No supper. That was my vow on a recent cool night in Suzhou, China. I was alone. My son Atticus, a fifth-grader at The International School (TIS) in Portland, was living with a Chinese family for a week and attending Suzhou Experimental Elementary School, the culmination of seven years of Mandarin immersion. Like some other parents, […]
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Last month I vacationed for 14 glorious days in the Bahamas, dividing my time between the islands of Exuma and Eleuthera. During my week on Exuma, the Bahamians voted in national elections, held every five years. Their fervor was inspiring. Nearly every car was festooned with flags of one of the four main parties. Many […]
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Walking among the graves of strangers on a sunny spring afternoon made me neither sad nor worried about mortality. It did have another effect: the sparse information on tombstones left me imagining the lives of people from other times and other places. They came to life again, however briefly, as I pictured the families they […]
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Reincarnation as this owl — that’s what I want. Not merely to flaunt my aerial adroitness, fierce gaze, and stunning plumage. I like the idea of staying up all night and hooting from trees. I found the video here via a journalist whose work I admire. But James Fallow‘s likening of owls to cats with […]
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Blind trust or death wish? One or the other afflicts the many pedestrians using cell phones as they cross busy downtown streets. I see them often while driving in downtown Portland. They don’t see me. The increased risk of getting run over while using phones is well-documented. Now comes Siri, the virtual personal assistant on […]
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Some shopping malls can be dangerous places thanks to random outbreaks of violence, including at the one near my house. That doesn’t explain all the clothes for sale featuring patterns once the exclusive purview of battlefields and hunting grounds. Takeoffs on camouflage have infiltrated clothing lines for kids, judging from my recent shopping trips for […]
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A long-dead Oregon cowboy and rodeo star, whose life I’ve written about and continue to research, is finally receiving the recognition he deserves.
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I strolled the aisles at Walgreens recently while waiting for a prescription. A locked glass case containing medical test equipment stopped me. I wasn’t surprised to see monitors for blood sugar and the like. What surprised me were test kits for intoxication, marijuana and cocaine use, and paternity. For a modest investment, someone could reveal […]
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The nearby Safeway grocery reigns as my epicenter of oddity. Tonight, while waiting to buy bananas, I watched the guy in front of me pay for two big bags of potatoes. He didn’t answer the cashier’s pleasantries. When three pennies slid from the change machine, he flicked them onto the end of the counter, as […]
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Why does the mind, acting independently of its owner, insist on attaching significance to coincidences for which chance is the only plausible explanation? Or if not attaching significance, then automatically sketching out possible narratives that have no basis in fact? These questions and many others linger after a day of coincidences. First up: Driving to […]
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The flowers are gone. So are the candles, hand-scrawled notes, and other remembrances that for months crowded the sidewalk beneath a sign advertising passport photos. But the story they told is still with me, replayed every time I pass the intersection of NW Glisan and Broadway in Portland. It’s where a TriMet bus ran down […]
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Forests and cliffs along a finger of Puget Sound replace scenes from my city life. I’m driving north, Highway 101, enjoying glimpses of water reflecting gray sky. Then a small roadside cross blares a silent message: Fatal Crash Happened Here. Questions come in bursts, and the mind answers with gory images. Did the car flip? […]
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Two years ago, I was waiting in the hallway of a small Portland high school. I was there to interview students and a teacher for a story. As kids milled about in the din between classes, many hugged each other. Some embraces looked like reunions between dear friends who hadn’t seen each other for years. […]
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