The Good Wolf of the North

It has been almost a year since I left my home in woods for a new one on the plains. I won't lie and say it was an easy choice, but it is one that has been made and it's better to look forward than back. Now the White Pines have been replaced by fields of wheat and soybeans. Country churches and grain elevators dot the horizon where panoramic sunsets can expand unhindered by landscape. Though quiet and beautiful in a structured way, things feel distinctly foreign here. Now what can I do but put in a both feet effort to find a piece that fits? Step one is finding nature, because it's out there, hiding between sugar beet fields. That determination brought me and a visiting friend from back home on a camping excursion to a little known state park, Hayes Lake. If you're wondering where it is, just drive north where the soybean fields meet state forest. Just before you hit the border you'll find a patch of woods welcoming you to camp and explore. A year ago I lived

Are you a night shifter, or even just a run of the mill insomniac? Having been a nurse for almost fifteen years (damn, that sounds like a long time) I've done my share of night shifting. Companies can sure make it sound enticing with fat shift differentials and the absence of management raining down extra tasks on you, but as we all know, everything costs something, and night shift costs sleep. When I first dabbled in night shifts I told myself I could sleep when I'm dead. I soon felt like that appointment would come quicker than expected if I continued to deprive my body of this fundamental need. One weekend, when I was desperate to get a dog fence put up, I remember working all night at the hospital, sleeping two or three hours, fencing the rest of the day, then going back to work at night. That's probably not the the nurse you want caring for you when you come bursting into the ER mid stroke, but in reality, sleep deprivation of night shifters is more common than you m

Have you ever listened to a podcast called Mortified? The premise is this: a middle aged adult on stage reading from his or her high school diary or poetry collection. It's inspirational, it makes me feel better about my own high school diaries, which I recently unpacked while setting up my new office.  While I don't expect to do a reading on Mortified, I have threatened to read from one of these old diaries, circa 1996,  at an open mic night. I've even gone so far as to visualize it: I'd walk on stage wearing glasses with thick tortoise shell frames and a loosely tied scarf like all female authors seem to do on TV. Once up there I'd shuffle through a stack of bound books, flipping pages wildly until I found just the right entry. Then I'd hold it into the light and the crowd would wait in earnest to hear something brilliant. Then, I'd begin:                                 "He was in Third grade when I was in Kindergarten. I want to marry