Category: Community (Page 2 of 2)

Stop, drop, and roll.

November 15, 2022 / Eric / 0 Comments

We’re now a week past the election; this is the day when Oregon certifies its vote – it leaves a week window open to allow ballots to arrive by mail, and as long as they are postmarked by the deadline, they can be counted. Of the many things on the ballot this year, one of the more contentious items was Measure 114.

In short, this measure requires a permit to purchase a firearm and bans magazines that hold more than 10 rounds of ammunition. For the permits, police agencies will have to add a process to their offices – already some sheriffs have announced they won’t comply with this addition to Oregon’s Constitution, claiming it is “unconstitutional” in part or in whole.

Funny – I thought the Constitution was pretty clear: “A well regulated Militia, being necessary to the security of a free State…”

Well now: regulations. Go figure.

Measure 114 puts Oregon near the head of the pack when it comes to firearms regulations. It doesn’t take firearms away from anyone, although reading the voter’s guide and letters to the editor leading up to election day there were many dire warnings about government coming for your guns! Measure 114 just, well, regulates the sale and transfer of them going forward.

This measure came about in no small part because a number of us have been fed up with the epidemic of firearms deaths in our nation. Yesterday’s headlines tell us about the shootings at the universities of Virginia and Idaho, in a year where there have been 599 mass shootings thus far.

At the rate we’re going, by the time you read this, we’ll be past 600 mass shootings for the year.

In a few weeks, we will meet a grisly anniversary: the tenth anniversary of the killings at Sandy Hook Elementary. Sandy Hook is but one of many school shootings over the years, but it’s worth noting its anniversary for a few reasons. One is personal: Benny Wheeler, killed at six years, is the nephew of a childhood friend of mine. Another reason is that the victims’ families have been in the news recently, as a vile conspiracy theorist who maligned and slandered those families has been found guilty of his malignant slander, and faces over a billion dollars in court-ordered fines.

We’ve become numb to the daily reports of mass shootings. We’ve become numb to school shootings – over 35 this year. That’s almost one per week of the school year.

A school shooting per week.

Really?

It’s in the face of this epidemic that people started doing something. A few years back, Oregon passed a common-sense safe gun storage law. And this year, Measure 114.

It’s not a wave, but it’s a start. Maybe an early indicator of a changing tide? We can only hope.

We, as a nation, have a problem. Too many people die from firearms in the country. Period.

We can reduce that number, but we manage to avoid our responsibilities to each other in favor of a distorted sense of individual freedoms. Our nation was built on the notion of insuring domestic tranquility and promoting the general welfare for we, the people.

And so I was intrigued to read over this morning’s Oatmeal News Network a very insightful piece by the Washington Post’s Petula Dvorak. She makes a great point – we’ve been here before. Fifty years ago, we decided too many people dire from a different kind of fire: actual fire.

So we did something about it. And since then, fewer people die from fire.

And nobody has come to take anyone’s Zippos.

https://www.washingtonpost.com/dc-md-va/2022/11/14/uva-shooting-run-hide-fight-alert/

Trek To Galehead – August, 2000

October 19, 2022 / Eric / 0 Comments

Northeast Passage is a group of dedicated individuals at the University of New Hampshire “empowering individuals with disabilities to define, pursue, and achieve their Therapeutic Recreation and Adaptive Sports goals.” In late summer 2000, a group with NE Passage trekked to the newly renovated Galehead Hut in NH’s White Mountains.

Here’s a short story we made from that weekend:

If the embedded video is not displaying for you, try watching on Vimeo

The inspiration for the trek was the uproar over upgrades that were done to the rustic cabin located on Forest Service land, which required meeting current ADA spec. Many in the AMC community thought the ADA requirements were balderdash and poppycock (although they used less colorful language) and railed that the next step would be paving the pathway itself.

For Jill and the team at NE Passage: challenge accepted. Three wheelchair users and two crutchers completed the climb, and I was charged with documenting the event. In addition to recording much of the video you see (while hiking the trail myself), I also coordinated a 2nd unit and sound recordist – couldn’t have done this without Tom & Mark – plus a “sherpa” who brought fresh production supplies. Also embedded on the trek was a reporter and photographer for the New York Times, as well as another video crew. Almost a bit of a circus swirling around the actual hikers…

Heading down the mountain after two nights in the hut, the team was met by hikers coming up the trail with a copy of the day’s NYT – we were the first story from the University of NH to make the front page of the Old Gray Lady. (Below the fold – but still!)

This video is one of the stories we made from the footage – it ran during an intermission in NHPTV’s coverage of a UNH Hockey game…and that’s how I got an Emmy on my shelf. We also completed a half-hour feature on the trek commissioned by the UNH Foundation. (I sure wish I’d saved a copy of that one, as there is a ton more footage and fun.)

To my great surprise, I was less tired or sore after getting home than I expected I would be. Something in the work and the people I was with was keeping me going with ease. Working with Northeast Passage on this project and many others informed my thinking about life and how inclusive actions make us all better people with fuller experiences. I am grateful I got to know Jill and the others, and feel lucky to have tagged along.

Meanwhile… I recently discovered a 20-year retrospective video on the trek put together by my friends at Northeast Passage. Watching it, you can see what a difference the trek made to so many people – our teams, yes, but even folks who weren’t part of the challenge.

I can’t embed the video, but you can watch it on YouTube. That’s Jill Gravink, Founder and Director of Northeast Passage at the beginning.

To this day, I have yet to experience anything like this project. It was hard work, sure – even the day before the trek we climbed some supplies to the hut and did some test footage. During the hike up, I bounced between the lead and middle teams, and probably climbed the trail twice. On the way down, again I bounced, from the middle team to the last team, at one point, I ditched the camera to lend an extra set of hands and getting chair down Jacob’s Ladder.

Then I hiked back up to retrieve it, and hustle back to leapfrog those folks and find the group further down.

I have never worked so hard for a story before, let alone a story that meant so much to so many. Thanks, Jill (and everyone!) for having me along.

Seven hundred thirty-one

January 21, 2022 / Eric / 0 Comments

When you write it out in words instead of digits, it seems more impressive.

731.

See? But here we are, that many days since a positive test came back for
SARS-CoV-2 in Snohomish County in state state of Washington.

Two years – officially – have we now been dealing with this virus, this pandemic, in our nation. We’re hitting a few milestones over the next several weeks. Two years since this, two years since that. Sitting here over my breakfast, a flood of things came to mind when I heard the two-year mark noted on the radio. The earliest days were confusing. We’d been following the progress of this disease as it quickly spread beyond first one city, then the next, then leapt borders and continents.

Then, two years ago today, a Washington public health official said, “it’s here.”

Suddenly, the images of masked people from an infected metropolis were domestic images, not international news. Schools closed. Businesses closed. Reactions were swift, and varied, and in some cases seemed like panic. Amidst the reality of the spread of COVID-19, the biggest headlines seemed to be about the toilet paper wars.

One-fifth of a decade into this plague, we’ve come a long way. Or have we? Masks seem everywhere, and yet, as I dropped Her at the bus this morning, I watched a group of young adults try to board the bus sans masks. Stopped by the driver. They were incredulous that they couldn’t ride on a public transit without a mask.

Incredulity no longer rises within me at these sites: even this far in to a pandemic, it’s become the norm that there are those who, through willful ignorance or willful disregard for the state of affairs seem to still not get it: we’re in a pandemic.

Two years in, and some folks still can’t grasp that.

I fear this is just the first of many multi-annual milestones before we start clocking the days this is (finally) behind us.

Stay safe. Stay well. Mask up, get your shots. We’re still in the middle of a pandemic folks – the middle.

Boosted

November 13, 2021 / Eric / 0 Comments

Got a booster shot today. Between age, underlying conditions, and – I think – my job situation, I checked enough boxes to get through the portal and obtain an appointment. And with that little jab I’m now that much more protected here in the pandemic of the unvaccinated and unmasked.

This one was different than the first two; right now, 12 hours later, my arm hurts like heck. The original doses in the spring didn’t seem to affect me much. Maybe it’s because this time around I’m feeling Moderna in my system. Who knows?

I’m just grateful that I am able to say I have taken active, pro-public health steps and done all I can to protect myself and those around me. This whole pandemic thing is starting to get old…

Annual Report

November 12, 2021 / Eric / 0 Comments

This was an interesting project to work on. Looking through it, we were busy last year! University Information & Technology Year in Review 2021

Leaving the borg (again)

October 29, 2021 / Eric / 1 Comment

Tonight I once again suspended my activities on a large (anti)social media site. I’ve downloaded my account, so I have all the inanities I’ve posted, photos I seem to only have located therein, etc.

The account is deactivated now. Maybe, after some time has passed, I’ll delete it. Who knows?

It’s been an interesting ride, but I’ve been weaning myself for a few weeks, and I’m ready to go cold turkey again. My big concern is that I don’t know how to reach many of the folks I’ve come to be in touch with via the (anti)social media behemoth because that’s our only connection. But I can’t worry about that too much. I am, as they say, in the book if someone’s looking for me, I am not hiding underground.

Card and letter use via the mail has and will continue to increase. It takes more time, and it feels better to stick an envelop in the box on the corner and wonder what may happen – or not – and not have to worry about the interval before someone presses the “like” button. There’s no instant gratification in slow pace of the mails, and waiting around for such a thing creates its own stress.

What with all the hubbub and hoo-hah about the behemoth in recent weeks, it’s time to go. The technology is not evil, but the folks running the company have proven themselves time and again to unconscionably put their own growth and valuation above the impacts on the communities their product touches.

I hope you might consider joining me out here in the empty, less-connected wasteland of the rest of the internet. At the very least, I encourage you to spend less time on social media than you do now. You’ll be a better person for it. I say this with conviction, as I did this once for the better part of a year, and probably would have continued away from the beast but for the onset of life during a pandemic.

It’s served it’s purpose. It’s played me, I’ve played in it, and it’s time to grow up and move on. In the meantime, watch this space…

Hooked on a Feeling

July 11, 2019 / Eric Gleske / 0 Comments

One advantage to being where we are is a strong sense of community, which is well expressed by having a Community Band. Every Tuesday night over the summer they perform for us in our Central Park. This summer the boy started playing with the band – his school band director will be the new C-Band director, and a few high school players show up each week to play alongside the veterans.

Yesterday was a wet one; kind of unusual for this time of year hereabouts (that’s another benefit of life here – pretty good weather in the summer allowing regular events like this) and so the band, a smaller group of diehards, gathered together under the park’s gazebo for shelter, and began their regular 7pm rehearsal.

It was raining steadily, and Robyn, the night’s conductor, figured they would rehearse then call it a night. And that was the plan, but, sure enough, right at eight o’clock a handful of people showed up for the show.

So they played. It was a shortened performance, but one with heart and gusto. The rain was more of a drizzle, and there were only a baker’s dozen in the crowd, but the bond twixt the band and their audience is strong. The theme was to be Music From The Movies, so this clip is an excerpt from a medley of pop tunes used in Guardians of the Galaxy.

This was to have been Robyn’s last concert; with the rain out, she’ll be back next week with the whole band and much larger crowd, which is appropriate. She’s been in the lives of so many kids for a few years now, as she was the band and choir director at their middle school. So many young lives were touched by her, and by so many marvelous musicians in our community.

We don’t go to as many of these concerts as we should; more now, though, since the Boy is playing in them. Right now is a time of transition, as the old leadership is retiring and new blood is picking up the baton, as well as some of the instruments. It makes me feel good knowing that this institution, our community band, is alive and well, and appears to be thriving, here in the place I call home.

It’s a good feeling on which to be hooked.