A snowy day in Portland as the new year begins
Westmoreland Park, Snow Storm, 2016

(Click on each photo to see a larger picture on a separate picture page.)

What a glorious day. When I looked out my window I was greeted with a lovely dusting of snow outside my home and all around the neighborhood. I was not expecting this, and because I had no plans to drive today, it was a blessing.

I grabbed my point and shoot Canon and did a run through the Westmoreland and Eastmoreland neighborhoods, taking a detour to the campus of my old alma mater, Reed College. The campus projects that regal and expensive air of high-priced academia when covered in snow, like its sister private schools across the country. Regardless of the very high cost to attend Reed, I still think it looks great dusted in snow.  My Sellwood neighborhood and Westmoreland Park also looked stunning. The park conjured an image of a Japanese woodcut painting of winter in Japan.

I hope others are enjoying snow as much I have today. Happy new year.

Warm Springs on a winter’s day
In the town of Warm Springs, a visitor will see the casino on one side of the road and museum on the other. This is common in many tribal areas, where the two are grouped near each other.
The new casino opened in February 2012.

(Click on each photo to see a larger picture on a separate picture page.)

I just passed through the Warms Springs Indian Reservation, which lies in northwest Oregon, on the east side of the Cascade range. It is managed by the Confederated Tribes of Warm Springs. The bands that claimed ancestry in the region include the Paiutes, Warms Springs, and Wascoes.

The reservation was created by treaty in 1855, which ceded lands to the United States in exchange for rights and services. Those rights include fishing rights for salmon that remain today.

I will go back in the spring, when the weather is warmer. There is a lot I would like to see.

Today, the reservation has made a lot of news because of a tribal vote to allow cannabis cultivation. During the same election in December, there was a measure to remove lifetime members from the tribal council. The tribe reported this update in November that the petition needs to be submitted and approved for further review by the regional office of the Bureau of Indian Affairs.

This measure to change the tribal constitution likely stemmed from news that broke earlier in 2015 that the tribes overspent $100 million over the last 10 years, which put at risk  pensions and distributions from a tribal trust, and also impacted essential services.

The tribes’ former treasurer, Jake Suppah, was put on leave after identifying the mismanagement. These findings and the treatment of Suppah led to the tribes contacting the office of the Inspector General of the U.S. Department of the Interior to investigate tribal finances in March 2015. Since that time, the fiscal mismanagement, the connection between the reporting of the mismanagement and the petition last month to amend the constitution, and the impacts of these findings have not been widely covered in Oregon. I still cannot find out how this petition process turned out, yet.

As the Bend Bulletin in March quoted council member Carlos Smith, also general manager of Kah-Nee-Ta Resort & Spa: “Our tribe was one of the richest tribes in the ’80s and now we’re broke. That’s why we brought Jake back, to figure out, ‘Why are we broke? What is this issue?’”

I am hoping the residents of Warm Springs have found answers to their questions about what went wrong. There are many reasons for silence in Indian country, but I think many on the reservation think otherwise with this matter.

 

 

Season’s Greetings from the Pacific Northwest
The Community Trail in the Methow Valley, in Washington State, is one of the best skate ski trails in the United States, outside of Alaska. Photo taken in February 2013.

I can think of few better ways to enjoy a winter holiday than skate skiing. Hoping you find a way to enjoy yours, and that it brings you closer to nature, friends, and the world around you. (Click on the photo to see a larger picture on a separate picture page.)

Fisher Auto Body Plant, Detroit

Just off Interstates 94 and 75, north of downtown Detroit, at St. Antoine and Piquette and Harper, stands the abandoned and crumbling Fisher Auto Body 21 plant. It closed in the 1982. It used to produce auto bodies for GM, then limos and ambulances, before finally shutting its doors. Its design was not compatible with auto manufacturing needs, and the industry had long changed, moving to single story, vast production plants, located throughout the country.

The plant has frequently appeared on blogs celebrating the industrial decay of Detroit, of which I would have to count this web site among them, except I am not celebrating massive economic de-industrialization in the Motor City. I found this on my own, just driving. The plant stood out prominently, and I circled back to it once I left the freeway. It was completely surreal to see it, standing next to apartment buildings still being used and across the street from functioning businesses and a warehouse. No one in those buildings coming and going seemed to look or notice the structure, as it had become part of their environment. I saw a couple of guys hanging out there, and decided they were either security or perhaps folks I didn’t want to meet with a lot of camera equipment. Scores of photographers have been here before me, and will come after me, and you can see the wreckage in very accurate detail on Google Street View.

For many, it is just another eyesore and reminder of what was, and also a visible icon of what a declining industrial city looks like. (Click on each photograph to see a larger picture on a separate picture page.)

 

Tourists of Rome, and everyone is loving it

Rome has been on my mind lately. So I dug up some of my old shots from my only trip there in 2006. It was perfect, in every sense. Even the horrible trip coming back to the United States, getting stuck in Paris, getting harassed by French security officials, train stoppages and bus mishaps–it all faded in the dazzling memories Rome left behind. Here are tourists in Rome, quite of few of them in nuns’ habits. They were having a grand time too. (Click on each photograph to see a larger picture in a separate picture page.)

 

 

Urban critters: here, there, every where

Earlier this week near my home I saw a coyote leap out in front of me from its hiding place. We both did a “whoa, what was that” jump. It dashed back to the shadows, on a bluff above a nature reserve near the Willamette River, where they are known to congregate in numbers and howl. So, in honor of the urban wildlife I see in the Oregon, here are two random and not really connected shots. In Alaska, the critters might be moose, eagles, and perhaps a bear if you’re lucky. Here, you settle for lesser critters in our pantheon of majestic animals we idolize.

(Click on each photo to see a larger picture on a separate picture page.)

Roger Gollub: doctor, leader, mensch

A year after the utterly senseless killing of the best man I have ever known, Dr. Roger Gollub, I decided to pay tribute to him around Westchester Lagoon, in Anchorage. I put these signs up on a cold November Saturday, in 2009. It is where Roger often went for walks with his dog, Sophie, and it is where we spent some memorable moments walking and talking about nothing in particular at all. I cannot claim to have known him that well. But I still miss him, and so do hundreds and hundreds of his former patients, coworkers, family members, and friends. Thanks for everything, mensch!