Category: The Inner Workings

Short, potentially scary, insights as to what goes on in my brain.

February 27, 2021 / / 616

  September 2017–I knew it was there somewhere.  Deep in my second floor storage closet in the Noble Hotel was a rectangular, blue, Tupperware bin of tools.  There was an…

December 25, 2020 / / NOLS
November 18, 2020 / / Horses
October 24, 2020 / / Family

I knew there would be some choice words for the cars in front of us whenever we next stopped, but the truth is I am glad we were going twenty…

September 23, 2020 / / Horses
August 23, 2020 / / Horses

The phone rang.  I looked down at my desktop and saw a 307 number–Wyoming–but not one I recognized.  I picked it up.    Three weeks earlier in mid-March, NOLS had…

June 15, 2020 / / Family

Editor’s Note:  a compilation of various things I have written in the past mixed with new material, this is posted here today in honor of what would have been my…

June 4, 2020 / / Pandemic Dialogues

NOLS courses are hard. My jaw thrusts downward and outward while my hands cup the sides of my mouth. “Rrreeddd tent, close your vestibule” I yell from my tent door…

April 26, 2020 / / NOLS
April 2, 2020 / / Pandemic Dialogues

Editor’s Note: I have had this languishing in a folder of documents for a while, mostly as written below. The Corona sure has thrown a wrench into the plans of…

February 21, 2020 / / The Engine of Survival

I keep a running list of ideas for blog posts.  At the top of it lie three quotes which have struck me hard over the past months.  They bring tears, desire…

January 27, 2020 / / On Being a NOLS Instructor

I started off with two strikes against me. Water is not my element and Spanish is not my language. Luckily Maija and Fiona were kind enough to take spots nearby…

November 17, 2019 / / The Inner Workings

“How do you process thoughts and ideas?” is a question I often ask in the course of doing my job. The quiet, internally processing instructor can be enigmatic, confusing, or…

October 23, 2019 / / The Inner Workings

For twenty-three and a half years I have done what I wanted to do.  I have made my choices and chose, for the most part, wisely (matters of the heart…

July 28, 2019 / / Climbing

“I’m willing to bet that the drive and the walk will take more time than the climbing will, even with three of us.” Above us lay 200 feet of granite…