Photo: A beautiful dawn on an ordinary winter day.
A reminder to savor the ordinary beauty in the world.
Latest
Adventures in aggrieved entitlement: The nightmare world of tax protesters.
Interiors: Den at “Slabsides,” John Burroughs’s rustic cabin, West Park, New York.
The lost cataclysm: The Cascadia earthquake and tsunami of 1700.
Historic Painting: “Self-Portrait with Vanitas Symbols” by David Bailly, 1651.
Thin flat plastic slabs of my childhood: Remembering CED videodiscs.
Fire off Long Island: The S.S. Lexington disaster.
The Verge
Adventures in aggrieved entitlement: The nightmare world of tax protesters.
What happens to your life when grumbling at your tax bill becomes a moral crusade? Nothing good, as history shows.
The lost cataclysm: The Cascadia earthquake and tsunami of 1700.
Historic Painting: “Self-Portrait with Vanitas Symbols” by David Bailly, 1651.
Thin flat plastic slabs of my childhood: Remembering CED videodiscs.
A bunny, boiled: “Fatal Attraction” and my strange history with it.
Historic Photo: Paris in winter, near Saint-Augustin Church, 1952.
The Poseidon phenomenon: Thoughts on a New Year’s Eve disaster that never was.
The Outer Garden
Photo: A beautiful dawn on an ordinary winter day.
A reminder to savor the ordinary beauty in the world.
Interiors: Den at “Slabsides,” John Burroughs’s rustic cabin, West Park, New York.
Fire off Long Island: The S.S. Lexington disaster.
A timely warning: The prophetic words of Rutherford B. Hayes.
Year’s end: The best of the Garden in 2025.
Have a wonderful Christmas!
The Truce of 1914: A thought of hope for Christmas.
The Inner Garden
It’s Not Love, Actually: Watch me do an about-face on the world’s worst Christmas movie.
A dozen years ago, I passionately defended this film. In 2025, I'm ashamed of myself.
Behind the Scenes: China’s Long Revolution, 1900-1950.
Behind the Scenes: Brazil in the World Wars.
Searching for a story: A look at my chaotic writing process.
Behind the Scenes: The American Revolution, In Its Own Words.
The book(s) I’m working on: “Faraway Star” and “Wild Among the Moons.”
