We've got issues.
June 26, 2015, 6:30 am. I drift into wakefulness, my darling Wifey asleep beside me, the window air conditioner whirring in its valiant effort to keep our bedroom cool overnight. The cats are still curled up, too early even for their breakfast yowling. Continue reading
The tension in Salem at the end of any legislative session is attractive if you’re an unrelenting sociopath who loves pain and heartbreak. With the preceding five months of plodding public process behind them, partisan legislators will finally cast their votes in stone in early July. The game will only finish when the budgets are decided. It’s one of the things I miss most about being out of the Legislature for the past 12 years. I loved counting votes. Continue reading
Oregon’s 30-year “Ancient Forest War” has seen scores of lawsuits, big and small, yielding hundreds of court opinions and orders. From Judge Dwyer’s iconic 1991 spotted owl bombshell (“The argument that the mightiest economy on Earth cannot afford to preserve old growth forests for a short time, while it reaches an overdue decision on how to manage them, is not convincing today. Continue reading
In the heat of the day, we found relief standing in shallow water. Seven of us remained after a tour of the farm and the forested edge of the McKenzie River. Parent conversation roamed across trade-offs between herbicide use and the spread of invasive weeds, climate change and personal change, how to be a good father, how to be a good neighbor. Meanwhile the kids swished scoop nets in the ponded side channel, wowing over tadpoles, boatmen, mosquito fish and dragonfly larva. The air continued to warm, and with it the number of adult dragonflies zig-zagging around us increased as well. Continue reading
I’m a little nervous here, a little distracted. But don’t worry, I’ll cover the slug-like inactivity of the Oregon Legislature in a moment. Frankly, a bigger issue looms at the moment. We may be headed for a global theological/scientific Mongolian clusterfluck — not to be confused with climate change or global warming or the Sixth Great Extinction. This is much seriouser! I can see the donnybrook coming. Continue reading
Noah Michael DeWitt was a shining example of how to be. His sparkling brown eyes would absorb pain from yours when you were sad. He’d listen to you talk about what makes you happy with rapt attention. He always carried pen and paper around with him — in a fanny pack, in the red milk crate on his bicycle or behind his ear. He’d sway his head and shoulders side to side with swagger when he heard a slap-worthy song. Noah absorbed his experiences of this world and spread the happy vibes from them whole-heartedly. Continue reading
June is a tough month for Oregon legislators for a variety of reasons. There’s pressure to get out of the building by the 4th of July. Since it is a citizen Legislature, many of the members are missing work, and employers want their employees back. And, five months into session, members have listened to their colleagues’ positions and those of the other three caucuses ad infinitem and ad nauseum. Continue reading
This first week of retirement has been pretty uneventful so far … except for my new top-secret assignment from Gov. Kate Brown. But more about that later. Continue reading
Earthquake day in Nepal minus one — 2 pm Friday, April 24, I’m in a coffee shop in Berkeley. I hit the “send” button on a newsletter to my fellow Nepal 7 RPCV’s (Returned Peace Corps Volunteers) for our 50th reunion in August. My husband, Tom, and I are visiting here from Eugene to attend a dinner for retired Berkeley cops (my husband’s career) and to visit our son’s family. An hour later, 46 out of 76 have opened the newsletter. Success! Continue reading
Over the weekend hundreds of participants along the Klamath River gathered in ceremony for the 2015 Great SalmonR un of the Klamath-Trinity Rivers. For the first time this year, the Klamath Tribes participated in the run, which has been extended to Chiloquin, Oregon. Members and descendants from all the Klamath Basin river tribes took part in the ceremonial event, beginning May 29 at at the Pacific Ocean and concluding in Chiloquin June 1. Continue reading