Natalie Ogbourne

The Wonder of Winter

There is a time for everything. I know this. I believe it. The thing is, when a sliver of life overwhelms me, I forget it. I tend to operate on the assumption that whatever is going on in my life–good or bad, joy or sorrow–will last forever. The seasons,...

On Breaking Trail

We pulled into the gravel parking lot at the base of Bunsen Peak, piled out, grabbed day packs and water from the back of the vehicle, and set off. Dust had barely begun to accumulate around our ankles when we saw him: a lone bison, a bull, just twenty-five feet off...

Everywhere

We’ve taken to watching a little football at our house on Sunday afternoons and when the talk turns to the Super Bowl, I remember the day I found some unexpected beauty in Yellowstone. Oh, I expected to find beauty, but not indoors, not around the television,...

A Great Deal Of Good

Two Septembers ago my family spent a few weeks in South Dakota. It wasn’t a vacation; it was a working trip. My husband tucked us away in the hills and commuted every morning into Rapid City. The kids and I did schoolwork and read and whiled away the remains of...

A Little Thing

The littlest things make a difference, little things such as bits of scarlet in a tangle of brown on a winter’s day. It’s often true, what Blaise Pascal wrote: A little thing comforts us because a little thing afflicts us. A little thing can make all the...

Roads in Transition, Part 2

On December 12 the National Park Service posted a news release to inform the public that Yellowstone’s interior roads would open on December 15, just as predicted. Yellowstone’s fall and winter travelers knew when the road crews would start to let the snow...