A friend and business associate decided to quit. He had a small business, part of the dying breed of the self-employed. Read comments

According to the Chinese Zodiac calendar, we are ending the Year of the Rabbit and 2012 will be the Year of the Dragon. Read comments

I say goodbye to a dear friend in the late autumn: I put away my old farm shovel for the winter. Read comments

I'm inspired when people figure out a very simple solution to a complex problem. Read comments

Educational researchers call them "the stayers," those who remain in a community and don't go away for college or employment. They tend to be treated as second-class students, a blend of dropouts and low- and underachievers. They stay put in a community and are stigmatized because they supposedly pull down educational levels and employment. They're also our neighbors. Read comments

How does a town tell its story? If a stranger wandered into any of our Valley towns, what would they see, hear and feel? Read comments

Baby shoes. Read comments

As you graduate from high school and begin a new phase of your life, let's look back at the world you grew up in and the specific cultural context that makes you different, a frame of reference that is uniquely yours. Read comments

My father passed away a year ago. Within nine months, his sister, my Aunt Tomi, also passed away. Our family lost something more than their two spirits. Also gone was an old fashioned family leadership model of the older brother and older sister. Read comments

My daughter got stuck. The tractor she was driving rolled into a mud sinkhole on our farm this past winter. Read comments