For nearly three decades, I have lived in and explored the mountains and deserts of the Western Slope of Colorado, where the Colorado Plateau meets the Southern Rocky Mountains. This place has taught me how to love and how to live; how to hold on and how to let go; how to be strong and how to surrender. The essays and poems shared on Spruce & Sagebrush come from that relationship. They are tethered, sometimes invisibly, to this place that has taught and sustained me in my effort to stay connected to both the natural world and the human one, even as the two seem to grow further apart. My hope is that others may be inspired to seek out the natural world wherever they are, from the tallest tree to the smallest shrub, and develop their own relationship with what is wild. Karen Bellerose
