Columns

“Dark Land, Dark Mirror,” Jonah Raskin’s new, suspenseful murder mystery takes place in Sonoma County in the present day. The detective is a feisty woman named Tioga Vignetta. The criminals are all pretending to be respectable citizens. The fall guy who’s framed for a murder in town is a Mexican from Chiapas named Kiko Martinez who grows flowers and has hit songs south of the border.

Windsor Middle School has several community partners that work with us throughout the year in order to keep our students and staff safe, including Community Matters, Alliance Medical Center, Kaiser Permanente, Safe Routes to School and the American Heart Association.

As far as we know, vulnerable Sonoma County residents living in Cloverdale, Geyserville, Windsor and Healdsburg have not been detained by ICE or DHS; however, the threat and fear are real. Many immigrants all over California have been picked up and detained by ICE (Immigration and Customs Enforcement).

We’re all familiar with the catastrophe of the October fires, and so far, we’ve responded in a way that showed the strength of our community.

Oh, the stories they can tell

March celebrates the achievements of intrepid women — we might call them wonder women, superheroes of the past and present. Examples of previous honorees, all well-known trail blazers, are Harriet Tubman, Rachel Carson, Wilma Mankiller, Eleanor Roosevelt and Madeline Albright.

With all that’s going on in our country, it’s time for some good news. We need not look further than in our own backyard. Having recently attended the Sonoma County Winegrowers’ annual meeting, let’s review their elaborate plans for the sustainability revolution they are strategically designing and implementing.

Whenever the topic of mental health or mental illness is in the news, it is seldom a good thing. The mass killings at a Florida high school by a sick and troubled youth wrought moments of national grief over yet another preventable tragedy. If only 19-year-old Nikolas Cruz had received the counseling and support he needed, 17 students and teachers might still be alive today.

When I sit down to write my column, I draw on experiences in my life and hope they connect with you as a reader. I describe my writings as Erma Bombeck-like, a humor/slice-of-life commentary (and then have to explain who Erma Bombeck was to anyone younger than myself), but I hope you have felt that I am honest and as open as privacy allows.

Events at the Windsor Senior Center