The Tempest

William and I saw "The Tempest" in Ashland last night. Wow. I forgot how awesome professional theatre is. We were in the front row, stage left. Ashland is about 90 miles south of us, not a bad drive, except we have 4 mountain passes to cross on I-5. We met William's high school buddy and his wife there, they come from the south about the same distance. It was totally worth getting home at 1 am which is very late for us.

The Elizabethan Theatre in Ashland is a wonderful re creation of the one used in Shakespeare's time. Ashland is at 2,000' and the open air theatre was quite cool and everyone huddled under blankets. I don't think London is known for it's warm weather either. And I felt bad for the Elizabethans, I had a lot of polartic on.

The play was directed by Libby Appel, in fact it was her last, as she is moving on from Ashland. I had seen her direction of "Richard III", a few years ago when I took my English classes. I so loved what she did with that play, she made it was so much more powerful. When I heard this was her last play I really wanted to see it. I was not disappointed.

Prospero and King Alonso make peace.

- Ashland Shakespeare Festival

These actors were both incredible, especially Prospero. This is also Shakespeare's last play and some say his best. It almost begins where a tragedy leaves off, only years later. And though it is not a comedy as the other comedy's, it has some very funny lines. It has a happy ending and deals with all the mistaken identities and transformations of humans, as so many of his other plays do. The older I get the more I appreciate Shakespeare.

"We are such stuff as dreams are made on......."

- The Tempest, Act IV, Scene i

our government at work

BLM

Commonly know as the Bureau of Land Management
is now the bureau of land MIS management.

Pure and simple.

How could they cut these trees ancient trees?

Illegally! That's how.

The organization I worked for, Umpqua Watersheds http://www.umpqua-watersheds.org/ along with other organizations in southern Oregon, took the BLM to court last year to stop the logging of this old growth forest. They lost the legal battle but cut the road through illegally before the court decision. We won the decision, the court sided with us. Hey, wait, put back the trees....

And now they want to

revise their management plans for western Oregon to get around the law. The Western Oregon Plan Revisions (WOPR) is the BLM's process of removing and weakening important environmental protections. The BLM wants to log the last of the old-growth in Oregon's heritage forests.

"BLM Draft plan released, and its a whopper!

The BLM released its Draft Environmental Impact Statement for the "Western Oregon Plan Revisions (WOPR)" on August 10, 2007. The preferred alternative would increase logging of trees 200 years and older sevenfold over the next decade. Yes, you read that correctly, a
700 percent increase in logging Oregon's last old-growth forests!"

Quoted from http://www.oregonheritageforests.org/

Wow - supersize the cut.

Some background:
BLM lands, also known as “O&C” lands, are in a square-mile checker-board land ownership patterns. 2.6 milllion acres of public land.

Above: The Coos Bay BLM recreation map of lands about 20 miles west of Roseburg BLM lands are yellow, private industrial forest lands are white.

The federal government took these lands back from the Oregon and California (O&C) Railroads in the early 20th century because of fraudulent land deals.

In 1995, the BLM set aside reserves for endangered species like owls and salmon as part of a way around the Endangered Species Act when owls were listed. Somehow the recovery plans mandated by law for endangered species was only held to public lands. Private timber lands got away with murder.

Still the timber industry was not pleased, sued for a bigger cut on public lands (after there was no more big timber on private land ) and Bush "settled" with them by making a deal to let them eliminate wildlife reserves on BLM land, using an old 1937 O & C law of timber production.

I am reading the Draft Environmental Impact Statement so that I can make "comments" on the document and supposedly these public comments are taken into consideration. It is a 1,500 page tome and the planning process must have cost them a fortune already. The law says they have to have alternatives, so what, they are all terrible. Increase old growth logging by 700% - are they nuts. You can't pay for the expenses of the twenty first century with the resource extraction of the 18th century. Hello, does this look like 1937?

Only 18% of the northwest's ancient forests remain. Some sources say as little as 13%. Most of it now on public land, the private land cut theirs a long time ago. This is sustainable? We should cut what, more?

Check out Oregon Heritage Forests

http://www.oregonheritageforests.org/old_growth_giveaway

for more information and ways you can become involved - it's your public land, let them know how you want it managed. Even just caring helps on an energetic level.

This is not timber, it's a forest of grandfather trees.

Credit:

Almost all of these awesome photos were taken by my boss at UW, Francis Eatherington, seen here counting the rings on this over 300 year old tree.

Will they ever let a tree grow that long again?

It's so short sighted to cut these giants. It's like selling your family jewelry to pay the water bill. What are you going to do next month?

I hope in the future humans will understand that live trees are much more valuable to them

than dead ones. You can't even begin to match the power of these forests,

with an industrial tree farm. Which do you want to take your grandchildren too.

And that's what I think.

I'd love to know what you think.

blogger play

or, how to waste time.

http://play.blogger.com/

Blogger Play will show you a never-ending stream of images that were just uploaded to public Blogger blogs. You can click the image to be taken directly to the blog post it was uploaded to, or click “show info” to see an overlay with the post title, a snippet of the body, and some profile information about the blogger who uploaded it.

Blogger Play FAQ with more information.

There is some food for thought here.

First Day of Kindergarten

Emily in front of her school, Chimacum Creek Primary, on her first morning.

There's her teacher, Mr. Bento, with the hat, after school directing kids to their buses.

I was shy about bringing in my camera in the morning and so we got our photo in the parking lot. Well when we got up to the school, all the parents, were taking pictures and had video cameras going. One mother walked behind her son, taping him walking into school the first day. It seemed wierd to me. But at the end of the first day, I joined several other partents in taking photos and shooting videos.

I have tried, unsuccessfully, to put in a little video of her in her classroom.

If you know how to add a video to these blogs, let me know.

Fortunate Tree

Stephen Jay Gould said, "Homo sapiens [are] a tiny twig on an improbable branch of a contingent limb on a fortunate tree."

Today is his birthday. Feliz Cumplionos Stephen.

He also said, "Look in the mirror, and don't be tempted to equate transient domination with either intrinsic superiority or prospects for extended survival".

That's sure something to think about.

Cabin Clearing

I'm back from the cabin. What a trip.

The clearing was a great success!
You can actually walk all around the cabin.

Even room for a fire pit.

Our friends Carol, her daughter Ariel and husband Monico and their adorable boy Angel, came and built the first fire and cooked the first meal out there with us. It was wonderful. Carne asada, Monico's specially.

We have never seen the cabin from this vantage until now. By this winter this will all be green with new grass. If Beth keeps it mowed the berries won't come back.

Beth and Ben got the floor down and painted. It looks great.

One sunrise the Olympic Mountains were pink.

The view from the property is awesome.

I had a great time seeing old friends in Port Townsend and seeing energy put into this beautiful piece of property. I am very glad to be home though, and sleeping in my own bed with my sweet husband.

I also had the honor of taking Miss Em to her first day of Kindergarten! That's the next blog.

Thanks for listening.