It was the talk of the internet last week: an Instagram selfie of 78-year-old domestic icon Martha Stewart, emerging from her Lily Pond Lane swimming pool in full makeup, hair... more
Wind comes at a steady clip, and the killdeer position themselves to endure it. They dot the headland, each separately nestled on the leeward side of a grass clump or field stubble. Their white breasts give them away. Out of the wind, soaking up the sun, small bodies find ample shelter in a scrape of earth. The killdeer will be with us all season now. They spend early spring on the open fields. They follow the plow and the planter. Anyone who has spent much time operating a farm tractor knows this bird will get precariously close to your front ...
21 Mar 2023 by Marilee Foster
“Water reuse has been increasingly recognized as an essential component in effective water resource management plans,” says the “Long Island Water Reuse Road Map & Action Plan” unveiled last week. “The United Nations formally acknowledged the importance of water reuse in 2017,” it adds. “The benefits of water reuse have long been recognized and embraced in other parts of the world,” it continues. And now, in the United States, “approximately 2.6 billion gallons of water is reused daily.” But in New York State, “large-scale water reuse projects have been limited. There are a few projects in upstate New York, and ...
by Karl Grossman
By Peter Mayer It is close to impossible for the average American to follow the decisions coming out of the Supreme Court of the United States. However, certain matters that come before the court may have a direct impact on the functioning of our democratic form of government — a concept that should be of universal interest. On December 7, 2022, arguments were heard by the Supreme Court in a case called Moore v. Harper. The central issue was the question as to whether state legislatures should have independent power, not subject to any judicial review by state courts, to ...
20 Mar 2023 by Peter Mayer
My parents, three and four generations removed from their ancestral homes, never made a big deal about being Irish. There was no corned beef and cabbage, no talk of the old sod or its politics, or of relatives still living in Ireland. But I have always been drawn to the Irish — their literature, humor, brogues, and the men. All my life people have told me that I look Irish. I feel Irish. Although I had traveled through Europe and lived in Norway for a summer, I had never visited the Emerald Isle, mainly because their cuisine seemed to be ...
14 Mar 2023 by Denise Gray Meehan
Water reuse: It’s essential for Suffolk and Nassau counties, dependent as they are on an underground water supply, a “sole-source” aquifer below for water. A “Long Island Water Reuse Road Map & Action Plan” will be unveiled next week about making use, through reuse, of water from below. For years, there’s been concern over the quality of the water in Suffolk and Nassau counties, and steps have been taken to prevent and deal with the contamination of water. But the issue of water quantity has been largely ignored. Ancient Rome pioneered the building of sewers that dumped used water into ...
by Karl Grossman
Late winter is a very amorous time in the Northeast. You can hear it at daybreak when the wren wakes the neighborhood with his first territorial blast. A rooster, still muffled in the coop, answers back. You can actually see it later in the morning when two doves, two regulars at the feeder, have begun to perch next to each other. They touch each other, chase each other. To us, their behavior looks outwardly flirtatious. And we know they, like any set of seasonal lovers, will sneak off into the pines, to do “it.” The red-tailed hawks have been together ...
by Marilee Foster
In reality, all the months are windy. Wind is how the Earth gets things done. It’s how she moves mountains and places seeds. But we peg March as a windy month in the Northeast because the blows are of a certain type: nonstop and noisy. The wind in March breaks branches made brittle by winter. The wind throws empty flowerpots. At night, it whistles around windows and doors. The March wind will build to a prolonged howl as its plays against so many obstructions: a tree, a wall, a loose gutter. The wind plays each like a particular instrument, and ...
7 Mar 2023 by Marilee Foster
on Jul 28, 2020