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Posts published in “Essays”

Why The Lights Go Out Again & Again & Again

Early January. Big storm, lots of rain; the electricity goes off for four days. I'm not home. I'm traveling. I return a few days later…

Hospitality & Ruffing

How do you top the story of the Fort Bragg City Council approving an ordinance that provides for cannabis manufacturing within the industrial zones of…

Policing Mendocino County

In this interview, Deputy Orell Massey, Mendocino County’s first and only black deputy, looks back... Midnight Rambler Incident — I was on patrol one night…

The Sound Of Your Own Heels

There is a popular expression — among the sort of unimaginative types who continually recycle "witticisms" until any acuity they may once have had has…

Boat Sunk, Dog Dead

When Olive was taken to the animal shelter in Ukiah thousands of people reached out to me. Every day I meet people who ask me…

White Supremacy & Music Theory

For several years my grandparents lived in a small house on the same property on Bainbridge Island as my nuclear family—nuclear in more than one…

Shapiro vs. Sausalito

A yellow dredge sat scuttled in Richardson Bay, less than 100 yards south of the Napa St. pier, and about the same distance from the shoreline and the Sausalito Cruising Club. It was a barge with huge steel tanks for flotation, a wooden deck and 2-story superstructure.

Vaccines & Trumpism

Let's talk about vaccines for a bit — even though doing so in public forums always risks going down a rabbit hole of anti-science, conspiracy theories, and endless random nuttiness.

Against Chinese Immigration

Last week's piece concluded with information about the rising tide of anti-Chinese attitudes in Mendocino County and the entire West during the late 1870s. By…

Partners In Crime

Prison is a young man's game. Or woman's; I don't want to take a sexist position here, but I will take an ageist one in…

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