About 2.5 hours north of New York City and a world away lies the Ashokan Reservoir and the 18 bluestone peaks that form the Catskill Mountain Watershed. For the past 35 years, Gail Straub has walked these paths almost daily, and grown to rely on them as portals to self-understanding and spiritual restoration. In her luminous new collection of short essays, The Ashokan Way, Straub takes readers on a year’s worth of walks that explore and celebrate her beloved upstate New York terrain and its profound effect on her inner landscape.