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Posts published in “Essays”

Jazz in San Francisco

It used to be that you’d duck out of a smoke-filled jazz show for a much-needed gulp of fresh air. Bebop was breathless in more than one sense: not only fast, but also dangerous to…

Bach’s Day & Night

Time is not just relative. It’s political, too. We often measure our lives by presidential terms: the Carter years; Clinton time; Bush I; Bush II? The end of time under Trump? Time can be bent…

The Summer of No Return

The forecast for August 8th was ominous. The temperature in Portland was predicted to breach 100 hundred degrees for the second time in a couple weeks. In the end, the mercury stalled at 96 degrees…

Post-Election High

I turned on my TV at about nine-thirty Tuesday night. I wanted to see what the paid liars were saying about the fiasco of an election, and which of the “choices” offered them our ill-informed…

A Slice of Life from 1911

Here on the Macdonald ranch mid-autumn is a time to pick apples. In my youth, keeper varieties were stored in rectangular wooden bins on the kitchen porch. Rhode Island greenings were peeled and cooked into…

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