This anonymous old New England poem says it all: A wonderful bird is the pelican,His bill will hold morethan his belican. (or belly can) He can take in his beakFood enough for a week,But I’m damned...
Children's Books
Ballerina
When I was a little girl, I dreamed of being a ballerina. But my mother told me my Teutonic genes made that impossible…and maybe she was right…but I wish I’d had the change to try, anyway. What...
Twilight Competitors
This was my very first fully-executed watercolor painting.For Christmas, 2000, my husband came home with armloads of art supplies as a gift for me. He said he was tired of hearing complain that I...
Fast Food Web
Remember learning about food chains? Today environmental scientists talk in terms of the “food web,” a complex interaction of sunlight, microbes, plants, prey and predators exchanging energy at many...
Mermaid Tales
Remember your school definitions? A mammal is a warm-blooded higher vertebrate that nourishes its young with milk secreted by mammary glands and has skin usually covered with hair. Well-known marine...
Desert Princess
I lived in Iran during my high school years. Things were a little different for Americans during the time of the Shah than they are now. I’m so sorry that current politics keep our people...
Swing Into the Present
When I was a kid, I loved going to the playground and taking endless turns on the merry-go-round. I liked the way it felt to be at the center of the vortex and have everything around me become a...