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Posts published in “Essays”

Heavy Metal

I spent several summers on my grandfather’s berry farm in the Skagit Valley sixty miles north of Seattle. To irrigate his water-hungry crops, he had drilled a well in the 1950s. The water was conducted…

‘Encyclopedic Cookbook’ Cogitations

While I have written extensively about local history in Mendocino County there is another kind of history I enjoy delving into. Call it culinary history. I enjoy delving into what we eat, how we prepare…

Some Very Satisfying Pizza: A Tribute

Eons ago, in something like the mid-to-late 1990s, there was a period where there was no official place to get a hot dinner out in our little coastal Marin town. The local cafe hadn’t opened…

Donald Pardini Remembers His Navarro Childhood

One drizzly afternoon last week I sat around his dining room table with Donald Pardini and son Ernie and listened to Don’s recollections of his early childhood in post-milltown Navarro. What stories and what power…

John & Rita Jenrette

Even in his own obituary, John Jenrette had to yield the spotlight to lovely Rita, his devoted wife from long ago. The Times’ account began, “John Jenrette Jr., a charismatic Democratic Representative from South Carolina who…

I Return An Augur

Absent much of the past couple years, I too late realized I’d never taken full advantage of employment opportunities while in Mendocino County. The mistake was trying to fit my squaresville employment existence into the…

Norma Gee

On a leafy street in a leafy village on leafy Long island there was a local volunteer firefighter’s firehouse, as orderly as the military. Us kids knew some of the volunteers from our neighborhood. We’d…

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