I am lucky to live in the heart of the city, where I can walk or bike to work and play, and I’m only a hop and a skip away from a provincial park where I can lose myself in the woods and lakes for days. What I cannot escape […]
I am lucky to live in the heart of the city, where I can walk or bike to work and play, and I’m only a hop and a skip away from a provincial park where I can lose myself in the woods and lakes for days. What I cannot escape […]
Oh, and the night, the night, when the wind full of cosmic spaceGnaws at our faces – R. M. Rilke, Duino Elegies (trans. Leslie P. Gartner) IF WE CONSIDER the phenomenon of solar flares, Rilke’s description of how cosmic winds sometimes blow in our faces is surprisingly true. Atmospheric auroras, the […]
EARLY SPECULATION on what caused the train disaster in Lac-Mégantic, Québec, in July seems to have settled on the role of the train’s engineer and the railway company’s poor safety record – and penchant for cutting corners. Some attention was also paid to the out-dated technology used for dangerous cargo, […]
THERE’S A NOCTURAL SPECTACLE that I can’t recall seeing in the flesh before I moved to Kitchener, Ontario, a couple of winters ago. I’d take post-work walks to gawk at the bruised sky at dusk, and often as darkness fell I’d stumble across an enormous murder of crows. Thousands of them […]
From the northern lights to light pollution, the Night issue investigates ideas that resonate most deeply in the dark. In this issue, cultural historian Giles Slade looks at the cosmic activity behind the northern lights (which hit the peak of their 11-year cycle this fall) and discovers that North America’s energy […]
Out for a late winter walk in 2006, I was suprised to see a bat flying around in broad daylight in a wooded area of Bedford, Nova Scotia. Seven years later, Nova Scotia’s bat population is hanging by a thread and I have to wonder whether White Nose Syndrome (WNS), […]
The Night issue investigates ideas that resonate most deeply in the dark. Giles Slade sizes up the vulnerability of North Americans’ lifestyles against the possibility of a serious geomagnetic storm.
Trudy Sohl got to try out one of Kitchener’s new community access bicycles for the women’s bike ride last week. Because she doesn’t have a bike, she was particularly enthusiastic that she and her daughter were able to take the new cruiser-style bicycles for a spin downtown. And the best […]
On the warm sunny evening of August 1st, in an area best known for spectacular sunsets and relaxing on the beach, the local community hall in Saugeen Shores, ON, was at standing room only.
A mushroom island of Baobab trees perched atop the Bay of Moramba. A leopard’s gaze as it drinks from a water pool in the blackness of night. A group of nomadic Nenets surrounded by the hostile Siberian tundra. This is but a glimpse of Sebastião Salgado’s Genesis, an environmental art exhibit […]