The Hemp Invasion
Early this fall, along interstate 5 just north of Ashland, the air sometimes smelled of skunk—not the sharp odor of roadkill, but a foul smell that hung like fog. I later learned that I was smelling hemp, not skunk, growing on fields next to the Interstate. Hemp, you probably know, is a strain of non-psychoactive cannabis grown specifically for “industrial uses.” It must contain 0.3 percent or less of THC content. Cannabidiol, CBD for short, is its star performer. Here in Southern Oregon, hemp is an overnight Gold Rush—or, in this case, “green rush.”
Way to Go: Pooping at 7,900 ft.
A mighty volcano in the Cascade Range, Mount Shasta dominates the landscape, visible for more than 200 miles from parts of Northern California and southern Oregon. “When I first caught sight of it over the braided folds of the Sacramento Valley,” the naturalist John Muir wrote in 1874, “my blood turned to wine, and I have not been weary since.” Every mountain has its legends, big and small. This story, “Way to Go,” started with the whimsical decision by a local filmmaker to document Mt. Shasta’s composting toilet, the highest continuously operating toilet of its kind in North America. Like a nesting doll, the toilet soon led to larger stories: about Shasta’s distinct history, managing human waste in the high country, and the determination of local residents to keep their mountain public and wild.
Working Cats
The four, caged feral cats in the back of our Subaru wagon were speechless. We’d collected them a few minutes before at the Jackson County Animal Services, where they had been neutered rather than euthanized and granted a ninth life. Now, freshly anointed “working cats,” they were on their way to their new assignment: rodent control on a small farm tucked in the hills above Talent (pop. 6,500). “Why aren’t the cats meowing?” I asked Madeline, our guide on this expedition and feral cat expert. I was used to the ruckus our cats raised on a trip to the vet. “They’ve learned to be quiet as a matter of life and death,” she said.
Wellness in the Time of COVID-19
As COVID-19 stalks the globe, the term “wellness” has narrowed its focus to not (yet) infected. Psychologically, of course, we are all already infected. So far, the West Coast has borne the brunt of the U.S. coronavirus toll, though the East Coast is catching up. As of March 7, Washington State had recorded the most COVID-19 cases, more than 80, and the highest number of deaths, 14. California has treated 70 people for the virus and new cases continue to emerge at a quickening rate. In Oregon, the incidence has held steady at two cases—neither in Southern Oregon where the population density is 30 people per square mile and the only transportation hub is a small regional airport. By the time you read this, all of these numbers will have no doubt increased.
Open and Closed: A Coronavirus Update
As I sat down to write this coronavirus update, I looked again at the post I wrote a little over two weeks ago, ”Wellness in the Time of COVID-19.” Five days later, the COVID-19 epidemic—now a pandemic—was at our doorstep, an invisible beast unlike the earthquakes and forest fires for which communities in the Pacific Northwest prepare perennially. First to fall were Ashland’s two cultural icons. On March 12th, The Oregon Shakespeare Festival, which draws more than 300,000 visitors a year, suspended its 2020 season, which had just opened the week before. A day later, the Ashland Independent Film Festival, which gathers over 7,000 film lovers for five days, darkened its screens. Local restaurants and businesses held on for another couple of days, then shuttered.
Social Distancing: Week Four
In Oregon, we are entering our fourth week of enforced social distancing. In this preternaturally health conscious state, citizens and businesses fell in line quickly. I wasn’t surprised. Nor was I surprised when a few days ago, Jackson County (our county) made COVID-19 news: our per capita testing rate, it turns out, was second only to New York City, a statistic credited to the conscientiousness of local health authorities. As of today, there are 39 confirmed coronavirus cases in Jackson County (a number that has held steady for five days) and no fatalities. Ninety-nine percent of those tested proved negative.It’s hard to imagine, in sum, a better place to wait out the pandemic and, for this, I am so, so grateful.
Running with the Wolves: My Friend Sophia
Most personal narratives are built word by word. My friend Sophia weaves hers story by story. She is the most free- and deep-spirited person I know, a bookend to the anxiety and isolation that confines us now. From the Free Speech Movement at UC Berkeley, Sausalito’s houseboat community, San Francisco’s transformational (a.k.a human potential) movement, trekking in Tibet, teaching survival skills in Northern Ontario, cultivating a gay community of singers and ballroom dancers in the Rogue Valley—Sophia has lived more lives than most cats. She is an artist and a grandmother of seven, too. If she had a life motto, it might be, “You can do this girl!” Sophia is 76.
Animal Planet: Wildlife Near Me
“Goats, sheep, wild turkeys, and other animals have been spotted strolling through streets and plazas in cities around the world lately,” the New Yorker’s David Remnick writes. “On certain days it can appear that many places are being reclaimed, at least in part, by nature.” Where we live, there’s been a lot of animal reclaiming—less bucolic, alas, than the grazing sheep in the six-hour video loop (“Relax with Sheep”) that went viral a month ago. Here’s what it looks like.
Stunned: A Pandemic Time Capsule
Until five days ago, when the brutal death of George Floyd at the hands of Minneapolis police set American cities on fire, our streets were eerily quiet and empty from COVID-19. If we weren’t stunned then, we surely are now—by a deadly virus that has been spreading in America for two centuries: racism. Just last week, my five-year-old African-American grandson who lives in Brooklyn said, “I want to be a policeman when I grow up and save lives.” His Ethiopian mother, who knew little about racism until she moved from Ethiopia to New York City, sobbed as she told me this yesterday. For the two months previous, I’d been dragging and dropping articles, videos, photos and poems into a folder on my desktop named “COVID Time Capsule.” I opened it every day to savor one or another of its contents, some uplifting, some sharp. When I began this blog post a week ago, I thought I’d share artifacts from my folder—some of which may be in your coronavirus time capsule, too.