High Country News

Ashes

A woman and her son say their final goodbyes to a friend who committed suicide.

by Kathleen Dean, Sep 17, 2007
Finding reassurance in change: a review of Wild Comfort

In her new collection of essays, Wild Comfort: The Solace of Nature, Kathleen Dean Moore writes her way to the knowledge that "sorrow is part of the Earth's great cycles."

by Chérie Newman, Mar 20, 2011
In search of greener pastures

Laina Corazon Coit and her brother, Rick Chase, want to create Colorado’s first natural burial ground and wildlife refuge on the eastern prairie

by Jennie Lay, Oct 30, 2006
Mute, riven, blessed

All over the West, white roadside crosses and spontaneous, humble shrines mark the holy sites where the souls of human beings have left this world

by Brian Doyle, Apr 17, 2006
Natural comfort

It seems romantic to die alone in the wild, until you begin to lose the people you love

by Ana Maria Spagna , Jun 12, 2009
Resurrecting J. Thomas

The crumbling remains of a man named J. Thomas have a story to tell about life and death in the northern Colorado in the 1870s

by Laura Pritchett, Mar 20, 2006
The end is near -- the end of 2011

People should be less worried about the allegedly dire predictions of the Mayan Calendar, and concentrate on making the next year better, since we’re all on earth for a limited time anyway.

by Alan Kesselheim, Dec 01, 2011
The meeting of heaven and earth

A park ranger talks about the increasing practice of mourners scattering the ashes of loved ones outdoors in national parks.

by Paul Zaenger, Sep 05, 2005
The memory of mountains

The author remembers a long-ago hike up Pikes Pike with her mother, who later died having no memory of that hike, or of her daughter.

by Diane Sylvain, Sep 18, 2006
What is that dead deer thinking about, and why is he hanging there?

A close encounter with a deer head on the wall of an inn leads to musings on death, immortality, ancient Egypt, Lenin and Trigger the Wonder Horse.

by Andy Seiple, Dec 22, 2011