Up Bear Creek / 4aug50011

Up Bear Creek

by Art Goodtimes

Locals join civil disobedience protest

for Eco-hero Tim DeChristopher

WE SHOULD BE PROUD … It’s heartening in these difficult times to see Chris Myers and Skip Edwards stand up for one of the new heroes of the environmental movement in the West. I had the pleasure of introducing Tim at Mountainfilm this year, and his words were both stirring and true. His is a generation out of time. He and others refuse to sit back and watch natural resource extraction trash what’s left of the wild West -- all in the pursuit of cheap energy and export profit … Let’s start a defense fund for Myers and Edwards. They acted on behalf of all of us. We ought to support them as well.

SHROOMFEST31 HELP … It’s getting closer to Telluride’s most unique and quirky event, the annual Telluride Mushroom Festival, Aug. 18-21. A great lineup, with Paul Stamets and Gary Lincoff returning, Paul’s teacher at Evergreen College Dr. Michael Beug coming for the first time, an expanded program on seven tracks – Identification, Culinary, Cultural, Cultivation, Entheogenic, Medicinal and Remediation, and a move to three venues – the Palm Theatre, the Wilkinson Library, and the Miramonte Building Meeting Room … But we need a bit of help with lodging, getting speakers to and from the Telluride and Montrose airports, and possibly a Telluride backyard to do our oyster mushroom cultivation workshop. We’ll be happy to trade some festival passes and workshop tickets for those tasks. If you have an extra bedroom, or can drive for us on Wednesday or Sunday of that weekend, or have a backyard big enough to host 20-40 people, a couple 55-gallon drums, and kid’s swimming pool (for inoculation), give me a call at 327-4767 or email me at <shroompa@paleohippie.com>

SHEEP MOUNTAIN … Finally climbed our local iconic environmental symbol last week with my two boys, Rio Coyotl and Gorio Oshá. Been trying for several years and kept running into lightning and thunder, bad schedules or weak knees … But we made it this time. The wildflowers were divine, the views spectacular and I remember why I love living in the mountains so much … Find me on Facebook for photos.

GORDON GLOCKSON … It took three years but we finally got the County building in Norwood named after our deceased Finance Director. A fitting tribute. Gordon spent his career keeping the County in sound fiscal shape – building up a multi-million dollar operating reserve that’s helped buffer the current economic nosedive and allowed the County to keep minimum levels of service. Eagle County laid off 80 workers. Towns of Telluride and Mountain Village had to let a dozen folks go between them (a small part of the 1000 jobs lost in the county this past year) … But thanks to Gordon and his policies, San Miguel County laid off no one. And we just got a clean bill of health from our annual audit, as well as praise for our fiscal responsibility (thanks also to the efficiencies and dedication of our County employees in every department) … Gordon was a visionary. His son Chris pointed out that Gordon couldn’t have done anything less. That was his nature. Finance was just his job, and he did it well … Next time you’re in Norwood, stop by the Gordon Glockson Building and admire the bronze plaque that Gordon’s son Michael helped design. Jan Glockson wasn’t the only proud person with a tear in their eye at the dedication ceremony last week.

NON-STANDARD … I don’t know about you, but I’ve been loving former Tellurider Jeri McAndrews’ self-published memoir, Runaway Dancer … “Non-standard” in English means stepping outside the proper language box, or in JMA’s case leaping out, into reminiscence, story, gossip, diary and all manner of uninhibited conversational English inspired by Kerouac’s free-flow spigot mind – straight from the source, without complete regard for laws or grammar or accepted convention and free of stuffiness or artifice, Iowa writer guidelines or New Yorker polish (although more than one metaphor threw this poet for a loop & some of JMA’s word inventions tied the knot) … Highly recommended.

TRUTH IN ADVERTISING … We all know these are hard times. Raising prices is a difficult but sometimes necessary decision for retailers. But trying to disguise a price hike is deceptive. Truth hurts. But deception angers … So, as a loyal Clark’s Market customer in Norwood, I was curious about a sign on a cash register last week suggesting management was “excited“ to announce it was offering a “senior discount!!!!” on Tuesdays only. I was a tad confused, since I already had found myself buying more locally because our Norwood market had been offering its senior citizens (like me) a 5% across-the-board discount seven days a week. A sweet little perk that never failed to bring a smile to my wrinkle-worn face … Well, it turns out the announcement was a mask for the fact that the local retailer was scrapping its across-the-board senior discount, and replacing it with a Tuesday-only discount … You know, if the market had explained that the cost of replacing a broken window somebody drove through a couple months back, the new oiling of the old gravel parking lot, gas prices, or almost anything reasonable had necessitated a dropping of the senior discount on all days but Tuesday, it would have hurt. But I could have lived with it. But “excited”? I don’t think so … I plan on stocking up in Ridgway and Montrose as often as I can from now on.

THE TALKING GOURD

Green Tea Party

-for Jack Mueller

Let’s take back

the flag

& celebrate the wind

Honor the paradox

of this imperfect

union

A free-for-all

visible

but indivisible