Category: Nature
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Insects inspected
This summer I managed to snap pics of a few cool and colorful critters spotted around our yard and house. And thanks to my phone’s aforementioned Visual Look Up, I actually know what they are. Here’s an ailanthus webworm moth: And a two-striped grasshopper: And a grapevine beetle: And some kind of mantis (species unknown):…
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Bye bye, butterflies
Recently my aunt got my 4 year old a “something special for the new big brother” gift: a popup butterfly garden with a cup of live caterpillars. The cup came in the mail prefilled with caterpillar food, which they ate over the course of a week as they grew and eventually retreated into their own…
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Mulch ado about gardening
We’re finally, finally, doing stuff in our yard and garden areas. Some of it is remedial caretaking—fertilizing and weeding the lawn, removing dead bushes and trees—but a lot of it has focused on beautification and planting vegetables we’re not totally sure will thrive but are giving a try anyway. I gotta say: I’ve really loved…
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A mind for winter
As above… …snow below: Before the recent heat wave started melting the abundant snow, I was able to enjoy a moment in the snowfall with Mr. Two Year Old, which is where I grabbed the clips above. I’m so glad he loved it as much as I did. Anytime I’m able to dwell in idyllic…
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Down from Basswood: Voices from the Boundary Waters
A friend of mine recently moved to northern Minnesota’s Iron Range. He said he’d been looking online for information about the region when he stumbled upon mention of an obscure book that was supposed to really capture the area well. It was the short story collection Down from Basswood: Voices from the Boundary Waters by…
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Meditations on Hunting
Can’t remember how I came upon it, but I recently read Meditations on Hunting by philosopher José Ortega y Gasset, published in 1972 and apparently considered a classic in hunting literature. It isn’t really about hunting itself, but the philosophies that undergird it and the meaning it can provide. I found great wisdom in these…
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Recent Views
More photography here and on my Instagram. From our go-to park last fall: Little man enjoying the ball pit at his cousin’s birthday party: The inside view of Madison’s capitol dome: Turns out kids love swings: A few shots from probably the last snowfall of an extremely mild winter:
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Quotes from the Underland
I’ve only made it through the preface of Underland: A Deep Time Journey by Robert Macfarlane—an “epic exploration of the Earth’s underworlds as they exist in myth, literature, memory, and the land itself”—yet rich quotes abound: “The same three tasks recur across cultures and epochs: to shelter what is precious, to yield what is valuable, and…
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Circle of lives
Somewhere on the Internet I stumbled upon this print from the artist Nina Montenegro’s series Against Forgetting: It struck a chord in me not only because I’ve been reading the tree-centric novel The Overstory, but also because six days ago I became a father. And I’ll tell ya, I know I’m barely a week into…