Editorial

I was avoiding Amour, the movie. I’d seen enough previews to know the story line and it frightened me. For a while I was saying I’d sooner see a Die Hard movie than Amour. And I’d have to be dragged to one of those brutal movies. And then sit through most of it with my eyes closed and then rant about Hollywood glorifying violence.

When their oppressors fled, the people of Mali danced. The African women wrapped themselves in bright colors, some even bared their bellies, and they got out into the street and shimmied. How sweet, freedom. It makes you want to dance.

Power washing and our local creeks

Instead of our usual Winter Lite we have been experiencing record cold. A cold snap, they call it. Nothing as punishing as in other parts of the country. A Kansan might poo-poo how we fret over our lemon tree, tucked in like a dowager on a cruise ship. A New Englander might not share my delight in how my neighbor’s frosted roof glimmers in the dawn.

It seems to me unseemly that our leaders object so strenuously to the State of California wanting to charge $8 for visiting the State Beaches along our magnificent coast while at the same time saying it makes sense for the County of Sonoma to charge a $7 fee for visiting its own parks.

I was glad to see my friend and colleague George Snyder go out in style last week. His memorial in Occidental last Saturday drew a mob of his friends and family who packed St. Philip the Apostle Church as everyone knew they would.

“Where’s my Evita?” That’s the question on the mind of John DeGaetano, who will direct the famous musical at the Raven Performing Arts Theater this summer.

Dressing in my sweats, high-top shoes, hooded jersey and cap, I leave the house to meet the morning  cold. As my father would say, “No one is tougher than the weather!” I am going to meet an old friend— wild, steep, dense stands of redwood, oak and madrone— the forested path of the Fitch mountain fire trail. Hiking it brings understanding and awareness of life’s connectedness, of oneness with the Earth.

The Russian River Watershed Association through its member agencies strives to inform community members about our watershed. This series of articles serves as a tool to educate the community in ways to promote and maintain healthy watersheds.

December 25 is, of course, Christmas Day, the celebration of the birth of Jesus Christ. Christians believe that this birth is the turning point, the very center of human history. From it we count the years forward and backward, B.C., before Christ, and A.D., Anno Domini, Year of our Lord. We believe that the baby born in Bethlehem is Emmanuel, God with us, fully human from the flesh of His Mother Mary, and fully God by the power of the Holy Spirit. We also know, along with this and because of this, that every birth is sacred. Carl Sandburg, in his uniquely down to earth way, said that a baby is God’s opinion that life should go on. When my older brother’s first child was born he called me in the middle of the night to tell me that his son’s birth, at which he was present, was the closest thing to a miracle he had ever seen. I had the joy of witnessing the births of my five children and I agree with Carl Sandburg and my brother and certainly with Mary and Joseph. Birth is a miracle, it is God’s opinion, it is God with us.