Down we descend, fifty-pound packs shifting with each step. The canyon landscape is as desolate as it is magnificent: the grey desert escarpment giving way to maroon cliffs carved like red-velvet cake—a welcome serving to my starving soul...

In high school, books by John Steinbeck were assigned reading: The Grapes of Wrath, Of Mice and Men, The Pearl and The Red Pony. I loved those books. Now that I’m getting ready to retire, it’s time to read Travels with Charley: In Search of America...

The Road, a film based on a novel by Cormac McCarthy, unfolds in a devastated world where every city lies in ruins, animals no longer exist, all plant life is destroyed and bands of cannibals roam the country. At the center of the story, a father and young son journey toward the ocean...

I couldn’t find home. The weeds had grown tall over the old ball fields, the manicured diamonds all but blown away...

The kid slouches over a plate of stew, eyes glued to a phone, a storm of red hair billows beneath his cap. I unfold my napkin and glance at his dad. “Zeke,” he says. “Put the phone away.”