Grace Olmstead is a journalist and author of Uprooted: Recovering the Legacy of the Places We've Left Behind. Her writing has been published in The American Conservative, The New York Times, The Washington Post, The Wall Street Journal, and others. You can connect with Olmstead on Twitter and through her monthly newsletter.
We live in an increasingly polarized society, but there’s a role to be played by people who want to be bridge builders.
The instrumentalizing of our relationship with place has left us only practicing stewardship when we benefit from it. But it's our responsibility to live with an attitude of longevity.
A conversation about small towns, the need to tell complicated rural stories, and what we owe to the places that formed us.
It’s tempting to think the challenges we face in the “unprecedented year” of 2020 require big, top-down, unprecedented solutions. But this may be exactly the right time for the “little way.”
We need each other. Whether we live in a small town, dense city, or sprawling suburb, we can’t do life alone…or at least not well. How do we resist fragmentation and find the wholeness and community we need to really thrive?
It’s not easy to live without a car when you have young children, but it’s certainly possible. Plus, having to walk can help you build unexpected connections with your community.