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Humans have seen troubled times before, but perhaps never quite like this. Certainly, World War I and World War II had huge global impacts, but not as quickly, nor as indiscriminately, as this world-wide pandemic. There is a lot of talk now about future changes, and what the New Normal might look like ... . Perhaps, first, we should take a hard look at the Old Normal – endless wars, political instability, escalating climate destruction, desperate refugees, homelessness, racism, mutual religious intolerance and millions living in...
We are not halfway there yet. We might not know or see or experience the halfway point. With luck, perhaps, it will pass, we will get past it, without realizing it. Patience. How hard that is, to be patient, whether we are three or 33 or 93? Of course, once we pass 13, we are challenged to be mature role models and to set an example for others. So here we are. Let us count the days. It is 51 days since the Skagit County commissioners declared a public health emergency; 44 days since Gov. Jay Inslee closed restaurants and then the next week,...
Would you like to help the scientific community improve their (and our) understanding of the transmission and impact of COVID-19? There are easy (and anonymous) ways to do that by answering a few simple questions about how you feel each day and adding your information to that of thousands of others. The broader the participation in these crowd-sourcing data activities, the better our understanding of the incidence and prevalence of COVID-19 in our local communities and in the general population: information that is vital to understanding risks...
Did you know that Shakespeare did some of his best work during a pandemic? And he even referenced it in his work. “A plague on both your houses” are Mercutio’s dying words in Romeo and Juliet. Now, I am a totally ADHD person dealing with the challenges on self-imposed, government mandated (common sense) isolation. So, I am finally sitting down and finishing my play, “MAX TO THE MAX.” I’ve had staged readings with theatre companies in Vancouver, BC, and Santa Rosa, CA, gotten notes from friend...
In these difficult and frightening times, many people have come forward to help our community in a variety of ways. I want to give a BIG thank you to all who have stepped up to help our community, especially all those workers on the front lines, whether in our hospitals, medical clinics, ambulances, law enforcement, or essential businesses. We cannot get through these times without their invaluable contributions. With the Center for Disease Control recommending the wearing of masks, numerous people have volunteered to sew masks. However, it is...
In the past hundred years, our country has faced a number of crises of a world-wide dimension, including the Great Depression and World War II. There was Republican push-back to FDR’s economic and social solutions to help us get out of the Depression, and there was isolationist opposition to entering WW II. But as we look back on those times, one of the characteristics that has become most memorable is the sacrifice that the average American demonstrated then. People united and proudly pulled together. Rather than having a president that p...
It is not a war. It is a health care crisis. A nationally mismanaged healthcare crisis. How do we deal with the uncertainty of it all? We are lucky to be in a state that follows the scientific consensus of how to fight this virus, lucky to be in La Conner where there is enough physical elbow room to walk about, lucky to connect with our friends and neighbors for human warmth. The difficult part is accepting those new rules while we seem to be doing all right. Massive loss of freedom. Businesses closed. Keeping distance in the grocery store. Not...
Ken, I enjoyed your photo this last week; “This Is What Stay At Home Looks Like”. We seem to have the same sense of humor. Richard Raisler...
I was impressed by the insightful and timely article, in the April 15 edition of the La Conner Weekly News, reporting on the rate of Covid-19 virus infection in Skagit County. We are all learning, or should be learning, more every day about the spread of the disease, and the correlation with good health and sanitation practices, and the ever present health risk from human interaction. I was never sure of what exponential growth meant. This, too, we have learned: The epidemic “doubling time” is the rate or time it takes for a disease to inf...
Learning certainly looks and feels different now but it is still happening. Our teachers updated their websites with office hours, class times and learning materials. I encourage you to check it out! There are some great learning resources available. Our office staff is planning how to deliver to and retrieve learning materials from families that are not able to access them electronically. All teachers are identifying what learning standards are the most important to explore with their students. Some creative learning experiences are arising...
“Love in the time of the Cholera” is a book famous in part because of its title. The 1985 novel by the Columbian Gabriel García Márquez traces the complex journey of a couple from their youthful marriage through a lifetime of lovers, beyond any one cholera epidemic. Cholera, a deadly infectious disease, is spread through contaminated water supplies. Best if we recognize laughter in the time of the coronavirus now, in the present moment. Even in this worst hard time, to echo the title of Tim Egan’s 2006 award winning history of th...
Today is the 50h anniversary of Earth Day. Conceived by Wisconsin U.S. Senator Gaylord Nelson and brought to life by a 25 years old Denis Hayes, Earth Day burst forth on April 22, 1970, during the then never-ending Vietnam War and two weeks before students were shot dead at Jackson State and Kent State universities as campuses erupted over the U.S. invasion of Cambodia. Our country and our planet has known massive strife. In 1970 it was also a very dirty, polluted, world. But Earth Day and follow up actions by millions of Americans of all ages...
Dear editor: On March 25 Gov. Jay Inslee decreed that construction is not “essential activity” shutting down residential and commercial building projects, leaving some with unfinished houses. The order allows construction on government projects, but takes away thousands of private-sector jobs, with builders and contractors forced to cancel orders. Inslee’s mandate kills many trades, hurting families and the economy. Now some construction companies, roofers and others may have no choice but to leave the state to find work. The const...
Our times compel a search for wisdom, if not distraction. We survey the landscape of snarky-yet-telling memes and self-help bromides. Eventually, when eyes weary of our umbilical, glowing beacons, we plumb the depths of more enduring traditions. Perhaps the most iconic account of global cataclysm, the Bible’s Flood Epic, comes readily to mind and heart in these strange days, less as facile fable of punishment for evil than as an embrace of catastrophe as opportunity. Judaism’s take on this ancient, shared saga goes beyond the mythic her...
Among everything else collapsing in our society, this pandemic could be the death knell for newspapers. Publishers are worried. Ads have disappeared, page numbers have shrunk – except for a so far stubbornly resistant Weekly News – and some have eliminated issues. The Cascadia Weekly is for now a bi-weekly. Subscriptions and retail sales are 16 percent of the Weekly News annual revenues. Paper sales just about cover the single cost of printing the paper annually. What does this mean? Newspaper subscribers get an incredible deal....
This was the Saturday that the 34th Annual Not-So-Impromptu Tulip Parade did not take place in the month the Tulip Festival was cancelled, in the spring that school stopped for the rest of the year. This is the year that a novel coronavirus conquered the world. This is the time that the economy stopped and people from Washington state to Washington D.C. were told to stay home and stay out of work, to close their shops, shutter and shut down their factories. This, the year of our Lord 2020, is the year without Easter services in church for the...
In this COVID-19 nightmare, several newspapers in our state have ceased publication – they rely on the advertising dollars from stores that are shuttered right now. Readers of La Conner Weekly News are very fortunate they still have a community newspaper. La Conner has been home to a weekly newspaper since the 1870s and publisher Ken Stern is working though one of the worst economic times in the newspaper industry to keep our small-town paper alive. Community journalism is always more about community service than making a living. And you...
Dear editor: A “musing” on my part led me to thoughts of words – words from paper mail, words from emails, words from twitter, words from articles and warnings on the internet, words from Facebook, words from texts. Our minds are overflowing with words, and these days; they are mostly about Covid-19. In the early days of social-distancing confinement, I spent hours pouring over words that might help me keep the invisible monster at bay. Some words were helpful; some were horrifying; some were infuriatingly false. Some of them were ble...
Do we really want things to go back to normal? Are you sure? One definition of normal is to be healthy in mind and body. Ahhh … that strikes a chord, doesn’t it? A global, unprecedented turn of events has focused the entire world’s attention away from life as normal. Now it’s on our collective health and its very personal impact as well as the dire, economic consequences to each individual on the planet when things go catastrophically awry. The COVID-19 virus is very different than anything we have ever faced before. It has certa...
There is a new normal out there but that day is still to arrive. It’s dawn is not yet on the horizon. The old normal, so much of the status quo, needs to spiral from crippled to life support. It is the one thing that needs to die and get buried. It has taken a crisis of once a century proportions to reveal the weaknesses behind the rhetoric and the structures of this, the greatest country in the world. Greatness stands solid in the storm. Strength shows in the protection of those first and most battered by disaster. Instead the winds and w...
Being members of the group likely to suffer the most from our current health crisis, Barb and I have been trying to practice “social distancing” during our day to day activities, and in most instances we have succeeded. Grocery shopping was when we felt vulnerable until we learned that Pioneer Market willingly accepted phone orders with deliveries to the trunk of our car. I ordered over thirty items, and slightly over an hour later they called that my order was ready for pickup. Except for a couple of out of stock items, all fresh and good qua...
The White House Dear Mr. President: Congratulations on your decision to extend your national social distancing directive through April. The strength you displayed in changing your mind is admirable. It is a wonderous show of courage, that you are large enough to refute your earlier words, your hope that churches would be packed on Easter. I write as one who has questioned and even criticized actions of your presidency. But your directive opened my eyes to your path to reelection. I, too, love my country, and, like you, fear for its future, and...
Steady as she goes. In the old days, before planes or even cars, the metaphor for the nation was Ship of State. Is it smooth sailing? Are we battered by high winds and storms? Are there clouds on the horizon? Can we get over the (sand) bar? Are we on course? Never fear, the Captain’s steady hand is on the helm. The Captain will guide us into port. As a nation, we have always embraced the myth of a strong leader, whether that was General Washington or General Custer. From the first landings in Virginia and Massachusetts we have always pushed f...
Dear, dear people of La Conner: If we have stay away from each other and can’t work, how about being outside? You can keep your distance outside. I have reopened my on-the-honor-system plant sales at my clinic (located behind the post office) so you can get some plants. How about helping your neighbor with their yard? If you would like some plants and cannot afford it please contact me and we will work out a trade. If you don’t know much about plants, I will help you, free of charge at this time. Adding a little color can bring some joy to you...
Letter to Editor: My name is Connie Funk and I feel so blessed to be a part of this amazing community. Like everyone else in this current time of challenge, I am looking for ways I can be of service to others and helping to create positive connections. As a long time gardener and mosaic artist, I have created a table out on the road in front of our home with free bouquets and damaged china, which is the mainstay of my mosaic art form. We are located near the Rexville store on Dodge Valley Road-13973 Dodge Valley Road- Mount Vernon 98273. I...
