Dear Readers, Welcome to a new feature on my blog, “A Visit to My Back Porch,” which is reserved exclusively for my favorite musicians. It is my pleasure to start this feature with one of my favorite singer-songwriters, Lori McKenna, whom I was lucky enough to hear and meet in Zionsville, Pennsylvania, a few weeks […]
Random Thoughts
Expo West Grows Up
Every year when I go to Anaheim, California, for Natural Products Expo West, I have a ritual: I rent a car (this year I got a cute white VW Beetle), turn on K-ROCK (106.7) real loud, get on the highway, and drive. At first, I get that happy California feeling of sunshine and palm trees. […]
Can You Make Your Sexuality Organic?
By guest blogger Pamela Madsen, founding executive director of The American Fertility Association and author of Shameless: How I Ditched the Diet, Got Naked, Found True Pleasure…and Somehow Got Home in Time to Cook Dinner (Rodale, 2011). I love this concept of “organic sexuality.” In fact, I recently wrote a piece in Psychology Today about […]
Why Is There Never a Bird Around When You Need One?
by guest blogger Rick Chillot, senior editor, Rodale.com Well, we’re into the final week of our plastic-free challenge at Rodale.com. One thing that’s become clear to me is that each of us has different challenges when it comes to cutting back on our plastic use. For me, I think the biggest issue is getting by […]
How to Start a Fire (Fast and Furious, and without Fuss)
We’ve all been there—either as individuals trying to start a fire, or worse, watching someone else trying to start a fire and not succeeding. There is the fussing, the prodding and poking, the elaborately shaped structures, and blowing and huffing and puffing. I could go on and on, but that’s the point of this blog […]
Living (Briefly) without Electricity
It’s not a real winter in these parts without one good ice storm—the kind that covers all the trees with a clear-crystal-candy coating, stops all the traffic, and invariably, knocks out the power for a while. Which is an important reminder of just how close to primitive chaos we would be without a steady supply […]
Why Women Love Cats
This morning, I was sitting on my couch drinking my coffee (happiness!), and my cat Pumkin came over for her morning love. We have a thing in our house where I sit in Baddha Konasana (cobbler’s pose) on the couch—completely slouched, mind you, and covered in soft cashmere blankets—and make a “nest” for kids or […]
The Power and Persistence to Create Change
While today we celebrate Marin Luther King Jr., and the change in the world he helped create, sometimes I can’t help but feel depressed about how long the change process takes. More so than a salmon who swims upstream (who at least gets to mate at the end of the swim), our efforts to […]
Scratch
Raised on America’s first organic farm, Scratch author Maria Rodale learned how to make everyday favorites from, yes, scratch — the way you remember them; the way they turn out best.
Order NowOrganic Manifesto
Drawing on findings from leading health researchers as well as conversations with both chemical and organic farmers from coast to coast, Maria Rodale irrefutably outlines the unacceptably high cost of chemical farming on our health and our environment.
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