Peri McQuay

Peri Phillips McQuay is the author of Singing Meadow: The Adventure of Creating a Country Home, The View From Foley Mountain, a book of nature meditations on her experiences living for 30 years at the Foley Mountain Conservation Area and A Wing in the Door: Life With a Red-tailed Hawk is the story of her adventures with Merak, a human-imprinted hawk, who lived free but saw McQuay and her family as her special people. Also Peri has written numerous essays, articles, book reviews and a weekly column, published in the Kingston Whig-Standard Magazine. Her credits include Country Journal, Harrowsmith, Bird Watcher’s Digest, The Snowy Egret, Seasons, The Fiddlehead, Herizons and Brick.

Begin Again

Begin Again Today, like every other day, we wake up empty and afraid. Don’t open the door to the study and begin reading. Take down a musical instrument.  Let the beauty we love be what we do. There are a hundred ways to kneel and kiss the ground. Rumi “I can’t do this!”It’s early morning, and, yet again I am trying to move ahead with some of the work which matters to me. But right now I can only stare …

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Mel Shaw’s Love Affair With Foley Mountain

Mel Shaw and His Love Affair With Foley Mountain Overlooking Westport From Foley Mountain I wanted to interview my long-time friend, Mel Shaw, not just because his intimate nature photos please me, but because he is a good example of someone who enjoying retirement. (Some of you may know him from the attractive calendar he and his wife Rose Ann designed and sold the past two years as a fundraiser benefitting the Foley Mountain Conservation Area.) Recently, I sat down …

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So, This Happened

So, This Happened So, after Christmas, this happened. And I am still at a loss to explain to you why it happened. Nevertheless, I have to confess that the completely unreasonable arrival of the yellow Kitchenaid mixer on my kitchen makes me very happy. Even still, though, this shocks me. In fact, this mixer is the exact opposite of the simplicity I pride myself in practising, in fact which generally I take pleasure in practising this. “Why now?” If you …

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