Tale Of A Prodigious Cottonwood

Cotton pickin’ cottonwood, detail of the cotton produced by the female cottonwood out near our back patio, photos © 2009 by ybonesy. All rights reserved.         …or is it prolific?                   I’m a giant cottonwood, tall and stout I make lots of cotton if [...]

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R.I.P. Farrah And Michael (We Loved Your Hair, Among Other Things)

Oodles of words have been spilled about the deaths this past Thursday of both Farrah Fawcett, at age 62, and Michael Jackson, age 50, and oodles more will be said. There’s little I can add, except perhaps this.  When I think back to my youth in the 1970s, I will fondly remember one gift among the [...]

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One Tree At A Time

Vietnam Purple, blooming flower in the jungle of south Vietnam, May 2009, photo © 2009 by ybonesy. All rights reserved.       We leave on two buses for a hydroelectric plant in south Vietnam, near the forest where later in the day we will tend trees. I wear jeans, a blue t-shirt like everyone [...]

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Baby Eagles At Summer Solstice

Baby Eagle 5, fledgling eagle in nest, Minneapolis, Minnesota, photo © 2009 by SkyWire7. All rights reserved. feathers fly above eagles on Summer Solstice learn to leave the nest Post Script: It’s Summer Solstice, the longest day of the year in this part of the world. We didn’t have a formal Summer Solstice celebration this [...]

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The Ant & The Peony

The Ant & The Peony, a garden haiku, Minneapolis, Minnesota, June 2009, all photos © 2009 by QuoinMonkey. All rights reserved.                   benevolent myth growing in gardens worldwide do ants open buds?                   When the peonies on the side [...]

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10 Tips From Stephen King — On The Craft Of Writing

Coffee (Get Your Motor Runnin’), outside Diamonds Coffee Shoppe, a great place to write, Minneapolis, Minnesota, June 2008, photo © 2008-2009 by QuoinMonkey. All rights reserved.     It’s a rainy morning and I’m slowly waking up. It’s been a strange week. Many irons in the fire, not enough focus, distracted. I have felt like a [...]

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Call For Entries!!! — Out of The Blue Films “ENVY Contest” At red Ravine

    Whom and what do you ENVY? Who has envied you? What’s the difference between jealousy and envy? How has ENVY impacted your life? Barbara Rick, a Peabody & Emmy award-winning filmmaker/journalist based in New York City, and president and founder of Out of The Blue Films, Inc., explored these questions and more in Tuesday’s [...]

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Cracking Envy (Or How I Learned To Stop Romancing A Deadly Sin)

By Barbara Rick     Envy Green, New York Botanical Garden, 2008, photo © 2008-2009 by Barbara Rick. All rights reserved.       It’s a hard, rotten knot of a word. Sinister. Secret. Has a way of gripping me by the throat and squeezing my soul of rational thought, patience, and generosity. Keeps rolling [...]

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Exposed

Strange Bird, self-portrait, May 2009, pen and ink on graph paper, doodle © 2009 by ybonesy. All rights reserved.       Sitting on a United Airlines flight, San Francisco to Hong Kong, I am relieved to find the middle seat empty as the last passengers take their seats. The plane starts its slow taxi [...]

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