May I die in the spring after one last winter’s storm The first flakes fell yesterday morning. My wife, son, and I were returning from our daily walk and discussing the upcoming storm. The walk was uneventful other than the anticipation we both felt about the imminent arrival of Winter Storm Jonas. Throughout our walk…
My family walks with me most mornings. As mentioned in my previous post, we have all grown quite fond of our family walks. But sometimes, if I have work to do out in the field or if the family has other obligations, I walk alone through the mountains behind our property. I enjoy the family…
…let me have a draught of undiluted morning air. Morning air! If men will not drink of this at the fountainhead of the day, why, then, we must even bottle up some and sell it in the shops, for the benefit of those who have lost their subscription ticket to morning time in this world.…
Any day that I get to use a chainsaw, I consider a good day. The sound of the two–cycle engine’s one–note concerto. The smell of fresh saw dust. The manly force of the chain’s teeth. These are a few of my favorite things. Most days my saw just sits idle in my garage, but on…
Thirty–nine years ago, what we locals now call “the old way” was still just the way. The prehistoric New River Gorge dissected Fayette County, West Virginia, forcing travelers of Route 19 to traverse a narrow and winding mountain road if they wanted to cross the gorge. Not only were the bends and landslides on the…
Nearly every night since we arrived at our month–long stay at the cabin in the mountains, my family and I have listened intently to the sound of several owls, one of which sounds just beyond our dusk–to–dawn light’s illumination. “Who–who, who–whooooh. Who–who, who–whoooh.” Finally, after pulling into the driveway last night after a long…
My alarm rang at 6:29 this morning. At 7:30 I found the motivation to rise and greet the day. Misti and I stepped onto the cabin’s front porch and stared out into the Monongahela National Forest. We laid our mats onto the porch floor and began a stretching routine I adapted from the Army. The…
Sometimes it all comes crashing down on you at once. The bills are stacking up. You cross off an item on your “to do” list only to add two or three more tasks that you need to do. The walls seem to close in around you, and life seems more like a long list…
I’ve written countless pages of fiction, creative nonfiction, poetry, and blog posts since I began my endeavors as a writer. Most of which have been what I consider paying my dues. I have only a few legitimate publication credentials (with several hopefuls in the pipeline), quite a few essays and stories ready for revision, and…
To celebrate our anniversaries, my wife and I have agreed to alternate between romantic getaways and outdoor adventures. She, the hopeless romantic, prefers the former while I, the hopeless, prefer the latter, but we both just really prefer to be together. Two years ago, we celebrated by camping and canoeing the Greenbrier River. Last year,…
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