of which I’ll be saying more about here in a few

Envoy

One day melds into the next. I sleep fitfully, wake late, write nothing for days on end. I stare at the screen, get up, get more coffee, fall asleep drinking coffee.

We walked into the hills three days ago, my gaze turned sullen inward. Ceanothus

Wee Thump Sunset

Slept on the ground last night in sub-freezing temperatures. Woke up surrounded by Joshua trees growing out of patches of snow. Drove with The Raven along Route 66. Ate lunch-dinner at the Bagdad Café.

Best Birthday Ever.

Also, please join me

Ripley Desert Woodland

Snow remains this afternoon, thin glazed patches underneath the junipers. Ravens fly in pairs through the Western Mojave sky. A pair approaches, not seeing us behind a stand of juniper and Joshua. First one and then the other double-takes, stumbles

Surprise Canyon

There’s snow on Telescope Peak right now. We saw it from the spot we hiked to in Red Rock Canyon State Park this afternoon, my first visit in years. (The Raven and I sat for a time where Zeke and I sat one night long ago.) And then a few hours

End of November

The valley here runs south to north. At sunset the shadow of the Clark and Ivanpah mountains creeps across the valley floor, a second hand marking the time in yards. From where I sit, a mile up the washed-out road to the Lucy Grays, I watch the