Archive for November, 2006
RENO, NEVADA (Post Time News)--Envelope, please.
Swift Newspapers--owners of the Aspen Times and dozens of other dailies--has figured out a way to make its way in the gnarly world of The Internet and new media.
And the winner, according to sources close to the company, is...video.
That's right, a newspaper chain with over thirty dailies and weeklies in Colorado, California, Nevada, and Oregon has determined the route to 21st Century survival lies at the end of a lens that captures motion video news and information. The shift also has significant implications for commercial television in both the valleys, shifting the competitive media landscape to include Plum TV in Aspen and Vail, RSN, and the new TV Aspen.
Continue Reading November 30th, 2006
I now understand the Homeland Security Threat Level codes and completely understand why we are at an elevated level of "orange". I also understand and have much more respect on how a national operation works...think of it as a city within a city-that include lots of GPS...and I understand that why sometimes in the past I personally have been frustrated with the "system" it is good to know that the "system" is always working in one way or another.
Continue Reading November 29th, 2006
Recently, Brian Ross of ABC News blogged and produced a piece for ABC TV, and on Good Morning America regarding a very racially charged incident at Texas A&M University. Three students were involved in videotaping a "home video" depicting three white males. Two dominant white males were shooting the video and commanding the submissive white male, complete with a black latex mask on his face, to do as they said, etc. I've seen the video and it is rather well, stupid. Yet, I can also see how the video is being construed as being very nastily racist.
Continue Reading November 29th, 2006
While a work day in Aspen/Snowmass may start with rolling out of the bed and throwing a ski co jacket over your pj's and hitting the slopes...in D.C. it's all business. My alarm goes off at 4:45 a.m. and by 5 a.m. I am in the gym, where cell phones ring, deals are discussed and if your lucky enough a morning workout is completed. When the clock hits 7 a.m. it's throw the office shoes in the bag, grab the laptop, lace up the sneakers and hit the pavement.
Continue Reading November 28th, 2006
While listening to Con Games Tuesday morning I was tempted to call Michael Conniff and add my two cents worth of useless personal information. The topic dealt with the frequency of transients passing through the valley and how it affects relationships. Not just for couples or romance, but how it also affects friendships. Why didn't I call in? Because sometimes the truth hurts too much to speak about it.
I have my own theory on this subject, since it has been a thorn in my side for over nine years now, and yet I have managed to somehow barely survive this potential epidemic. This is the Valley of Acquaintances. This is where you will see people on the street or in the restaurants, you know their faces or first names, you say hello to each other, exchange small pleasantries, and yet you can't say that you're friends.
There is a curse in this valley. One that guarantees if you find a good friend, within two years one of the two of you will leave the area. You will be minus one very crucial requirement for a comfortable life here. The older I get, the more I realize just how much something as simple as friendship is taken for granted. I also realize how much harder it is to find, especially for single women over forty.
The up side is that it is less expensive. You only have to buy one concert ticket, one dinner, one lift ticket, one movie ticket. The downside is that if you tire of flying solo all the time, your choices for locations to find human companionship without involving carnal knowledge are very limited. Bars are definitely out of the question. A mature woman seen sitting at the bar is instantly labeled as a "pathetic, desperate, middle-aged, menopausal reject," while all she's hoping for is to strike up a conversation, have that verbal human contact, exchange intelligences, or watch a football game, or have dinner. I know. Been there, done that. Maybe you saw me once or twice when I was determined not to let this curse get the best of me. But since I am the epitome of misfits among misfits in Woody Creek, I have been cursed. There were times when I feared it may even be terminal.
It has been extremely difficult for me to make true friends over the course of the past nine years. No -- let me rephrase that. It has been IMPOSSIBLE. Why? Because the older you are when you arrive here, if you came here alone, you will most likely remain alone. People over forty already have all the friends and family they need. They have been here for a couple of decades and have settled in.
This isn't a "transient" problem people are facing here. It is a problem of a tremendous lack of trust or personal interest in people. It is a problem of fear and suspicion. Establishing yourself, proving your value and worth as a worker, a friend, a compassionate human being, takes twice the effort as it would anywhere else in the U.S. This valley requires a support system, but there is no Solitaires Anonymous. Being accepted as a member of the community requires a rite of passage; an initiation that was never explained to me.
My plans of relocating to living a solitary life on a sailboat aren't unrealistic or even fearful for me. Hell, I've been living a solitary life here for years and have become a better, stronger woman as a result of doing most things alone. I'm anxious for the day I can set sail. The confidence and excitement of my youth has been restored.
When I look back over my time spent here this second time around (I didn't learn the lesson in 1975), I will always think of a scene in the movie Six Days, Seven Nights. Harrison Ford's character tells a woman vacationing on a tropical island, "People come here looking for romance. I've got news for you. It's an ISLAND, babe! If you didn't bring it with you, you won't find it here." That logic also applies to the Valley of Acquaintances. While it isn't always romance people are automatically assumed of searching for, common interests with common friendships have a vital role in everyone's well being. Maybe it's true that we're all just really "passing through." Whether we're here for a week or ten years, people need each other for support.
Parting words to the wise for my farewell blog: If you're heading to this valley to visit or to live,
"Friends. Don't leave home without them." Sometimes the curse does win.
Update - April 26, 2008: "A change will do you good!"
It's a sad fact that the past ten years of my life in the Valley of Acquaintances were the worst years of my life. Fortunately, that was then, and this is now. I am back in my element; my comfort zone of what has worked for me in the past. I have returned to the comaradarie of the strange breed that chooses law enforcement as their way of life.
This coming Wednesday evening is the first in the summer series of weekly sailing regattas. I have already been offered opportunities to be a deckhand on at least six boats. We will leave the marina in Newport, Oregon and sail out to sea for the races, coming back in at sunset. I'm anxious to get my sea legs back.
I am in the land of PT Cruisers and VW microbuses with surfboard racks. More important than the board itself is the wetsuit. You don't dare paddle out without one; even in the summer. I love that cold water doesn't stop us from catching great waves, and the best are the ones in the winter when we have tow-in surf competitions.
Look me up if you're ever out this way. We'll go sailing and whale watching. I'll even play the ukulele for you while you sip your glass of wine and watch the sun sink into the Pacific.
November 28th, 2006
Freddy and the Fishsticks have a return engagement at Belly Up Aspen but don't be surprised if Jimmy Buffet shows up. Tickets are $600 reserved; $250 general admission.
Continue Reading November 28th, 2006
As an eternal optimist, yes, I truly believe we are at what could be a very exciting, yet difficult, crossroads here in American history. Why? Because after WWII, our society has become rather dumb-downed to what is really happening in Washington. Washington grew... and grew, and grew and grew. Society grew and grew. Technology exploded. The cost of living and (sorry, but trade deficits) and inflation and interest rates and much more began to withdraw us from the coffee shops and town hall meetings and caused us to be slaves to the most incredible free enterprise economy in the history of the world -- a system that will eventually bankrupt us, at least those of us without solid financial planners. (But that's another column.)
Continue Reading November 28th, 2006
I was on the steps where all these historical moments had occured and I was moved. President Lincoln words inspired many "We hold the power and bare the responsibility"; "I have faith in the people"; "A house divided against itself can not stand"; "...government of the people, by the people, for the people, shall not perish from the earth."
Continue Reading November 27th, 2006
Damn the damn O’Kells! Maybe if they didn’t have more money than sin, they would leave Arnold Bagdikian alone. The last thing Baggie wants is to bring their mess to Aspen, but he has a way of not getting what he wants, not even in Aspen, and especially not when Amanda Madison is involved.
Now he has to fight for the inheritance of the test-tube babies Eleanor O’Kell brought to life when she tried to create a town without men. The bad news is people will kill or maim the women he loves if he won’t drop the case. The good news is if he wins, Baggie takes home like a billion dollars, and the O’Kell heirs get to go home happy. So it could be worse.
At least DROP DEAD BEAUTIFUL gives the Bag Man and his penultimate surrogate, Michael Conniff, a chance to break some new ground with an online serial novel, a mystery set in Aspen and points west. Did somebody say Charles Dickens? What the hell. For the next 33 weeks, one chapter a week, Arnold Bagdikian is going to have a dickens of a time in Aspen with the O’Kells and all the trouble money can buy.
Continue Reading November 27th, 2006
This morning I attended mass at St. Matthews Cathedral in D.C. (www.stmatthewscathedral.org/phototour.html) The church was built in the 1800's and seats the Archbishop of Washington. Mass was celebrated there by the late Pope John Paul II-however the church is famously known for the fact that President John F. Kennedy funeral was held there on Nov. 25, 1963. 43 years later and almost to the day I am attending mass. While I am blown away by the beauty of the church the main thing I notice while at mass is the amount of homeless people who are attending church.
Continue Reading November 26th, 2006
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