One of the hardest parts of leaving Idaho for Vermont in 2021 was believing I would never again visit any of the cairns I built in the Payette National Forest to memorialize the lives of Maia and Meadow, my two Alaskan Malamutes who helped me explore wild forest places after we moved to Idaho in… Continue reading The Magic Remains
Tag: memorials
A Heap of Stones
Cairns are piles or stacks of stones constructed by humans. We’ve done this over millennia and across continents for a variety of purposes: burial monuments; spiritual ceremonies; marking the location of buried food or objects; way finders; astronomy aids; solstice celebration markers; land boundaries; battle memorials. The word cairn is Gaelic, meaning “heap of stones.”… Continue reading A Heap of Stones
The Wolf Visit
This morning, we saw one. A wolf. In the wild. Running a trail in a remote part of central Idaho’s Payette National Forest in August 2006, my two Malamutes and I were allowed to commune with nature in a way most can only dream of. First, the wolf and Maia exchanged direct looks. Then Meadow… Continue reading The Wolf Visit


