Media
All the Feels
A FEW RECOMMENDATIONS FOR RECKONING WITH HISTORY, CLIMATE AND THE HUMAN CONDITION | BY JENNIE LAY
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pring is hot and cold, sunny and snowy. These days, we never know if we should laugh or cry. So, here’s a suggested media list for all your moods during this unpredictable season. No matter which way you look, listen, scroll or read, the horizon is going to look a little more interesting.
READ LOCAL “Ray Heid: Man Behind the Duster” By Ray Heid with Irene Barba Among his notable skills, fourth-generation local Ray Heid makes a mean telemark turn in his famous elk hide duster. He also spins a yarn like few other storytellers. Heid grew up the son of Steamboat’s lone grocer in the 1940s, was a big hill ski jumper in the 1950s, then a ski business leader in the industry’s founding days. Today, he continues to guide on the family’s outfitting ranch in Clark. You’re as likely to find him on horseback as skis, but either way he’s got a ‘boat-load of history and perspective to share with his hometown. Thankfully, he’s found a way to share a lot of it in vignettes and photos that are as charming on the page as Heid is in person. It’s the story of a man, and a community, in constant movement. This skiing cowboy is no myth; “Ray Heid: Man Behind the Duster” honors us with the voice of a legend. Watch for a live community author talk and book signing at Bud Werner Library once gathering restrictions ease – likely winter 2022!
READ GLOBAL “Under a White Sky” By Elizabeth Kolbert Pulitzer Prize-winning author Elizabeth Kolbert (who visited Steamboat in 2017 to share her insights on “The Sixth Extinction”) is back with stories about how humans continue to creep into every aspect of the planet’s natural mechanisms and landing us in the Anthropocene. There are limits to what we can save and engineer, but that doesn’t mean we won’t try. Read about super coral, electrifying rivers, turning carbon emissions into stone 68 | ONLINE AT WWW.STEAMBOATMAGAZINE.COM
and shooting diamond dust into the stratosphere to deflect the sun. Alas, that solar geoengineering leaves us down here on Earth “under a white sky.” Will defying nature continue to work? Invention, intervention and consequences collide in Kolbert’s brilliant, and important, new book.
READ HISTORY “Four Hundred Souls” Edited by Ibram X. Kendi and Keisha N. Blain Absorb the stories alone. Read it as a family. Expand your truths of American history, and discuss this book widely. Ibram X. Kendi and Keisha N. Blain have assembled 90 brilliant writers to stitch together a poignant 400-year “community history” of African Americans, told in fiveyear increments. The tome is a bestseller for a very good reason. Absorb diverse perspectives of resistance, struggle, hope and reinvention, and keep it close for future reference.
LISTEN TO NATURE TreeFM Listen to a random forest. When you can’t get out in the woods, let nature come to you. Bathe your ears in the relaxing rustle and sway of trees and their living, breathing, chirping forest ecosystems recorded all over the world. Maybe it will even spur you to reach out and protect one. https://www.tree.fm
Beast Box Be a wildlife DJ. Brooklyn-based beatboxer Ben Mirin samples animal sounds all over the world, then layers his loops to make groovy ecosystem-inspired recordings: elephants in the Okavango Delta, bobcats in the Sonoran Desert, indris in Madagascar. Pick your natural beat. Layer in your species. Unlock Beast Mode by adding five animals from the same ecosystem. Admire the hip animation and learn cool stuff. You’re creating wild new hip hop. https://academy.allaboutbirds.org/features/beastbox
