Deep Drafts, Rivers, Bridges and Dollar Stores

When I saw the video of the giant 3 football long container ship crashing into the Francis Scott Key Bridge, the first thing I thought about was deep draft container ships and the issues we have had on the Columbia River here on the other side of the U.S. I took a community college economics course in 1998, at Clatsop CC in Astoria, OR where the mighty Columbia River meets the immense Pacific Ocean. The teacher required that we report upon a local economic issue, with careful research on both sides of public opinion. I chose the proposed deepening of the Columbia River shipping channel by the Army Corps of Engineers -ACE. I had friends working with Columbia River Keeper, so I began with a sense of the importance of the issue. The shipping channel through the Columbia must be dredged on a regular basis by the ACE to keep it navigable for large container ships. The issue was, should they authorize a massively increased amount of dredging in order to accomodate the new generation of large container ships, with drafts 3 times the depth of the current ones? Can you see how this relates to the recent disaster in Baltimore? The inner harbor there has facilities for those massive container ships. They must make certain people very rich, and offer lots of goods made in other countries cheaply, also cheap to move. This is where the dollar stores come to mind. Do you ever wonder, "How is it possible to make these items and ship them for 1.25? The answer to cheap things almost always involves hidden costs elsewhere. It is worth the time to research the back story of what we buy. In this case I make the connection between cheap goods and disrupted salmon runs, impacted harbors, costly accidents and general waste. Not buying extraneous stuff is a statement we can make. It's worth pondering.

Mom Comes on Memorial Day

Today is the official US Memorial Day Holiday - May 29, 2023. Thoughts and reminders of my parents float through.. While I was out running this morning a little bunny ran into my path and paused. I stopped and we stood there quietly staring at one another. My Mom loved the little wild bunnies, and was always pointing them out, even when she just imagined seeing one. Before she died we talked about having a code where she could connect with me from the other side. This Bunny, on a fine May morning right near her child hood home was our connnect. It's been 8 months since her passing. I still have things I want to tell her. I got to talk to the Bunny.

Deep Gratitude for Vaccines

This month of February marked my 66th birthday. Right on top of that I tested positive for covid-19. It was rotten timing, and yet as this month ends, I am left mainly with a sense of deep gratitude. 

We dreaded that positive test for 2 years now. At the beginning of 2020 most people were intensely fearful and anxious that death might be around the corner. Millions died in 1916 from the Spanish flu. So we locked down in our homes, barely going out for groceries. Those were tense months of watching the covid dashboard, the numbers by state and country of infections, deaths and recoveries. 

Like a ray of hope. the following February were able to get the vaccine. Then last fall, a booster. 

Now the strains have become less virulent, which is what I must have had. It was a cold that lasted but a few days. 

My gratitude toward researchers, scientists, doctors and all medical professionals is profound. What would have played out without a vaccine? We've now had 2 years of closures, restrictions, worry, masks and confusion. How would that have been without a vaccine? 

Gratitude. Let me say it again, and again and again. The fearful virus went through me, and my body was able to fight it off in less than 2 weeks because of science and those who spend many hours in labs, hospitals and classrooms working hard to learn more every day. It makes me almost wish I'd become a research scientist, unlocking the secret of our bodies on that molecular level which most of us take for granted. When we are well, and there are no threats, in labs all over the world talented, focused people are still working to learn more.

I feel love and gratitude for their presence. 

No Festive Christmas Lights on Jan.6 , 2022

 Today is the horrible anniversary of a year ago. January 6, 2021 when angry white people with guns and bad intentions broke into our Nation's Capitol. The things they did, the terrible words they used, the violence, the disrespect....it was nothing I could have imagined in the country I love.

Tonight there were some candlelight vigils around the U.S.. I almost went to a gathering in North Portland. While checking for new gatherings closer to me, I found one which merely asked participants to place a candle in the window.

I am doing that. I usually turn on my Christmas lights. I left them off to illustrate the gravity of this night .

To my delight most of  my neighbors did not turn their lights on tonight either. I took a walk around to confirm. There were a few, but many I know have lights that were completely off. Thank you neighbors, for sharing in this little way the gravity of this anniversary.

I will never forget reading the accounts of our representatives who were at the capitol that day to certify the 2020 presidential election. One of them wrote of his experience afterwards, wiping up excrement which one of the intruders had smeared around the senate chambers. This is how I will remember those people, smearing poop, lies, hatred and bringing injury and death. 

What now dear country?

Planting the Three Sisters

 Today I planted 3 sets of the Three Sisters, an indigenous companion planting mound.

First I dug the dark, rich and moist dirt from my compost pile, and mixed it into 3 mounds.

In the center of the mound goes corn. I used my colored corn from last year. I chose 6 of the biggest kernels for each mound. Next, around the corn are beans. Again I used saved seeds from last year in a circle around the corn. Later I will plant squash. That is the third sister.

This will be my first time trying this ancient method.  I learned it from a chapter in the book "Braiding Sweetgrass", by Robin Wall Kimmerer. I read that chapter to my mom too.

I can't wait to watch the corn sprout up an then the beans climb up the corn. No need then for strings and frames, as the corn is the support. The squash at ground level shades the other plants and climbs all through everything. It seems like magic of a sort. From this day in April I anticipate my three sisters, 4 months from now, in August showing me how they get along.

Campaigning for Alex

 Alex Josephy, a lovely forty something young man, is running for Mayor of Oregon City. One town away from me, but quite a bit more 'purple' than Milwaukie/Portland.

My feisty, political friend, Cheryl, gathers up the local Deocratic Precinct Committee people to hold signs on the streets for Alex, a fellow Democrat and a " Bernie Sanders" Democrat at that. The election is only 3 days away. 

Because of all the above, I find myself on a Saturday afternoon on the sidewalk outside a shopping center containing, among other things, a Safeway and a McDonalds. There is lots of car traffic, and I hold my hand painted sign in various angles so drivers can see it. At first I sing songs to myself to make the time pass. The initial feeling is one of weird exposure to this general public in cool, gusty March air. March is a strange month to me. The most transition of any transition season we have in the Northwest. There is more light, some flowers, and the air still has the biting edge of winter.

After about an hour of standing I begin to feel sort of equanimous. About 6 cars so far have honked in support. I appreciate that.

Then, the unpleasant exchange suddenly comes. A middle aged guy in an SUV with a young man in the passenger seat opens his window, leans over the young man, who I assume to be his son and says " Did you know that he (Alex) is an Marxist Communist?" I squint at him, feeling the oh shit, beam me out of here internal response.

He reiterates, as though I haven't responded appropriately like he expected me to say " Really??"

 "Ya he's a Marxist Communist". In my head I am thinking, has he ever read Marx? I don't respond, except to slightly bow my head and shake it. Then he says, " Did you know that? You should educate yourself." I guess I should have gone for my masters instead of just staying with a BA.

He turned the corner, his son in tow who watched all this. I wondered how the son would turn out as he grew up. I hope he goes another way, like many of us in the 60's who saw our parents politics as an impediment to real world issues. For one, Alex believes climate change is a serious, pressing problem.

After that encounter I try to ground myself. I even send the car man some feeble Mettha. 

Later I composed some snappy fantasy comebacks. They are only a fantasy, because silence was the right thing. But here are some possibilities: 

"Oh, you mean a communist like Vladimer Putin?"

" You know,  Alex is my god son"

" Tell me more about Marx, have you read his work?"

I will continue to try for new responses, every time I come up with one I feel a little more release of the negative energy, misinformation, strident resistance to progressive change, the embracing of dangerous lies, etc.

I'm still trying to send some mettha, glad to be back in my warm house off the sidewalk, toasting myself with a well earned glass of wine.

February 2021 - A Poem a Day

 January 30, 2021 

Inspired by Eddie Izzard and his month of marathon-a-day runs, I decided to do a poem-a-day during the month of February. I began a little early. Here is what I have so far:

 January 28

 I french braid my hair- 

sip the last bit of creamy warm coffee 

morning light emerges

 emerging heart 

Traveling spirit out of the hopeless night

 Step out the door.

January 30

 7:30 am, the light comes around the long dark month

 closing the final square on the calendar

 Driveway sheen reflects the neighbors new bright outdoor lights

 Soon I'll pull on the black compression socks,

 new running shoes lock my front door, 

step into the cold air

 Begin the lope,

 try for landing on the toe joints

 find the dirt at the edges of pavement

 step, step, step into morning.

 January 31

 Out of the scary night I wake

 from under the 4 layered bed I make 

At 7 the light from ink to gray

 A slow turn now to Sunday

 7 to 8 I write by the fire

 8:15 slip on outdoor attire 

shoes mud crusted , although new

 Other runners, just a few 

Breath winter air, chill and wet 

Never fast, but grateful yet. 

February 1

 The morning starts with my teacher's voice

 On a screen, other faces in the gallery 

My tree, through the west window meditation tree

 My teacher reads a poem, then plays our refuge song 

A fine start to Black History Month The month of my birth.