Where just last week, all the clothing racks at Freddy’s were filled with “summery colors,” today, they are featuring my chosen wardrobe options — black and gray.
Of course, I don’t need any new clothes, but you can be sure that when the turtle neck display appears, I will buy one in both colors. I pretty much wear out both my gray sweater and my black one every year.
It is amazing how powerful dependence on fossil fuel is. Cars, of course. Driving back from the river yesterday, I needed to get home in a hurry, so I chose I-5 over beautiful country roads. As I came over the overpass to get on, I noticed unbelievable numbers of big rigs going in both directions. I know we need the goods loaded on them, and in recent decades, the US has relied less and less on a modern rail system. Of course, trains use fuel too.
Would we be BFF’s for even a minute with certain Arab nations were it not for their oil? Right now, would the EU be putting up with Putin for a split second if not dependent on Russian natural gas?
I used to haul logs into my fireplace for winter warmth, but this gradually proved inefficient for several reasons. I was considering solar panels for my roof, but I do live in Oregon where we have lots of trees which are watered by lots of rain. The roof at 1880 is wonderfully shaded.
All this is fraught with contradictions and dichotomies. I read another one in the SJ this morning: “The fracking revolution is about to make the US a natural gas exporter.” In spite of the many problems with this method of getting our fossil fuel to the surface,
would it not be too cool to provide it to Paris, Berlin, and Warsaw to keep them warm in the winter and say to that Russian thug, “Take that, Putin!”?
#1. The Salem Art Fair
I like it all right. I just don’t love it, unlike at least 50,000 people who descend on Bush’s Pasture Park every July to peruse over 200 crafty booths and sample the carnival food at 50 vendors’ tents.
I do always go, but after I’ve at looked at maybe five or six booths, I just zone out.
I generally do this on my way home from working in St. P’s food booth, which I actually really love doing, even though I’m sure if we divided our net profit by the number of human hours we’d discover that we’d all worked for about 25¢ per hour.
You always get to work with the nicest people on the face of the earth in a church kitchen, even a makeshift kitchen in a park on a hot summer day.
“Hot summer day” is my segue to the second thing I just don’t get.
#2. Convertibles.
I ask you, what is fun about driving around with the sun beating down on you, grit and wind blowing in your face, and traffic noise?
Life is not a Rom-Com, more’s the pity.
So, if you come by for me with the top down, I’ll tell you that I just realized I need to take my own car and will meet you there — after I’ve driven over in the air conditioned Subaru with the windows closed.
It’s not the Willamette, although there are many spots along our big river that have my heart. It’s the Santiam. Factually, the put-in at Green’s Bridge is the North Santiam. Then after a few miles, in from the left comes the South Santiam. The confluence. I love that word. And then you’re on the Santiam all the way to the Willamette.
I have now been certified — which is to say I have a very impressive embossed certificate from the Marine Board — that states that I am the official SOLVE monitor for that stretch. SOLVE is a volunteer arm that stands for something like Save Oregon from Litter and Vandalism, etc. Just ask and they give you the stretch that you love most to look after.
As luck would have it, this is also the run that myriads of kids — read anyone under fifty — like to load up anything inflatable with a twelve-pack and float down to Jefferson on hot days. You can just guess how many beer cans and bottles and ripped open air mattresses and chairs that were never intended as flotation devices wind up along the banks and in strainers all along the way. “They” recently put up a gate with a complicated lock. It’s complicated to get the key. Jim figured that out. And it’s complicated to get the gate unlocked. Dave figured that out. Supposed to keep out the riffraff. Not so much. Now everyone but us key holders just hikes in with their plastic floaty things and beverages.
Jim and I just happened to be driving in as the gate was being installed last month. Getting a key requires a fishing license, a twenty dollar bill, and a drive over to the Fish and Wildlife office north of Corvallis. The Key Club is very exclusive.
Took Dave and me two trips loading up our kayaks to collect all the trash.
It is such a beautiful stretch. Lots of splashing to negotiate. Lots of birdsong. Deer families grazing in the tall grass along the bank. Ospreys flying over our heads showing us their amazing markings and diving down to catch fish for their families.
Usually a blue heron comes along with us all day , showing us the way in case we get confused and forget which direction is downstream.
And spotting an eagle always takes my breath away. Helps if you bring your good camera. Hard to zoom in like this with my iPhone.
Cigarette butts are litter, damn it!!, and are very dangerous to birds and fish who get them caught in their gullets. (Can you see Mrs. Urbanski’s face from there? Does she look happy to you?)
Looks all cleaned up to me now. I can’t understand how anyone could mess up this special place.
Mostly , in this personal journal, I don’t wax political, but this week, after thinking so much about the Supreme Court’s recent decision, I just can’t help myself. I was gratified to read the SJ’s response to this painful question in this morning’s paper. Right there next to blurbs about last weekend’s multicultural festival, soccer, and the Fourth of July, I found this bold and risky column:
OUR VIEWPOINT
U.S. Supreme Court. In seeking to not infringe on religious rights, the Supreme Court did exactly the opposite this week. It conferred on businesses the ability to possess religious beliefs, further expanding past court rulings that corporations are people, too.
The issue was health insurance coverage: Could a family-owned business be forced to include coverage for certain contraceptives, ones that the family management construed as tantamount to abortion?
The court ruled 5-4 that the company did not have to provide that coverage, which was part of President Obama’s Affordable Care Act. Requiring that coverage, when it went against the owners’ religious beliefs, would violate the federal Religious Freedom Restoration Act.
That raises the question of consistency on the part of plaintiff Hobby Lobby. Mother Jones magazine reported this spring that Hobby Lobby’s 401(k) employee retirement plan “held more than $73 million in mutual funds with investments in companies that produce emergency contraceptive pills, intrauterine devices, and drugs commonly used in abortions.”
Business life is not nearly as simple as the court majority tried to make it seem. If companies can claim a religious exemption for contraceptive coverage, what other exemptions can they claim: That no divorced or cohabiting, unmarried couples will be employed by their business? That only males be employed? That vaccinations, blood transfusions or organ transplants will no longer be covered by health insurance? That family and parental leave will be honored only for parents in traditional marriages, not for children born out of wedlock?
Furthermore, the court implies the religious “beliefs” of a business trump an employee’s beliefs. The decision certainly takes away her right to health insurance that includes the disputed contraceptives.
If anything, the court’s “conservative” majority may have added to the impetus for universal, single-payer health care in the United States instead of our convoluted combination of employer- and government-paid coverage. ”
I am an old woman, so sometimes I must write bold and risky things too. First, let me say I’m pretty sure no one thinks abortion is a really nice thing. It is most often the result of tragic human mistakes. Humans make tragic mistakes. Telling men not to impregnate and women to be good girls is not going to make a bit of difference. Sex is a powerful, primitive drive. Seems to me, contraceptives are going to prevent more abortions than anything else that comes to mind.
The connotation of words and phrases is powerful too. “Pro-life” sounds really nice. So does “pro-choice.” “Health care” has a nice ring to it too. But these phrases are loaded with multiple meanings. I am trying to come up with a pretty phrase to describe the Court’s decision. Can’t do it. I just want to say,”What on earth were you thinking?” “Can of worms” comes to mind.
