Mindblown: a blog about philosophy.
-
Blogging for a Better World: Girl Scouts at PEEC
On October 26th, PEEC welcomed over sixty Girl Scouts for a day of badge work and exploration at PEEC. To help our scouts in the badge work of sharing their experience, we ask them to write a few words about their adventures: “Are you a person of nature and the great outdoors? Well if you…
-
Me, I Want a Hula Hoop
Naif in the Forest by Darrell Berger Wing Tips to Hiking Boots: Musings of a New, Full-Time Poconos Resident Violet the Corgi is convinced there are chipmunks living in these pallets. She can smell but not see them. I can’t photograph them. She’s been telling me they are everywhere this fall. Chipmunk populations increase after…
-
The Shale on the Trail
A Naif in the Forest by Darrell Berger Wing Tips to Hiking Boots: Musings of a New, Full-Time Poconos Resident Two Ponds is my favorite trail at PEEC. Its water is horizontal. My wife prefers Tumbling Waters, where the water is vertical. To me, it should be called Tumbling Hiker. I find it too challenging,…
-
Under Milkweed
A Naif in the Forest by Darrell Berger Wing Tips to Hiking Boots: Musings of a New, Full-Time Poconos Resident The open milkweed pod with its cottony seeds was an annual fall decoration in the schoolrooms of my early education. Milkweed was among the first plants I could identify. “See,” my father said, “it’s called…
-
Oh, Deer!
A Naif in the Forest by Darrell Berger Wing Tips to Hiking Boots: Musings of a New, Full-Time Poconos Resident This photo shows a deer exclosure in Rockville, Maryland, a suburb of sixty-eight thousand people seventeen miles from Washington, DC. Rockville both values its modern conveniences and protects its natural beauty. As a result, there…
-
Fear Itself
A Naif in the Forest by Darrell Berger Wing Tips to Hiking Boots: Musings of a New, Full-Time Poconos Resident This is the first snake I have featured. Those I have seen in my part of the forest are too small and fast. By the time I see one, it is gone, under a log…
-
What it Takes to Migrate
A Naif in the Forest by Darrell Berger Wing Tips to Hiking Boots: Musings of a New, Full-Time Poconos Resident I was jealous of my wife for taking such a great photograph of a male Monarch butterfly. I had tried repeatedly in the spring, but they proved too busy. I rationalized this by concluding that…
-
Never Pet a Green Caterpillar
A Naif in the Forest by Darrell Berger Wing Tips to Hiking Boots: Musings of a New, Full-Time Poconos Resident There was a large green caterpillar in the middle of our front door threshold. I attempted to move it from harm’s way. I gathered it into my hand. I immediately felt a sharp sting. I…
-
A Plague of Misinformation
Naif in the Forest by Darrell Berger Wing Tips to Hiking Boots: Musings of a New, Full-Time Poconos Resident Until this week I thought locust, cicada and katydid were different names for the same critter, like pop, soft drink and soda all indicated carbonated beverages. Regional differences. Wrong. This is a locust. I think. A…
-
A Dubious Partnership
Naif in the Forest by Darrell Berger Wing Tips to Hiking Boots: Musings of a New, Full-Time Poconos Resident The field near the creek is alive with goldenrod, a sign of fall approaching. That was why the dark yellow writing tablets of my early education were called Goldenrod Tablets. I walked through the goldenrod without…
Got any book recommendations?