It was the flash cards that prompted Helen White to speak up. Seven years ago, the school counselor at Sparta Elementary School was observing a third-grade music class when the teacher held up pictures of stringed instruments…read more

I consider myself a good sport. But my sporting ability – well, that's another matter. Two other prospective archers, Melissa and Irene, are standing in front of me at the archery range in England. They look as though they know what they're doing, and, even though their arrows are not quite making it to the target, I'm impressed… read more

My fiancé, Matt, and I are standing on a roadside in Kentucky deciding whether we want an old cast iron sink full of mud. For some, this might be an easy choice. But we are playing the is-it-a-piece-of-junk-or-an-antique-worth-saving game… read more / view gallery

Postcard 1:  I have just reached my hotel in Quito, Ecuador. It is a city screaming with bus brakes and rabid dogs. I am already weary, but I pause to talk to a woman who has set up shop on the stoop outside of the lobby. Her name is Rosa. She is 79 years old, and she has spread her white linens over gray cement where they appear as fully bloomed lilies growing in stark contrast to such a gritty city…read more

I noticed the puma on my first day in town. The cartoonish, carved wooden mask hung just inside the open door of a store next to the hotel where I was staying during my time in Cuenca, Ecuador…read more

Unlike our parents, as my generation navigates the professional world we are faced with a job market that expects us to move on after a few years so they can hire younger, inexperienced workers whom they can pay less. The corporate ladder may have been in place a generation ago, but we're the ones for whom the rungs have been spread out across the country and all over the world... read more

To reluctant skiers, the bunny slopes of Colorado look more like bears. I am one of them...read more

There must be hundreds of claw-foot tubs in this field. They're lined up in long, straight rows that, from a distance, might look like cotton waiting to be harvested. The owner of this offbeat crop, Mr. Faircloth, is known in my small town as the "tub man." ...read more

“Can you believe this is here?” Gary asks, heavy sadness in his eyes. By trade, he is a biologist, but I know he is not referring to an out-of-place species. He is referring to the people. They are all around us, mining the garbage of Quito, Ecuador...read more

Ladybugs are, well, ladylike houseguests. I should know; I hosted dozens this winter. Living in an old farmouse, I'm used to unexpected guests...read more

When my plane touches down in Guadalajara, Mexico, I disembark with a plastic bound conversational Spanish guide and a small rolling suitcase. The agency arranging the home stay for my study abroad hadn't been able to give me any details about the woman I would be living with for the next few months. So, I search the crowd looking for my mysterious hostess...read more

The concrete-and-tile house in which I'm living in Boquete, Panama, is often filled with echoes of the indecipherable chatter from the restaurant next door. It is patronized by men in evenly pleated Panamanian shirts and women in flower print, polyester dresses...read more

I cringed when I saw the bicycles. They looked harmless, stacked like dominoes against the wooden fence. But dominoes were designed to fall, and so, in my experience, were bicycles...read more

Alfred Michels' shop smells of sweet pipe tobacco and wood varnish. Often, lazy smoke curves around the room, caressing the slender bodies of violins left hanging by the curve of their scrolls, and dancing around the substantial bellies of stand-up basses waiting patiently for their turn to dance...read more

Every Thursday night, Boone Stockyard is filled with the blood, guts and glory of bona-fide bull riding. But before cowboys strap on their spurs and dirt is kicked into a shimmering dust, there is prayer...read more