NOTE: This is the first in a series. What has changed in Moab & Vicinity in the last couple of decades? These are my own remembrances going back to the late 70s. What was here…what’s gone…what’s lost forever? And…what’s new?…
It was early afternoon and the grocery store was bustling. The cashier’s name was Candy. Candy had her long white hair smoothed back into a low ponytail. Thin and agile, she wore blue jeans and her regulation-red vest. She cast…
“The truth will set you free, but first it will piss you off.” Gloria Steinem San Juan County comprises a splendor of canyons, cliffs and castles of sandstone. Anyone who has made a random discovery of 1,000-year-old artifacts of human…
Cultural and political rifts widen as newly elected Navajo commissioners of San Juan County, Utah, govern by resolutions approved without advice or informed consent of those governed. Critics say the commissioners’ private attorneys writing those resolutions and offering legal advice…
One of the most interesting lessons of history is how ideas, skills, and character traits are passed on from person to person. This is a story of a twenty-three-year-old Swedish explorer and scientist, Gustaf Nordenskiöld, who brought some remarkable influence…
Under the sun without summer and in landscapes familiar to me, and still I wonder what the hell am I doing here. A couple of weeks ago, I went for a walk not far from the house I’m renting and…
“The problem with the conservation movement is that it has clear conscience.” — Wendell Berry. DISCLAIMER: This story makes no attempt to offer ‘solutions’, nor do I have any illusions, when considering the Future of Moab, Utah. I am simply…
Paul Vlachos is a New Yorker who understands The West. And he is a New Yorker who understands New York. Wherever Paul goes, he finds signs of life… I was going to write about “quiet.” It’s a subject close to…
I was raised on a dairy farm, and grew up with the strength that long hours, hard work and responsibility gives a farm kid. When I wasn’t doing chores, I wandered and explored the fields, woodlands and swamps. I didn’t…
The kid — male, age 16-25, stupid — was about nine feet up a sandstone fin, within sight of his campsite at the Devils Garden. He (I’ll call him Bobby) had been showing off for his girlfriend, eager to thrill…