Saturday...Computer Repairs, Inspirations, Aaron and BJ's Coffee

  I don't have much to complain about. So many of you have been so inspirational to me that I find my complaints these days reduced to a minimum. So today it's hats off, and thanks to two people, Tiffany Castellvi and Kristy Kottkey. 


  Tiff Castellvi is a lovely lady with one leg who amazes me with her HR acumen, her communication and skiing skills, her perpetually happy and cheerful face and her excruciatingly catching optimism. Referring to herself  self deprecatingly as a monoped, she moves more gracefully on crutches than I ever have on my own two feet. And she has wonderful taste in shoes!  


Tiff and I used to work together. She moved on to other challenges and when I lost my job in June she was the first one to get in touch with me, offer consolation,  conversation and good advice. When I saw her at Starbucks in Beaverton that day I knew I was going to be fine and that I needed to soak up a few of her positive views on life. She still amazes me. 


  Kristy Kottkey, I really don't know too well at all. She and I attended a Kitzhaber for Governor House Party at her dad's house a couple of months ago. She is a former school teacher and is an activist who often writes articles in the local newspapers. I came across an article she just wrote for our Forest Grove News Times just this morning when I was grumbling about having to shell out money to repair our family's Dell XPS and I was also  feeling abused by my son's desire for more money in his checking account. What nerve. 


Her article starts out humorously about ending up at a nudist beach on the Columbia River, and it flows into a discussion of how her autistic son reacted to it all, with joy and smiles as he headed, splashing, into the water. See how poignantly  she ends her article from September 8, 2010:

"Moments of joy

I think for so many people in so many of life’s situations, it is the moments of joy that help us through the challenges. It is facing something terrifying, daunting, and tough that does indeed make the great things seem even more so.

That’s why I knew there was only one thing to do as I stood there on the beach watching my son splash with the biggest, most gleeful smile I have ever seen.

I tossed my swimsuit to my husband who stood there with a bemused – but not surprised – smile and I turned to join my son. Hand in hand, we ran off into the river, laughing all the way."

Thanks to Tiff and Kristy for helping me smile a little longer today as I picked my son Aaron up from a rain soaked  park up the hill. No I'm not going to comment about his messy room today or roll my eyes at his musical tastes (which are pretty good in fact) and I'm pretty ok with his hair.  But don't tell him ok? 

Drinking a latte here at  a bright and cheerful BJ's coffee shop in Forest Grove, in a little booth, wifi is humming, I'm humming and BJ herself is here running the show with panache.  As my darling wife Emma says, "Life is good!".  I love the sound of steam being blown into milk and the chit-chat around me. 

...yes it's a clear day, between the raindrops, here in Oregon. 

If It's Wednesday...Gotta Be Derek and Susan

Okay...I'm moved to tears. Yeah I've watched this DVD many times,  Derek Trucks and his wife, or is it Susan Tedeschi and her husband playing and singing together at Eric Clapton's  2007 Crossroads Festival. But let me tell you, sitting here in the little space we have carved out for our PC, earphones on, it doesn't get much better. I sat down this evening to relax and good god I've plugged in this performance again and it's hit me like a goods train, an emotional thumping I never expect from a sound, but that sneaks up and I'm gone. About half way through "Little By Little" ( http://www.dailymotion.com/video/x34aux_derek-trucks-susan-tedeschi-little_music) I got this big lump in my throat and I was transported again. I ramble on so much about religion, nature, beauty but I have to admit, the beauty that this kind of blues and this kind of soul, art and heart generate is not surpassed by anything I can think of. 

Musically, I"m really not a pushover....but jewelry can get me from time to time...

(I want those earrings...ok I lost focus for a while...)


There is a certain zone that couples can find, my wife and I find it often, even if it's just chatting about you know, our work day, talking about her artistry in the downstairs workshop, you know what I'm talking about..  Heck you all have felt it at least once. This magical zone is what exudes from Susan Tedeschi and Derek Trucks,  in the proud glances between them, in their genuine smiles, in their movements in  the shared invisible space that they are in during this performance.  And the audience, a huge one, falls right into their zone...head... over... heels....heels

If you need the blues, and we all need the blues, track this one down and set aside some time for it. This performance, like the Columbia Gorge and Big Sur, should be right up there on your Bucket List, I ain't lyin'. Or come on over and borrow my copy. Hats off Susan and Derek. Chapeaux! That's it for me tonight. I'm in a zone....

And it is a nice, rainy day here in Oregon

Tuesday and the Gorgeous Gorge

I spent the last couple of days in Boardman, Oregon. It's a small out-of-the-way town scrunched between Interstate 84 and the lolling Columbia River.  The Columbia River and her Gorge need to be on everybody's bucket list. As one drives along I-84 from east to west, one is blasted with the sheer beauty of nature run wild and there is something magical about the way the river and its gorge morph east to west from a wide lake-like expanse, between brown desert hills, then through a stage as a ruggedly beautiful flowing river between immense crags of granite and windmills, (yup, hundreds of them), ending up as a gentle blue winding expanse, thanks to multiple dams surrounded by immense pine covered bluffs and rocks that just plain...soar. 

Names like Maryhill Museum,  Rooster Rock, Multnomah Falls and Vista House jump at you from signs along I-84. Another bit of what has to pass as one of man and nature's most successful collaborative sleights of hand is how the Gorge going from west to east just isn't the same one you see when returning home traveling west. Really.  I feel strangely calm after the 190 mile drive today. You see I haven't had time in the past two days to obsess about politics, I was working after all, and I listened to music all the way home from Boardman this afternoon. Last night's sunset was incredible...above, that little cone in the background is Mt Hood. The far bank is Washington State. 

I stopped along the way as I drove home today, at various view points and I stopped at the former site of Celilo Falls.  I had passed by it so many times in the past and had to stop this time. Before we put in The Dalles Dam in 1957, Cililo Falls (formerly Wyams Falls) was the premier fishing spot for the native Americans of the region. We flooded it. No more falls. I love the electricity but folks, we took away their lively hood and there is an "Oregon's History" placard there in the little park they have built for travelers stating that destroying the falls in no way meant the loss of the Indian way of life...and they still have a treaty that lets them fish :o/

So what are my takeaways from the drive? I am even more astounded by the sheer power and the beauty of the gorge and the Columbia herself. You have to go see it, drive it both ways. I understand some prehistoric ice dam  in Montana gave way and the torrent created the Pelouse in Washington and the boulders and water carved out the Gorge. What a visual. What words could we use. Can't you imagine?  Maybe some pol will piss me off tonight, but I doubt it. Going back to work in Tillamook tomorrow, it's my daily drive through the Wilson River Valley through the Pacific Coastal Range...oh and the weather was fantastic.


And it is a nice, clear day here in Oregon

Uplifting Sunday

I was pretty cynical about life in a Christian country this past week. And my face looked it. After all,  I had read Sam Harris' short book Letter to a Christian Nation and had waited for some leaders to step up and tell all of the newscasters and bloggers to just stfu about a pastor in Florida with a flock of 50 wanting to burn Korans.  I wished for leaders to do likewise with the outraged Christians in the US jerking chains/getting their chains jerked about Muslims and a planned mosque in New York.  

I had a good week at work, a successful one, I saw my son Scott that I have missed a lot and I was delighted!! But the whole atmosphere of intolerance and fear on the internet, in the news and on the radio revolving around 9/11 had added to my cynicism. And there is no way I'm going to cut myself off from the media.  We're heading for fascism and fundamentalist Christianity and Islam are dragging us all there..day by day, little by little. 


My face was heavily lined with the old language of something I could not verbalize.



So when I went to church on my own this morning, I had mixed feelings. On the one hand, I was and am rather hypocritical about attending service while being convinced (last week I had an epiphany...another story) that the Old Testament is not godly at all. I walk my way through the self imposed hypocritical cynicism by telling myself that my Pastor is someone I admire, and that even though I deny the Old Testament's standing as god's word, at least I still lean toward the New Testament as a good effort on the part of many good people to sell us on and tell us about a really good man that preached love and humility. So for books, I'm on board with 50% and for pastors, I have one of the best. 

Pastor Diane verbalized masterfully from the pulpit what my heart needed her to say as the spiritual leader of our congregation. She too was "sickened" by the attention given to the pastor in Florida and by the phony outrage surrounding the mosque in New York, both of these issues being whipped into a frenzy by politicians and the media. Her sermon and her messages soothed me, just as a surprise visit from my son Scott this past three days did. I was happy I went to service, and buoyed psychologically and spiritually by Diane's' sermon. So I ain't giving up just yet on Christ's message. 

Something else I took home with me from this morning's sermon was Diane's selected excerpt from Katherine Rich's Dreaming in Hindi.  It pointed out that our faces seem to change visibly when we learn a new language. Ms Rich had looked in a mirror while she was in India learning Hindi, and didn't recognize the woman looking back at her.  It's a physiological change that is true. (I noticed that when I learned French. I looked far more sophisticated :-) )   Serendipitously a friend of mine had been looking at her face in the mirror yesterday and had the same feeling of "just who is this woman staring back at me". So I'm all "what the hell I'll look too". 

You know what? Maybe were are learning a new language. Diane suggested it is the "Language of Christianity". Annie could be learning a new language?  and me? I'm relearning the language of acceptance which is a real bitch. I do look a hell of a lot better this afternoon though. Thanks Diane, Scott, Emma and Annie.

And it is a nice, clear day here in Oregon

Saturday...Time to Think...

This is a very important date in the history of our country, and I've been thinking, sitting here on the deck. How is this place handling life right now?  

I do love this place and worry about it a lot. Worrying is not in the Constitution or the Bill of Rights...and I worry about that too, but I do feel free to worry and fret as much as I want. As I look out behind our house from the deck to the southwest of Forest Grove, Oregon, I am constantly amazed at the variety of colors, crops, clouds and foliage I can see as the year passes from one season to the next and as the day's sunlight passes from east to west...I just accept the changes I see, the rich variety that makes up my view from the deck. I revel in them, I celebrate them. I worry that we as a nation and as a people just haven't been able to do the same with the rich variety and varied palette of people that make up our demographic landscape.  

Events such as the tragic one that occurred in New York on 9/11/2001 or more recently in New Orleans shake us and try our faith in humanity in general. We seem to thrash around for meaning and turn to our churches and synagogues and yes mosques, for direction. We also look to our political leaders for moral and emotional support.  So I wonder and I worry about how we will ever get to a loving and tolerant place as a nation of such rich diversity when so many of our religious and political leaders offer us mystical and fanatical drivel on the one hand and self righteous hate filled racial intolerance and saber rattling on the other. 

I enjoy the beauties of nature, but sometimes things don't go well for us here, weather wise.  But I know this:  When strong storms blow down my fence or the snow keeps me house bound for days I don't believe that some god has it in for me due to an error in judgment I made in 1972 or because I marched in the Portland Pride Parade in 2008.  No, Katrina wasn't some angry god's revenge on the people of New Orleans for enjoying life too much.  What do you hear from religious leaders these days? 

When economic times are rough I refuse to believe it's because of Mexican laborers who mow lawns for CEO's or pick our strawberries are to blame. No the ladies who clean the hotel rooms and work for Merry Maids didn't take work from me or my neighbors.  I want leaders to stand up for what is right, decent and loving. Tolerant, rational and thoughtful.  

Well, we ain't getting it folks and a lot of Americans are willingly eating up what they are getting from many religious, and political leaders and media pundits who make a living on spreading fear through the countryside.  I will keep thinking about ways I can help move people I know away from the social dangers that are facing us. I admit, I need help. But I am willing. 


And it is a nice, clear day here in Oregon