Would You Like Scaling and Root Planing With That?
[dropcap]A[/dropcap]ngela, a bright, pretty, 30 year old came to me for a TMJ exam last week and when I asked her who her general dentist was, she told me she didn’t have one. “I just moved to San Diego from the east coast and I am looking for a new dentist. I went to Acme
Sherpa Stew and Yak Butter Apple Pie
[dropcap]T[/dropcap]he mountain came into view at dawn, a beautiful alpenglow pink against a still dark but clearing sky. Lang Tang, 23,711 feet tall, is not even in the top ten of Himalayan peaks, but its magnificent shape captured me. We were at the first of several tea houses on our way up the Lang Tang
Chop Wood, Carry Water…and answer your cell phone
Old meets new in the Middle Himalayas [dropcap]I[/dropcap]’m in the back seat of the bus from Kathmandu to Pharping, literally the end of the road. It’s a jouncing and twisting hour-long ride and although I never suffer from car-sickness I’m fighting nausea with every turn on this mountain road; at Pharping I’m happy to make
A 1950s Christmas
[dropcap]W[/dropcap]e lived in those days in a modest farmhouse at the end of a gravel country road a quarter mile off the two lane county highway. There was a barn and in the winter our cows did not venture outside (of course there’s a story about the cow manure and how we spread it over
River Memory
[dropcap]I[/dropcap]have written about this little stretch of river before, (see Sand, Stars and The E-Myth) but the Colorado River is a treasury of memory. Standing at the upper boat dock just last week brought some of them streaming back to me. My dad introduced me to this place decades ago. His smiling face, big hands,
Chipotle Women on Mt. Whitney
[dropcap]O[/dropcap]ne night after we’d returned home, I woke up from a dream with some words echoing in my head and I scribbled them down. In the morning I didn’t remember writing them and in fact—since they were written in the dark—could hardly make them out: “If you see a distinction between the genders, it does
Mt. Whitney Warm-Up
[dropcap]S[/dropcap]he had driven her Ford Ranger pick-up, painted the forest green of the National Park Service, from Lone Pine up the narrow switch-back road to Horseshoe Meadows. Her khaki shorts and shirt clung to her young, thin form and showed off strong runner’s legs. I happened to be in the parking lot, retrieving some gear
High Sierra Springtime, 2013
[dropcap]I[/dropcap] spent a few days over the Memorial Day holiday hiking in California’s eastern Sierra and recalled some of the things I’ve read about mountain and woodland walks. So here are a few photos and quotations the places brought to mind. “The mountains are calling and I must go.” ~ John Muir “In some mysterious
In School With the Posture Police
[dropcap]I[/dropcap]n my elementary school days, I went to a one room country schoolhouse where Tom Sawyer or Huckleberry Finn would have felt at home. It’s an historical landmark now—you can Google it: Papoose Creek School. And yes, one couldn’t possibly give that name to a school these days. Papoose Creek School was one modest room,
