Until the last few days, I hadn’t traveled through the Columbia River Gorge and seen the new price of protecting the planet. For several miles east of The Dalles, the bare ridge lines that for eons had starkly demarcated earth from sky now are scarred with wind turbines. Aligned like robotic sentries, they look like a science fiction future set in the prehistoric past. Read More
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South of the tiny hamlet of Pilot Rock along a lonely road, I saw an ancient barn. One end had collapsed. No one lives close enough in the desolate hills to have heard it. The rest of the building looked ready to fall in the next big wind. I ventured inside. Sunlight poured through holes in the roof. Dried cow dung littered the dirt floor. From a darkened corner came a noise. A deer stared at me then scrambled through a gap in the rear wall, hooves clattering on fallen planks. I was alone.
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Mother: What are you so angry about, bitch?
Daughter: I’m not angry.
Mother: It’s all over your face, bitch.
Daughter: What are you talking about? Read More
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I make no secret of my adoration for The Avett Brothers, a band I fell for even harder after seeing them live last summer. For that concert at the Oregon Zoo, I stood in a monsoon-like rain, oblivious to the drenching.
Now I’ve seen them again, this time indoors last Friday night at the Crystal Ballroom. I leaned against the stage with the most die-hard music fans I’ve ever met: people who had flown from South Dakota, a couple who had driven eighteen hours from Colorado, and a woman from Washington, D.C. who was taking in her eleventh show on the band’s present tour. Another guy was seeing his sixth performance in nine days. All planned to take in the Saturday night show too. Read More
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Movement outside the bathroom window. Peering through the blinds, I see a heron atop the neighbor’s garage. It’s scoping out the goldfish in our small backyard pond. Some are so large they’re often mistaken for koi. All are oblivious to the harbinger of death gazing upon them. Read More
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In evening light, she and a friend drift past my house. “Can I take a picture of your hat?” No hesitation or strange look in her response, only a guileless yes. “What’s the occasion?” She glances at her friend. “I make them all the time from what I see along the sidewalk.” Lilac today, maybe dogwood tomorrow. They saunter off. I ask flower girl her name. Looking back over her shoulder — slowly to keep her hat in place — she calls out: “Matilda.”
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We had crowded into a building filled with tables filled with wine. As we — wife and another couple — snaked through lines of people and sampled the wares of artisanal vintners, rain began drumming on the roof like it does in Florida, not Oregon. The sound drowned out the chatter. Wind swept through open doors. Curtains of rain swirled sideways. Then came thunder, and people cheered. They cheered because thunder is rare in Portland and because enough wine makes violent storms a happy backdrop on an early spring Saturday. Read More
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I can find just about anything at my neighborhood Safeway grocery. That was my reaction while perusing its modest books section for the first time. Romance novels pack the shelves, though some titles hawk a niche form of lust.
Romance novels apparently have sub-genres, including what I cynically classify as the rich-dominating-studs-knock-me-up category. Take these titles that caught my perverse eye: Read More
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In February on a rare sunny day, I helped friends dig up and move a Japanese laceleaf maple from their backyard to their front. No chance the tree was going to survive the unavoidable mugging at our hands. Read More
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My intrepid correspondent (wife), a food cart gourmand, spotted this menu item in downtown Portland AFTER ordering the yakisoba. Or so she claims.
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The ‘hood has changed after a week of violent crime only a short walk from my Northeast Portland house.
Count them: two stabbings in two gang fights at the Lloyd Center Mall, another gang fight at the Applebee’s restaurant across the street from the mall, a bank robbery, and a gang-related shooting at an Asian restaurant-bar four blocks south of me. The victim survived four gunshot wounds. Read More
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Do two make a trend? I’ve now seen lone tricycles perpetually locked to sidewalk bike racks outside two Northeast Portland restaurants. They’re obviously in place for symbolic value, but symbolizing what?
One has been parked outside Tin Shed for at least a few years. A couple nights ago, a newer trike grabbed my attention. It’s outside Belly, which opened in July to good reviews but isn’t getting the business it deserves. Read More
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