June 10, 2018 Four summers ago, I went to write a magazine story about a root-digger in the mountains of East Tennessee, coalfield country. I spent five days with her, riding around that rugged region & talking with neighbors, walking in the woods with her. I have 38 pages of notes & several hours of… [ Continue Reading ]
Nov. 9, 2017 Thank you to terrain.org for nominating my essay “Seven Words for Sustenance and Gnawing” for the 2018 Pushcart Prize! I am so honored and grateful. [ Continue Reading ]
Oct. 25, 2017 >> My essay “Places that Have No Names,” in which I ride a train from El Paso, Tex., to Lynchburg, Va., was included as notable in the Best American Travel Writing 2017 collection! The essay originally appeared in the Oxford American‘s 2016 Southern Journeys issue. So grateful that the OA has been… [ Continue Reading ]
Sep. 28, 2017 >> My essay “A Complicated Belonging” accompanies Jeff Rich’s collection of photographs of the Tennessee River watershed, a stunning book that’s been published by Fall Line Press. I’m thrilled to see the book hot off the press; it has a truly elegant, artful design. Rich’s work in the TN River watershed looks at the impact of the… [ Continue Reading ]
Sep. 12, 2017 >> I spent five weeks this summer living and working on the Big Island of Hawai’i, in a continuation of what has always felt a disjointed relationship with the place, though it has gone on for 30 years now. My father is the thread who led me there & the reason I’ve… [ Continue Reading ]
July 7, 2017 >> A piece I wrote last year about native mussel species of the Tennessee River watershed is out now in the Summer issue of the Oxford American. I am delighted to see it in print, and I could not have asked for a better photographic pairing: Sally Gall’s “Efflorescence.” The OA doesn’t post… [ Continue Reading ]
March 29, 2017 >> Mycelium as both metaphor for, and actual physical reality of, interconnectivity and the cooperative nature of creation has been on my mind lately as a kind of guiding idea. I think that we need the story and symbol of mycelium now, as it reflects also our human structures and reminds us how… [ Continue Reading ]