(Humboldt County, October 1996. Tensions mounted at the Owl Creek Tree Sit, where a village of at least half a dozen activists occupied strategically-located trunks in an attempt to protect that grove of ancient redwoods…
Posts published in “Essays”
The scream echoed through the house like a fire alarm and caused the paniolo (Hawaiian cowboy) to bolt from his seated comfort in the anteroom. Following the sound he arrived in the kitchen on the…
If you want to see something sickening skip right past the latest video games or the most brutal Game of Thrones episode, shut off the DVR, and settle in for the current Pacific Gas and…
If you, or perhaps someone you are acquainted with or care about, is currently on the fence about a life spent doing drugs — either taking a pro-position on the issue or actively engaging in…
“War is hell,” General William Tecumseh Sherman observed during the hellish American Civil War. It’s hellish for human soldiers and also for dog soldiers who play a valuable role in the so-called war against terrorism.…
Jaipur, India — I have watched a whole family of monkeys perched on ancient stonewalls, and I have followed elephants as they’ve galumphed down the avenues of monstrous cities—undaunted by polluting buses, trucks and scooters.…
I drove up Highway One Monday afternoon to the old Fort Bragg Grange building in Inglenook to meet the local resistance. The Grangers, officially The National Grange of the Order of Patrons of Husbandry, were…
Everybody who knows the history of the medical marijuana movement knows that Dennis Peron started the San Francisco Cannabis Buyers Club in response to the AIDS epidemic, circa 1990. Less well known is that the Prozac epidemic…
Jeff Hillier sat in Cove Coffee at Arena Cove Pier when in walked Jim Murphy of Mountain View Ranch. A fixture at the coffee shop since 1989, Murphy’s an old logger. Jim offered to buy…