MARCH 2020 – ONE LAST ESCAPE

Essay and photos by P.C. Zick The winter of 2019/2020 may have been foreshadowing of what happened in the early spring of 2020. From the death of my brother to my husband’s myriad of physical ailments to surgery for my daughter, I’d had it by February and looked forward to a fresh start for a

MY KAYAKING ROOTS

Photos and essay by P.C. Zick (@PCZick) I began my water journeys in a canoe, but I never felt at home, either as the navigator in the back or the first mate in the front. However, I knew nothing else and loved the quiet and peace of the rivers of north Florida, mostly the Santa

Enduring Everglades

They came out of nowhere that day I floated on a fishing boat in the waters off Chokoloskee Island. Two men in a canoe using long poles to push themselves through the shallow water as low tide came. They said they went out every day on those waters on the western edge of the Everglades.

Snow Inspires Florida Writer

I woke to a fairyland of snow-covered trees and lawn on a day when I thought I would be waking up to the marsh and swampland of the Everglades. I’d planned a writer’s retreat while my husband attended a conference in Reno. We began by spending a week with my daughter and her boyfriend in

Standing Naked with Gators and Other Absurdities

 By Patricia Zick @PCZick I remember embarrassing moments of my youth with puzzlement. I’m unable to muster up the sheer mortification of my thirteen-year-old self whenever my father put on his new dark brown rubberized sandals over white crew socks. He only wore this atrocity on his feet when he donned shorts. We lived in

Living with Wildlife – Florida Style

  By Patricia Zick @PCZick “Why aren’t there any mosquitoes when I visit Florida,” someone from Pittsburgh recently asked me. “Where do you go in Florida?” I asked. “To Disney World, Sea World – all those theme parks around Orlando.” I wondered how to reply without bursting this man’s image of natural Florida within the