It is almost time. My sabbatical year is practically finished. Soon I will resume my “normal” academic life. There will be classes, independent studies, new graduate students, meetings, and a diverse collection of research projects to attend to—plus the responsibilities, minutiae, frustrations, distractions, and pleasures (there are a few of those) associated with my duties […]

Recently, two friends and I hiked into the High Sierra and camped for two nights at a beautiful timberline lake, beneath granite cirques rimmed with last winter’s snow. Along the way we spent a long and delightful day rambling across the broad alpine expanse of Humphreys Basin and scrambling up Four Gables peak.  From the […]

I began my sabbatical year at 8:00 a.m. on September 9th, as I drove out of Brockport and pushed west toward a three-week stint as a writer-in-residence at Great Basin National Park. Fifty hours and 2,200 miles later, I arrived at the park—worn down by my insistent motion, but happy to be in the West. My […]

One of the great joys of my writer-in-residence “position” is the opportunity to explore some wonderful aspects of the Great Basin with National Park Service biologists. Last night was one those occasions, when I tagged along with a crew headed to a nearby cave to band bats. The cave is a well-known roost for migrating […]

Yesterday an early storm brought snow to the high country. In a day or so, as September temperatures warm, meltwater will percolate through the thin soil, and where the rocks are right it will slip into limestone fissures, carrying a hint of acidity deep underground. As it has done for millions of years, the water […]