—Systemic change begins with personal change—
Kate in her words from her About page:
I am a freelance journalist and a correspondent for Outside magazine based in Durango, Colorado. I cover a wide range of topics, including science, the environment, social issues, mental health, and the outdoors for magazines, newspapers and websites.
I’m most passionate about tackling narratives that address challenging issues, such as deeply reported features on atypical anorexia for The New York Times Magazine, the perils and potentials of land acknowledgements for 5280 and suicide in mountain towns for Outside. I also love diving into personal essays, such as “Texas Makes Me Happy” about finding peace after depression on the barren roads of West Texas for National Geographic Traveler, and fun romps like “The Last Godforsaken Place,” a feature about visiting some of the most remote penguin colonies on earth for Outside.
In 2016, along with nine superb journalists from around the world, I was selected as a Metcalf Institute fellow and participated in a week-long science immersion workshop to turbo-boost my science reporting skills. The experience has proved invaluable as I continue to write more deeply about science and environmental issues. I am also humbly committed to educating myself and examining my own racial identity so that I can de-center whiteness in my work. I aspire to uproot heteronormativity and other oppressive forces from my writing.
My work has been honored with awards from The North American Travel Journalists Association and the Society of American Travel Writers, which named me a Lowell Thomas travel journalist of the year in 2011. My story, “Ghost of a Chance,” published in Preservation, was a notable mention in The Best American Travel Writing 2016. In 2018, my piece, “Adventures all Around,” in National Geographic Traveler, won a gold award from the Society of American Travel Writers. And my bestselling children’s book National Parks of the U.S.A. was named a 2019 Outstanding Science Trade Book for Students (K-12) and an Amazon Best Non-Fiction Children’s Book of the Year.
In my spare time, I backpack, hike and ski in the mountains and deserts of the Southwest. I am an enthusiastic vegetarian cook and committed meditator, and I teach and serve as a Dharma Leader for the local Buddhist meditation center. I am also the founder of the Durango Women’s Book & Cocktail Society, a non-exclusive club for all who identify as women who love reading and ideas.
I was led to Kate's article Should I Stop Flying? It’s a Difficult Decision to Make. from a newsletter from Flight Free USA. I've read, heard, written, and said a lot about not flying. I found her article the most sensitive, comprehensive, and thoughtful on the internal, personal challenge and gut check of deciding to stop flying. I'll let you read the article to find where she lands on not flying. I expect you'll find she covers your angle and others. It's challenging. We know it pollutes. We know it's not necessary. We want to do it, so we convince ourselves that what we believe is wrong is right, that the plane was going to fly anyway, that we're powerless to choose otherwise, and various other rationalizations and justifications (I used to. Now I find it repugnant). Though eighty percent of people alive today will never fly, we who fly feel like everyone does. So we convince ourselves that flying is inevitable, benign, and does more good than harm. Yet for people who fly, it's often their greatest contribution to pollution. Such are my views. I suspect you probably haven't heard people thoughtfully, intelligently explore the subject. In this episode, we do.