Saudade. The Portuguese have a word to explain perfectly the mourning I feel upon the suicide of Anthony Bourdain. Portugal’s…
We camped in woods filled with rosemary growing wild. We awoke to the bees rising in a buzz and wondered…
When I first looked at the house I’d move into in Portugal, the owner seemed relieved when I mentioned that…
Light comes in through the clerestory windows clouded by decades of salt. It’s bright outside, but still shadowed and cool…
Nasturtiums bloom yellow and orange–almost red–under their spreading green umbrella shades, covering the piles of landscape clippings that otherwise just…
“I swear they grew here last year…like weeds!” Where on earth did they all go? The milk thistle arrives each…
The piles of oleander branches surprise me as I crest the hill. We knew about the massive clearing of the…
During winters growing up in Iowa, one common holiday gift came from a well-meaning neighbor or friend: the Fruit of…
In the midst of the winter, the callas come out. Normally, they’re preceded by the fiddleheads, the first curls of…
“Time to stockpile wood, for when the rains come.” I have this note to myself from last year, when January…