Columns

The days between Thanksgiving and Christmas used to be marked with Advent calendars and printed newspaper reminders of how many shopping days were left until Dec. 25. Now this holiday shopping period is crowded with Black Friday, Small Business Saturday, Cyber Monday … and what are we forgetting?

100 years ago – November 22,1917

Looking for a lost pet or a new four-legged friend? See the list of incoming strays and the selection of cats and dogs available for adoption from the Healdsburg Center for Animals.

Everyone I meet believes this year has flown by. True, we lost weeks immersed in a fire storm. But, even that doesn’t explain why the months seem shorter. Before the fires, the winter had morphed into summer and summer into what? Thanksgiving.

When discarded, the toxicity of electronic waste functions as an eroding agent on clean water, healthy soil and fresh air. The impacts of improperly disposed e-waste are measurable, harmful and applicable on a global scale. The general cause and consequence of its mismanagement seem to be shared equally among manufacturers and consumers alike.

Sometimes being alive isn’t all it’s cracked up to be. But yes, it sure beats the alternative.

It is well known that during times of tragedy we often see the best of humanity. This is so true in Sonoma County as we continue to move forward after the firestorm. As a principal in the Windsor Unified School District at Brooks Elementary School, I am so proud and humbled to be a part of this process.

One thing for which I always give thanks is my parents. They worked hard and raised us well. My father pushed us. My mother hugged us. It was a good combination.

As with most parts of life in Sonoma County, now removed by one month from the Oct. 8 wildfires, our 2017 Thanksgiving gatherings will be unlike any previous ones, with extra thoughts and prayers reserved for the victims and volunteers of our region’s greatest natural disaster in history. The timing to pause and give thanks could not be better.

Right around the time on Thanksgiving morning when you pop your turkey into that fancy oven, just after you tune the television in your cozy living room to the Macy’s Thanksgiving Day Parade from New York, volunteers affiliated with a Healdsburg-based nonprofit will fan out into the community and inspire gratitude of an entirely different kind.