Drifting : two weeks on the Hudson / Mike Freeman.

Format:

Book

Author/Creator:

Freeman, Mike, 1968-

Series:

Excelsior Editions

Language:

English

Subjects (All):

Canoes and canoeing--Hudson River (N.Y. and N.J.).

Canoes and canoeing.

Hudson River (N.Y. and N.J.)--Description and travel.

Hudson River (N.Y. and N.J.).

Hudson River Valley (N.Y. and N.J.)--Description and travel.

Hudson River Valley (N.Y. and N.J.).

Freeman, Mike, 1968---Travel--Hudson River (N.Y. and N.J.).

Freeman, Mike.

Physical Description:

1 online resource (269 p.)

Place of Publication:

Albany : Excelsior Editions/State University of New York Press, c2011.

Language Note:

English

Summary:

This candid account of the author's two-week canoe trip down the Hudson River offers an introspective and humorous look at both the river and Recession-Era America. New to fatherhood and fresh from ten years in an Alaskan village, Mike Freeman sets out to relearn his country, and realizes it's in a far greater midlife crisis than he could ever be. With an eye on the Hudson's past, he addresses America's present anxieties—from race, gender, and marriage to energy, labor, and warfare—with empathy and honesty, acknowledging the difficulties surrounding each issue without succumbing to pessimism or ideology.From the river's headwaters in the Adirondacks, Freeman follows the Hudson south through America's first industrial ghost towns, where ruin begs for rebirth. Next is the Hudson Valley and the river's 153-mile estuary, with its once-teeming fisheries. Here, agriculture is redefining itself, while at West Point, officer candidates train for America's murky modern wars. The Hudson Highlands, too, are prominent, the place where Americans first wed God to nature, and where the mountains remain a potent place to mull that bond. From there it's on to Manhattan, with its skyline that symbolizes the world's financial might as well as its startling fragility.As controversial as it is comforting, Freeman's narrative makes us think in hard ways about America as the country itself drifts toward an uncertain future. But throughout, of course, is the magnificent Hudson, whose resilient beauty speaks well both to nature's toughness and America's greatest strength—the ability to redirect and change course when necessary.

Contents:

Rivers and the river

Dimensions

Mountains and wild

My land, your land

The maturity of idols

Tenting tonight

Quiet is the word

Where the wild things were

The country behind

Portals

Cogs and wheels

Pink flamingos

The gospel of Dean Wormer

Borders

The gravity of Greeks

The shadow

Still, still water

O Hudson

Red/blue

Imaginarium

Into the wild frontier

Conjugal

Purging Strangelove

The wolf

Such high zest

The wide water

Loomings.

Notes:

Bibliographic Level Mode of Issuance: Monograph

Includes bibliographical references.

ISBN:

9781438439464

1438439466

9781461906377

1461906377

OCLC:

756496415