x

75% of people globally want unbiased news (Pew Research) but are concerned they're not getting that.

Get balanced coverage with Symby. See how stories are covered across diverse outlets and spot when one side covers a story the other skips.

PODCAST

Desert Lady Diaries

Dawn Davis Voiceover and Podcaster

Desert Lady Diaries: 30-minute conversations with women who live in the desert. Find out why they came, what they do here and why they stay.

society & culture personal journals

All Episodes

32:32

DLD| Heather Vescent |Ep 105

Desert Lady Diaries ·

2019/09/10

Heather recalls her first experience with desert was on a road trip with her grandmother and says that wasn't the one that put the desert in her heart. At 14, on a Nile river cruise to Egypt with her mother and grandmother, the desert set her soul alight. Years later, living in Silicon Valley, Heather traveled to LA for work and planned a solo motorcycle trip back through the Mojave, up through Tahoe. She’d camped in Joshua Tree National park overnight, waking up to the sound of coyotes. Heather

en

40:15

DLD| Janet Armstrong Johnston | Ep 104

Desert Lady Diaries ·

2019/09/03

Originally from the Philadelphia area, Janet became enamored with the desert while traveling through New Mexico on a family vacation to visit her dad’s one and only uncle in San Diego. Driving through the desert she thought, “I have to come back to this place.” Attending school for architecture in Cincinnati, Janet decided she wanted to get into the construction side of the business and through a co-op program at the college, she'd heard about Habitat for Humanity and landed a co-op in Atlanta,

en

29:05

DLD| Marie Bobin |Ep 103

Desert Lady Diaries ·

2019/08/27

Born in France, Marie Bobin's first experience with desert was a trip with friends to Death Valley. It was a last minute, 'let’s get out of LA for the weekend' kind of trip – in August. Marie says they drove a lot, got out of the car to snap a few photos, then jumped back into the air conditioned car. Marie's family moved to California when she was in her preteen years. With a background in performing arts and producing, Marie started her career in London with a pub theatre, producing shows for

en

32:48

DLD| Gay Smith | Ep 102

Desert Lady Diaries ·

2019/08/20

Teaching brought Gay Smith (left in photo above) to California, as after college graduation there was a glut of teachers on the east coast. She’d read about a fellow student who came to Corona, CA to interview, she followed suite and got the job on the spot. Having been in teaching for over 40 years, Gay talks about the changes she's witnessed in the students over the years. Gay's first experience with the desert was during the December holidays in the early 60's with a group of friends she’d met

en

30:12

DLD | Elizabeth Campbell Pt 2 | Ep 101

Desert Lady Diaries ·

2019/08/13

In part two of the 100 episode milestone celebration, I read the remaining excepts chosen from 'The Desert Was Home', by Elizabeth Crozer Campbell. Elizabeth describes the beauty of the landscape, shares some stories about desert friends and neighbors and laments the changes she and Bill witnessed in the time since their initial arrival to the desert. The last passage describes a moonlight drive and concludes this love story between Elizabeth, Bill and the desert. If you'd like to read more

en

39:17

DLD| Elizabeth Crozer Campbell | Ep 100

Desert Lady Diaries ·

2019/08/06

In this special celebration episode, I'm reading excerpts from 'The Desert Was Home', a book by an original Desert Lady, Elizabeth Crozer Campbell. If you’re unfamiliar, Elizabeth, or Betts, as her husband called her, she was born in Beach Haven, NJ – so of course I felt an immediate kinship with her. Elizabeth Warder Crozer, was born the youngest of four daughters, in 1893 and died in 1971. She was raised in Upland, Delaware County, Pennsylvania, the daughter of a wealthy family and her

en

31:35

Kim Fulleman | Ep 99

Desert Lady Diaries ·

2019/07/29

Kim Fulleman's first experience with the desert were as a Girl Scout, visiting Joshua Tree National Park to camp and hike. Kim and her friends would find the biggest rock formation they could – and climb it. After 20 years in a 400 square foot Hollywood apartment, Kim was ready for a change. She was feeling like it was time to get back into nature and heal from some things she’d experienced in her life. After looking for and bidding on a place in Joshua Tree, only to be outbid, a friend suggested

en

31:55

Christine Anthony | Ep 98

Desert Lady Diaries ·

2019/07/23

Christine Anthony’s first experience with the desert was on a commercial shoot at the Glamis sand dunes in southern California. She’d picked up this commercial production job after arriving in LA on a greyhound bus from Cleveland, OH with $7 in her pocket, having followed her rock-n-roll boyfriend to the West Coast. The romance fizzled and Christine found her self reaching out to a few folks she knew in LA, also from Cleveland, one of whom became a roommate. Deciding to remain in LA, Christine

en

31:13

DLD| Carmen Mendoza | Ep 97

Desert Lady Diaries ·

2019/07/16

A lifetime of careers with Parks and Recreation, the Bureau of Indian Affairs, the National Park Service, as well as being a Jazzercise instructor, radio ad executive, secondary social studies teacher and director of a youth drug prevention program, Carmen Mendoza is finding her soul back in the Mojave desert, returning here after spending over half her life in Colorado. In this episode, we talk about the ways the light travels along the mountains during a desert day, which leads us to a

en

33:37

DLD| Brenda Littleton |Ep 96

Desert Lady Diaries ·

2019/07/09

Brenda first visited the desert as a young girl on family camping trips and those visits continued into her teen years as a destination for soul-searching and wandering the space. Needing a change, Brenda made the move to the desert with her horses. Upon arriving, she found she had many friends here and immediately found her way into the community. Brenda loves the diversity of the weather, the beauty of the landscape and talks about the differences of living in Idyllwild and the desert,

en

38:35

DLD | Lisa Rae Black | Ep 95

Desert Lady Diaries ·

2019/07/02

Lisa Rae Black remembers her first experience with the desert as a visit to Grandpa's house - he lived in Morongo Valley. As a five-year old, she recalls jumping out of the back of her dad's 280Z, feeling like she'd landed on Mars. Fast forward about 50 years, Lisa inherited the property from her now deceased brother, Jim, who’d lived there for many years with his three thoroughbred horses. Her grandfather purchased the property in1931 and built the 300 foot homestead in 1951. In this episode,

en

33:02

Ann Congdon | Ep 94

Desert Lady Diaries ·

2019/06/25

While working at a print shop in Pasadena, news came though that the government was giving homesteads to World War I veterans. After his shift, Ann’s father Bill Underhill , got in his car with a shovel and a sleeping bag and headed to 29 Palms to stake his claim. After moving to the area permanently, he recognized he needed a job and started The Desert Trail newspaper. After her own jobs in the various Underhill family businesses - the newspaper, movie theater, roller rink - Ann felt the urge to

en

30:26

Kim Martin | Ep 93

Desert Lady Diaries ·

2019/06/18

Growing up, family summer vacations in a rented Winnebago meant traveling to the deserts of Arizona, New Mexico among others. In this episode, Kim talks about playing games with her siblings on the drives and running around in the open space. 'Wanderlust' is a word she uses to describe her family, "We were always going somewhere." Her love of photography grew from taking trips to all the places Huell Howser featured on his California's Gold television show. Though coming to live in the desert

en

32:45

Miriam Segar | Ep 92

Desert Lady Diaries ·

2019/06/11

Experiencing a lunar eclipse at the Columbia River Gorge in Oregon was Miriam's first experience with desert. She shares a memory of standing in the open space, and having the realization that she was living in outer space. Not viewing it as something 'out there', but as something she was a part of. Art school brought an interest in film and the next thirty years were spent as a freelance art director for television commercials. The job took her from Portland to New York City to Los Angeles. And

en

31:39

Meilani MacDonald | Ep 91

Desert Lady Diaries ·

2019/06/04

Sixty miles into her trip moving from Florida to Los Angeles, the car radiator sprung a leak. Meilani MacDonald and a friend pressed on to Los Angeles, with a jug of water in the trunk to keep the radiator full. Once they got to the desert, they took to driving at night where the cooler air was kinder to the vehicle. This was Meilani's first experience with desert. Meilani's first brush with Joshua Tree was weekend camping trips to the national park to escape LA's urban environs. Though she

en

29:55

Kajiel Sullivan | Ep 90

Desert Lady Diaries ·

2019/05/28

Pulling up to their new desert home in the dark, Kajiel Sullivan and her husband were greeted by a coyote. Now living on base, Kajiel misses the privacy and quiet of the desert and sadly feels less a part of the 29 Palms community which she'd grown to enjoy. In the meantime, she also a busy full-time mom to her and Reginald's daughters, Rosie (4), Millie (2) and baby Rain who enjoy time in the park near their new home on base. Kajiel hopes to take a ride with them through Joshua Tree National Park

en

33:51

DLD| Adriene Jenik | Ep 89

Desert Lady Diaries ·

2019/05/21

Born and raised in NJ, Adriene's first experience with the desert happened after moving to Los Angeles in the late 80's. She and a friend took a trip to Baja, CA. Adriene says she immediately felt, 'this is where my bones will end up." and has been in love with the desert ever since. After returning to the east coast to obtain her graduate degree, Adriene returned to the west coast and having visited Joshua Tree with friends from Los Angeles in the late 80's, decided the hi-desert would be a great

en

32:47

Juliette Tworsey | Ep 88

Desert Lady Diaries ·

2019/05/14

Since the age of six, Juliette Tworsey knew she wanted to sing. Growing up in Chicago, she attended a small Catholic school with a really small choir. As she tells it, "there were like three kids in the choir". In her teens, Juliette worked up the courage one day to sing with the 'basement band' in her neighborhood. A group of kids, playing for other teens in her neighborhood. That lit the fire and Juliette began the process of trying to start her own bands, which she describes as difficult,

en

29:30

Jessica Dacey | Ep 87

Desert Lady Diaries ·

2019/05/07

An American citizen, Jessica Dacey was born in Canada. Her family left the U.S. when she was nine years old, living in South Africa for a few years before heading to England. After finishing her schooling, Jessica got the travel bug which lead her to Mongolia where, on the last day of her visit, she saw and applied for a job as Editor of the local newspaper. Jessica got the job, moving and living there for a year. On a month long van trip traveling through the southwest with her husband, Jessica

en

31:25

Petra Cimbalova

Desert Lady Diaries ·

2019/04/30

From the age of nine, Petra Cimbalova dreamed of leaving the Czech Republic and traveling to exotic places. Growing up she kept a book of photographs, cut from magazines of islands and other distant lands. Inspired by cousins, who'd returned to the Czech Replublic after living in Germany for many years, Petra embarked on a trip to the United States at the age of nineteen. Landing in Newark, New Jersey, Petra made her way to Grand Junction, Colorado, staying with a friend who was a church

en

165 results

Similar Podcasts

Voices of Life

APG Mannheim

Promo Estereo Podcast

Promo Estereo

Talking Timelines Podcast

Talkingtimelines

גיקונומי

ראם שרמן ודורון ניר

Drømmefanger

Drømmefanger