[Red velvet birthday cake, November 2008.]
The other night when I went running — for the first time in the dark after months and months of post-work light, alas — the moon rose out of the west very pale and bright, just a shimmering sliver. I thought about what would or wouldn’t happen the next [...]

Be the change you want to see in the world. - Gandhi

[Election cake, November 2008.]
PLEASE VOTE.
This morning I woke with a start: I thought I’d overslept, but it was just the time change that made it seem so, and I was actually up before the alarm. As I lay in bed I remembered: today’s the [...]

[Pacific Ocean from Tomales Point, October 2008.]
How I spent my birthday: up at 8 a.m. to pancakes and lots of coffee, presents in the backyard sun. Then to Pt. Reyes for a 10-mile hike through the dry fields, elk eying us placidly, a slight coastal breeze (just enough to temper all that sun but not [...]

[On Skye, October 2003.]
I always think about Scotland in October. Five years ago tonight I was perched on a cliff above the Atlantic Ocean watching the sun slide down into the sea while the hills and rocks of Skye spread around me. I’m turning 25 tomorrow, I thought. That seems old somehow — or, [...]

[Beets from the farm, with local butter, September 2008.]
So in early September I went to Maine. I took a 6 a.m. flight from San Francisco by way of New York, and landed up in Portland only a little off-schedule. It was warm enough — most welcome, after the omnipresent coastal fog of home [...]