High Country News March 31, 2008
Feature
My Crazy Brother
Ray Ring takes a personal, painful look at the West’s suicidal tendencies, as shown in the life and death of his brother, John.
Editor's Note
Breaking the silence of suicide
It may seem like a considerable departure for High Country News to write about mental illness and suicide, but as Ray Ring’s deeply personal lead story shows, both tragedies are rooted in the West.
Dear Friends
Dear friends
“Poetry Corner” brings verse from readers; schadenfreude in the correction department.
Two Weeks in the West
Two weeks in the West
A good time to buy a McMansion – cheap; lawmakers wrangle over development; “eco-terrorism” in suburbia; EPA head honcho in trouble; cleaning up dirty Western air – and a few dirty Western politicians.
Uncommon Westerners
Native Intelligence
Lili Singer is in love with California’s native plants and wants to share that love with other people.
News
Conservation easement conundrums
New York transplant Erin Toll helps Colorado crack down on conservation easement abuses.
3:10 to Baghdad
In the desert outside of Yuma, Ariz., the United States military prepares for overseas combat.
Book Reviews
Reasons to stay
In Charlotte Bacon’s novel, Split Estate, a damaged New York family seeks refuge and renewal on a Wyoming ranch.
Thinking like a fish
The essays in Chad Hanson’s collection Swimming with Trout celebrate the wonder of water and its mysterious inhabitants.
Essays
Wyoming’s day in the spin
Ed Quillen looks behind the recent brouhaha of Wyoming’s Democratic caucuses, and speculates on Hillary Clinton’s response to Barack Obama’s victory in the state.
A message to our grandchildren
Environmental pioneer Stewart Udall and his wife, Lee, ask their grandchildren to be “steadfast enemies of waste.”
The loneliness of the redneck environmentalist
Drew Pogge is caught between two cultures: the redneck good ol’ boy gearheads of his youth, and the holier-than-thou environmentalists of his present.
The legacy of the 10th Mountain men
Peter Shelton spends a day skiing and reminiscing with the veterans of the Army’s 10th Mountain Division.
Heard Around the West
Heard Around the West
Spring is around the corner, even in Wyoming; toilet-to-tap without a “yuck” in Orange County; Utah lawmakers say the craziest things; how nonprofits deal with stress; pink poodle kerfluffle in Boulder; and pterodactyls in Washington.
