“We recognized that, actually, our lives are richer for working with people whom we had previously written off…”
Category: Essays/Poetry
THE DAILY YONDER: Mud Season
In past years, I actually looked forward to mud season because it brought friends out of hibernation and into the woods…
ESSAY: Bad Bunny, at Halftime
Maybe nothing flipped overnight. Maybe hardened partisans didn’t suddenly renounce their politics. What happened was subtler — and more powerful…
Ancient Sky, Ancient Wisdom
The sky loomed large for early Native Americans, and its cyclical changes were cause for connection, awe, and ceremony…
EVIL MISTRESS: A LIfelong Affair with Music, Part Ten
Michael was larger-than-life, and sometimes amazed us with his antics…
EVIL MISTRESS: A Lifelong Affair with Music, Part Nine
March, 1978, back in Big D, we showed up at the Texas Music Awards at the sprawling Lone Star Ballroom…
A Debate Over Black Civil Rights in Colorado’s Final Territorial Legislature
Language protecting racial equality in CU admissions drew opposition from Democratic lawmakers…
EVIL MISTRESS: A Lifelong Affair with Music, Part Eight
We did our first concert at a festival at Lee Park; special guest, Randy Lee on sax. The crowd numbered in the thousands…
INTEL FROM THE IVORY TOWER: Honor the Linemen
Thanks go out to these tough linemen, on the field or on the snowy streets of our cities, from a grateful writer…
BIG PIVOTS: What Would John Wesley Powell Say About the Colorado River Crisis?
John Wesley Powell was both an adventurer and a scientist. Perhaps that’s exactly what we need now to end the Colorado River stalemate
EVIL MISTRESS: A Lifelong Affair with Music, Part Seven
We were booked two weeks at the Big Country, owned and operated by Snuffy Smith…
EVIL MISTRESS: A Lifelong Affair with Music, Part Six
Marching to the beat of two different drummers…
In 1876, Colorado’s New Public University Stood Finished… But Empty
Local dignitary and early University of Colorado booster viewed public schooling as ‘the palladium of our liberty’…
ON LAND: No Smoke, No Fire, in Montana Land Ownership Trends
The study opens by noting that most wildlife habitat in the United States is privately owned…
EVIL MISTRESS: A Lifelong Affair with Music, Part Five
The new and final name for the band was ‘Django’, named after guitar legend Django Reinhardt…
How ‘Agitators’ for Women’s Suffrage Shaped Colorado’s 1876 Constitution
With statehood on the horizon, national suffragists sensed opportunity in the Western territories…
EVIL MISTRESS: A Lifelong Affair with Music, Part Four
I was somehow cast with a Country trio called the Country Truckers. (I enjoyed calling it the ‘Mother Truckers’…)
ESSAY: A Year of Progress, Partnership, and Gratitude
These accomplishments represent just a portion of the important initiatives undertaken over the past year…
EVIL MISTRESS: A Lifelong Affair with Music, Part Three
We were a cover band, a commercial dance band. And we put on a pretty good show…