Abi Nighthill

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Emily Dickinson is an easy person to obsess over. Scholars have penned hundreds of thousands of words about her life. Archives rest in their respective institutions, bursting with paper scraps and scrawled missives. Her legend floats a ghost, the shy "Belle of Amherst" - an image which many a biographer (rightly) rages against.

Evidence of who she truly was lies in letters and in poems. Here and there, a told scene from her day. Gossip between acquaintances. Florid pleas wrought in metaphor. 

We can see her making custard pie with her mother (also named Emily). Her, writing at a window overlooking the graveyard or the common or the Evergreens. Her, talking philosophy late into the night with her brother Austin. She prunes roses, writes letters, presses and classifies flowers, bakes bread. 

She leaves scant evidence of her lovers, and of her illness. She clearly struggled with some chronic illness, but it is hard to say what. Something that affected her eyes, something that granted her exemption from social requirements. Something that made her feel like an "invalid."

In a way she leaves a great deal of evidence! But all of it is packed into metaphors. Her poetry evokes deep feeling, and perhaps that is a more honest portrayal than the retelling of a scene. 

I think that my biggest challenge as biographer and storyteller will be pulling those scenes into something coherent and true. So there are lots of questions that arise. How closely do I integrate the poetry into the narrative? Which events can I  infer based on "what was most likely" to have happened? How much fabrication on my part is allowable in scenes with dialogue?

There's plenty to figure out before I can get this off the ground, and I've been a bit paralyzed by that fear of being inaccurate. I think I'm finally reaching the point at which I must write in order to discover.                     

F466A (Emily Dickinson)

I dwell in Possibility - A fairer House than Prose - More numerous of Windows - Superior - for Doors -

Of Chambers as the Cedars - Impregnable of eye - And for an everlasting Roof The Gambrels of the Sky -

Of Visitors - the fairest - For Occupation - This - The spreading wide my narrow Hands To gather Paradise -    

           (illustration mine)

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Ernie the Chicken

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Beef may be what's for dinner but a National Academy of Sciences report finds that beef is on average ten times worse for the environment than other meats. Food systems expert Anna Lappé discusses the beef burden and how to eat healthily with host Steve Curwood.

Aired on Living on Earth, August 1, 2014.

(Photo: U.S. Department of Agriculture)

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Maya Lin’s Sound Ring — a large, wooden sculpture installed at Cornell’s Lab of Ornithology — plays the sounds of species and habitats that are on their way to silence. Living on Earth's Emmett Fitzgerald talks to John Fitzpatrick, Director of the Lab, about the structure and the significance of these endangered soundscapes.

Aired on Living on Earth, August 29, 2014. (Photo: Jeremy Oldenettel; Creative Commons BY-NC-SA Generic 2.0)

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Playing with color a bit today--the original photo is a B&W Carter Burton photo from San Diego Air and Space Museum.

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Eavesdropping on Neurons (video)

A new automated version of one of neuroscience’s most important techniques, patch clamping, makes it much easier and faster for scientists to tap into the inner workings of brain cells.

Published in MIT Technology Review, June 2014.

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The Pope and the Sin of Environmental Degradation

Pope Francis has called environmental exploitation the sin of our time. He is working on an encyclical about humanity’s relationship with nature. Christiana Peppard, Assistant Professor of Theology, Science and Ethics at Fordham University and author of the book Just Water, discusses the Pope’s call to “care for God’s creation” with host Steve Curwood.

Aired on Living on Earth, July 18, 2014.

(photo: Flickr user Doug88888, CC Attribution 2.0 Generic)

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Autism Linked to Pesticide Exposure

Women's exposure to agricultural pesticides during pregnancy appears to sharply increase the risk for developmental delays and autism in their children, according to a paper published in Environmental Health Perspectives. Irva Hertz-Picciotto, senior author of the study and Professor of Epidemiology at the MIND Institute at UC Davis discusses the study and the dangers of pesticides with host Steve Curwood.

Aired on Living on Earth, June 27, 2014.

(photo: Flickr user oatsy40, CC Attribution 2.0 Generic)

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Nature’s Dividend—Pricing Global Ecosystem Services

It’s easy for humans to forget that pollinators and trees and the sun work for free — they provide some of the many ecosystem services that benefit human well-being. Paul Sutton, a geography professor at University of Denver, has calculated a dollar price of these services, and explains to Host Steve Curwood how he calculated the value of these services.

Aired on Living on Earth, June 20, 2014.

(photo: Matt Kieffer, CC Attribution-Sharealike 2.0 Generic)

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The above video was used to measure activity in birds when pressure drops.

Birds, Bugs Do It, Stormy Weather Edition

A storm approaches, and the air pressure drops. Dogs hide in whatever adorably pitiable spot they can find, and people stock up on canned goods before settling in themselves. We focus on doing what it takes to keep ourselves and our families safe. But things aren’t so different for the birds and the beetles. Even without our modern methods of forecasting, these creatures predict and prepare for incoming storms... read on at Scope

Video from "Environment, behavior and physiology: do birds to barometric pressure to predict storms?" Breuner et al. JOURNAL OF EXPERIMENTAL BIOLOGY  Vol. 216  DOI:10.1242/jeb.081067, FEB 2013. Reproduced with permission from JEB.

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I drew some chickens for my folks. They like their chickens.

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Just ordered some ribbon cartridges as an early birthday present to myself. It appears to need a little restoration (cleaning, oiling, may need to fix the platen). I do enjoy fixing machines simple enough that I can figure out their logic just by looking at them. I've fixed many a bicycle in my short time as a mechanic at the antique market, but this will be my first typewriter.

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"A shuddering start, followed by a calculated growl. A rattling hiss that speeds away. A wayward clicking, the uncanny insect. A 1950s sci-fi siren of something strange and otherworldly." Check out my post on PLoS Blogs.

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It’s not heavenly creatures, but a sooty black fungus that thrives on pollution produced in alcohol distilling processes. Now, Louisville distillers face growing pressure to curb the ethanol emissions that drive the spread of this “whiskey fungus.”

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I swear this is relevant to something I'm working on.

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If you're in Portland, I'm doing a presentation and workshop on hypertext poetry, and we'll make a hypertext poem together. Absolutely no computer skills required, we're doing it all by hand.

Be prepared to hear me ramble about John Keats and Werner Heisenberg in the same breath.

Poetry, Uncertainty, and New Media: The Hypertext Poem PSU South Park Blocks (1875 SW Park) Monday, May 13th, 2013 3:30-5:00pm