When Holly and I signed the lease to our shop, George, we knew we had a lot of work ahead of us. Yes, the walls were Home Depot orange and the floor was decaying, but that wasn't the half of it. We suddenly had a business and now we needed a plan.Thankfully, Al Gore invented the internet (I know Al Gore didn't invent the internet, but the notion makes me chuckle every time) so researching was much easier. In my spare time I browsed city departments learning what licenses we needed and what permits were necessary. We made a checklist of things to do, and becoming a member of the local business association was near the top of that list.I composed an e-mail expressing interest in joining the group. The next day I was met with the dreaded "undeliverable" notification. I tried again only to have the message bounce back. Apparently the Georgetown Business Association was no longer."When I have a spare moment, create a merchants' association," I mentally noted.That moment came a couple months ago.With all the issues Georgetown is facing recently, the timing was perfect to form a merchants' association. After all, we had a lot at stake. A possible red light district could be located to our immediate north, and there was a chance we would have 600 diesel trucks driving through our historic business district every day. It was time to do something.
Last week a group of community and church activists held a going away party for the Seattle Sonics at city hall. With reporters looking on, the group sang, "So long it's been good to know you but we just can't afford you!" and hoisted glasses of sparkling cider to the basketball team's departure. Several MVP (More Valuable Priority) Awards were passed out signifying where city dollars could be better spent rather than on another refurbishment of Key Arena at the team's behest.Organizers emphasized this was not an anti-Sonics rally but an attempt to send a strong message to city officials: If the team was going to pull the old give-us-more-money-or-we'll-leave-town trick, then indeed it was time for them to go. The group also has launched a website, www.finethenleave.com, where people can add their comments, sign a petition and find links for the initiative now being circulated for signatures. So far they've collected over 850 signatures on a petition urging the city council to reject the Sonics' ultimatum for more than $200 million in public funding.
As a parent of a child in the Seattle Public School system for the past eight years, I have had the opportunity to deal personally with the district and its workings. In that time, I have been nothing if unimpressed with its abilities to handle problems - whether those of a single school or the entire system.Their approach to school closure/consolidation is a case in point.I find it questionable that the handpicked Citizens' Advisory Committee (CAC) included parents from schools that were on last year's closure hit list. Even the best of people would have a hard time being 100 percent objective when their own child's school was at stake. Perhaps there should have been no parents from any of the elementary schools.Though the CAC held a number of prior meetings and invited public comment, they did not make it clear that every school had a stake. The parents at TOPS, for example, had no indication that their school would be affected by the CAC's recommendations. Consequently, few, if any, participated in the process. The same holds true for many parents at my daughter's school, Graham Hill, as they believed it scored well in the various criteria categories (which it did in all but one). How many parents at other schools on the new list fell into this same trap? There are very few crossovers from the last list.
"How do you live with no money?" Southeast Seattle resident Gabe Stern questioned. "You experience something when you don't have to pay rent and have endless time."A week sans money is just one of Burning Man's many intriguing aspects and every year, come summer time, Stern is not the only one who is captivated by this concept. With more than 25,000 participants, Burning Man attracts people from all over the world to the Nevada desert for a week-long event spanning the long Labor Day weekend. Jordan Howland and Stern, both Seattle burners (a term used to describe those who participate in Burning Man), said Burning Man is an experiment in temporary community and the largest exhibition of outdoor art and sculpture in the world. As burners spend the week creating art, they also work to create a community, called Black Rock City. Participants are responsible for bringing in everything they need to survive for the week, and according to Howland, ice and coffee are the only items available for purchase."The only thing they really give you is a port-a-potty," Stern said. Some burners express themselves artistically by experimenting with this idea of survival. According to Stern, a man once showed up with absolutely nothing and attempted to survive in the desert. Stern said the man had found everything from clothes to a place to stay with ease. This, Stern said, is a huge part of what Burning Man is all about.
"Pianos and work are both badly needed in Kenya," says Arnie Tucker, owner of Seattle Piano Gallery. The unemployment rate in Kenya is about 50 percent, so it is obvious that work is needed.But pianos? Muriembe drums and obokano lyres, perhaps, but not pianos.In fact, an estimated 78 percent of Kenyans are now Christian, and Christian churches need pianos. Western classical music is also popular in Kenya. With a population of about 3 million, the capital city Nairobi is huge, "and every modern country in the world has an enclave there," says Kenn Wildes, co-owner and registered piano technician at Seattle Piano Gallery.Wildes should know; he lived there for almost five years. He went to Nairobi in 1991 to "run with the Kenyans." With hopes of qualifying for the Olympics, he trained with the world's fastest long-distance runners. He lived in a maisonette ("little house") and, to support himself, restored pianos.
When Queen Anne United Methodist Church gathers this Sunday, June 4, it will not only be commemorating its centennial but also celebrating a turnaround for a congregation that looked just a few years ago as if it would never reach this point.The history of QAUMC dates all the way back to the 19th century: Battery Street Methodist Episcopal Church in Belltown, dedicated in 1884.In 1904, with the city of Seattle expanding, church officials decided to move to Queen Anne Hill - namely the corner of Fifth Avenue West and West Garfield Street."Just about the time that the gold rush was hitting, and the shipping boom was hitting, this church was established," said pastor Rodolph "Rody" Rowe.Queen Anne Methodist Episcopal Church was dedicated on May 20, 1906. Renovations in the 1950s and 1960s produced most of the building that is seen today.But for various reasons, the existence of the church was threatened earlier this decade before Rowe arrived on the scene.
Five members of the Seattle City Council have joined a neighborhood group which questions whether three homes have to be demolished to make room for a new Fire Station 20 on 14th Avenue West near West Dravus Street.The council members signed a May 15 letter to Mayor Greg Nickels vowing not to enact legislation over the project until they're convinced a good case has been made for the site selection, said Valerie Paganelli, a member of Concerned Neighbors of Fire Station 20.The council letter is significant, according to Newell Aldrich, an aide to council president Nick Licata. The council has to approve an expenditure for the project, as well as the condemnation of the three homes if that is necessary, he said. "They're asking for another alternative to be brought forward." That could involve another location or a smaller footprint for the expanded fire station, one that could reduce the number of homes that have to be demolished, according to Aldrich.
You may have been so busy that you didn't notice, but I have a strong impression that the world changed last week. I couldn't be more surprised if I'd read that the Vice Presi-dent had shot himself.Monday As the week began, most of us were still thinking about whether that poor horse Barbaro, who broke his leg in the Preakness, was going to survive. And it seemed like same old same old when somebody asked the President if he would be seeing Al Gore's new movie on global warming and he replied coolly:"Doubt it." And most of us who'd already seen enough of Al probably thought, "Can't quibble." But a line of Calvin Trillin's also came to mind: "Obliviously on he sails." And then a lot of big stories be-gan to break like surf on the shore.
For those of you who have been to Japan, you already know that their culture, seemingly automatically, has taken the concept of service to a very high level. For first-time visitors, like me, their attention to providing service is astounding and awe-inspiring.Starting with the arrival at Narita airport, all blurry-eyed and jet-lagged, the process of baggage pickup and other arrival procedures were as smooth as silk. The constant bowing was awkward at first until your recognized that it is an extremely formalized way of acknowledging you as a sentient human being. Others have said the bowing recognizes the Buddha within each of us. Either way, it is in stark contrast to our current culture of Blackberry or iPod disengagement. There is no tipping. Giving courteous and thoughtful and individual service is just, of course, what one does on the job. Whether it occurs at the post office, in a cab or at a hotel, I felt the workers were acknowledging me with my needs rather than "dealing" with just another customer. Somehow, the supervisors have given their employees the ability to make individual decisions that enhance the transaction.
I'm sure you've heard by now that blue is the new black, 40 is the new 30 and they're lying through their teeth when they say that last thing. Also, imaginary childhood friends (you know you had one) have been replaced with online friends. They're the same in that no one ever really sees them, but you talk to them, you play with them, your other friends and family think you're just this side of a restraining jacket and you're a lot older than you were when you first had friends you never saw. "Sure they're real," you might say in that mocking tone you have . Well, stop that. Save your mocking for later on when I tell you all about my Internet friends. No, I can't see them, or touch them, although some of them have asked me ... um, we'll go into that later. People have become friends with other people across the world. Sometimes they've become friends with people they'd never become friends with in RL. That means real life for those of you who still have most of your friends offline. There's an entire new language that your online friends use, and we'll also get to that later.
Here comes the sun/ here comes the sun/And I say it's all right/Little darlin' it's been a long cold lonely winter/Little darlin' it feels like years since it's been here/Here comes the sun/ here comes the sun/And I say it's all right.-"Here Comes the Sun," the Beatles, Abbey RoadGeorge Harrison must have spent a winter in Seattle as the inspiration for those lyrics-or maybe not. The weather in England bears a close resemblance to ours, or at least their winter does.Once again summer is upon us, and as Seattleites, we'll go a little bonkers from now into October-weather permitting-barbecuing, boating, attending street fairs and soaking up as much sun as possible. It's the northwest equivalent of a bear gorging before its winter nap, as we seem to try to store up enough Vitamin D to get us through the winter.We kick the season off with last weekend's Folklife Festival, beginning our forced march through as much sun-oriented fun as our bodies and bank accounts can stand.People who should not be caught dead in shorts will parade the streets without a hint of self-consciousness. On chilly mornings, we'll drive around with convertible tops lowered, windows rolled up and the heater on.
It got to be spring the other day. I can tell because we're waking up to the calliope of birdsong these days. No longer the screech of the alarm clock at oh-dark-hundred hours has us hurtling from under the covers.And it's not quite as cold. Summer will be coming along in a few weeks. Seattle has a particular brand of cold that cuts right through you.Once, last winter, we ran out of heating oil and the house was really frigid when we finally crawled out from under the blankets. It stayed that way for hours-even after the oil truck had refilled our empty tank and the furnace had kicked on.How cold was it? The house was so cold that morning that in order to jump-start my old electric typewriter, I had to use the electric hair blower.But now, the Canada geese are well on their way north, the sprouts have all pushed their way up through the earth in the garden and the tree's buds have unfolded into leaves.Each morning, one of my tasks is to pick all the yellow dandelions from the yard so that it maintains an overall green color, at least until summer when it will then turn California brown.The coming of spring also means that our pretentious castle got its semi-annual "Power Clean."
The following letter was written Feb. 13, 1986, by the late Donald Vorhees, a longtime Magnolia resident and activist for the establishment and preservation of Discovery Park.Addressed to Jeanette Williams, chair of the Seattle City Council Park Committee, the letter is a detailed defense of the park's 1972 Master Plan.According to his friend and colleague Bob Kildall, also a Magnolia resident, Vorhees was instrumental in the establishment and preservation of Fort Lawton. "Anyone who took park in the defeat of a proposed antiballistic missile base at Fort Lawton," Kildall says, "and the establishment of Discovery Park [would agree that] the person most responsible for the park" is Vorhees.Vorhees died July 7, 1989, just three years and five months after writing the following letter.(Editor's note: this letter has been compressed due to limitations of space, with some of the technical language, references and longer passages edited down. However, the main thrust-as well as the spirit-of the letter remains intact.)Dear Ms. Williams:I am writing this letter to supplement my oral testimony before your committee Tuesday evening.My purpose in appearing before you was to urge that the plan, presently before you, be redrafted so as to be a revision of the 1972 Fort Lawton Park Plan rather than as a replacement for that plan. I urge that course of action for these reasons:I was a member of the Seattle Park Board at the time Dan Kiley was selected to prepare the long range plan for the park ... (Kiley's) experience and concepts were superior to those of the other applicants. The 1972 plan now carries with it all of the prestige and influence of Dan Kiley's name. The influence of his name would be completely lost if an in-house plan were to supplant his plan.
Sarah Coleman lives in a home on Perkins Lane with a panoramic view of Puget Sound, but something she saw from her deck on May 16 still has her a bit rattled.What Coleman saw was an eagle that ended up drowning about 100 yards offshore as the tide was just coming in that Tuesday afternoon.And the bird drowned despite a concerted neighborhood effort to save it, she lamented last weekend. Coleman was the first to notice something was amiss."I was just out there (on the deck) with Joelyn watching what was happening on the tide flats," Coleman said of herself and her service dog, a mellow Labrador mix. "I heard some noises."Coleman said she looked out on the water and spotted a giant wing flapping in the water, and a look through her binoculars revealed a large eagle struggling with what she thought may have been a seagull.It wasn't, but Coleman only found that out later after drafting her neighbors into a rescue effort.
It is coming up on my favorite time of year in Seattle again - the semi-spring, semi-summer of June in the Northwest. The rain comes and goes, but more often than not (relatively speaking - after all, we are in Se-attle, not on Kauai), it is mostly gone.The sun, that strange orb which disappears every winter for at least three or four months, is peeking around the scudding, gray-purple clouds almost every morning.The good weather turns my thoughts to more pleasant things than Pinhead (Let's invade Iran, not enough Americans are dying in Iraq) and Fat Greg (Let's have even more taxes to fix roads that by and large are already better than anything in Ohio. Why stop at $80 million - let's make it $80 trillion and pave 'em in gold. Close a few more free clinics if we have to and get all the Hummers and SUVs rollin').I said my thoughts turn; they don't disappear.