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August 26, 2004

In Traverse City, Bush faces “largest demonstration in history”

By Eartha Melzer
Sun contributor

TRAVERSE CITY, Monday August 16 — Despite northern Michigan’s reputation as a Republican stronghold, more than a thousand protestors took to the streets to crash George W. Bush’s party at the Traverse City Civic Center earlier this month. The acting commander-in-chief flew into Cherry Capitol Airport on Air Force One and played golf at the Grand Traverse Resort, according to Glen Arbor Sun sources, before addressing a crowd of more than 10,000 supporters late in the afternoon. The incumbent currently trails Democratic candidate John Kerry in Michigan as November’s presidential election looms on the horizon. A majority of this state’s voters are taking issue with his economic, environmental and civil rights policies as well as the disastrous war in Iraq, forcing Bush to court voters outside the labor union strongholds of southeastern Michigan in an attempt to win the state’s valuable electoral votes. He is the first acting president to visit northern Michigan since Gerald Ford 30 years ago. — Ed

U.S. Representative Bart Stupak addressed area Democrats in the parking lot of the Democratic headquarters off 8th Street. Bush has failed to deliver on protecting the Great Lakes, Stupak said. The Bush plan is to allow raw sewage to discharge into Great Lakes waters, he said. “From Detroit and Milwaukee, 10 billion gallons of raw sewage with all the parasites and bacteria that goes along with it…”

“We don’t need another study about what to do with the studies! We need clean up.”

Stupak said that Bush’s rotten environmental record is eroding his support among moderate Republicans.

The Democrats then marched down the street to the Civic Center and converged with a colorful mass of demonstrators, including members of the Sierra Club with signs about the impact of Bush’s weakening of mercury emission regulations.

Traverse City has always been known as a Republican stronghold, but last Monday — in what local historian Larry Wakefield termed the largest demonstration in the city’s history — over a thousand people gathered to protest a campaign appearance by George W. Bush.

Captain Morgan of the Traverse City Police Department estimated the crowd of demonstrators at between 1,000 and 1,500.

For hours before Bush was scheduled to speak, those with tickets to the rally (organizers say 14,000 tickets were handed out) filed into the Civic Center along a sidewalk flanked by a crowd carrying signs and energetically speaking out about the war, job loss, environmental degradation, reproductive freedom and other civil rights issues.

(Front Street was closed between Fair and Garfield and the Huntington Bank at Campus Plaza was ordered closed by Secret Service — there were three bank robberies during a recent stop in Iowa.)

The atmosphere was festive. A giant puppet, a woman in a Chicken Little costume, and mock secret service agents on stilts circulated through the mass of demonstrators which included babies, grandparents and people in wheelchairs. A woman with a French horn played “Send in the Clowns” and “Hail to the Chief” (during which demonstrators chanted “Hail to the Thief!”). There was drumming, accordian playing and a theater troupe that pulled a naked King George on a charriot and chanted, “The Emperor Wears no Clothes!”

One woman on her way to see Bush plugged her ears and talked loudly to herself to avoid listening to the demonstrators. Others engaged in debate. Several said that Bush’s anti-abortion stance is the single issue that will motivate them in the polls. Many acknowledged, with amused tolerance as they pressed through the crowd, that freedom of expression is a treasured and respected right.

The Civic Center, a county-owned recreational complex, had been rented to the Republican National Committee for the day. At least one woman, local teacher Kathryn Mead, was denied access to the event, even though she had a ticket, when she refused to remove her sticker in support of John Kerry. Others were forced to remove political buttons.

Kate Stephan, chair of the Grand Traverse Republican Party said the Bush campaign has the right to admit whom it chooses.

In some towns along the campaign trail people attending the Bush event were required to sign oaths of support.

Earlier this summer the national American Civil Liberties Union sent a memo to groups planning protests. It asked people to note whether the President appeared in his official capacity as President or as a candidate for the Presidency and whether Bush supporters are allowed closer to the President than other types of demonstrators. The ACLU is considering a nationwide class action suit against the Bush campaign for disrespecting First Amendment rights.

Meanwhile, The New York Times reported on the day of Bush’s appearance in Traverse City that FBI agents have been covertly intimidating activists all over the United States and discouraging them from attending the Republican National Convention next week in New York City (Look for coverage of RNC in the September 16 issue of the Glen Arbor Sun). — Ed

After supporters and protestors alike had milled around for hours and the country music band Trick Pony had finished it’s opening act, the Bush motorcade sped into the Civic Center through a crowd of hundreds.

As the motorcade whipped by, local activist and occasional Glen Arbor Sun contributor Holly Spaulding stepped forward in order to be more visible. Holly had been told by police that the “NO MORE BUSHIT” banner she was holding would have to be taken down when Bush’s entourage arrived, but she wanted to make sure that Bush was aware of the opposition massed around the Civic Center.

Spaulding, along with Terri DeFillipo was immediately arrested and charged with disorderly conduct for breaching the “sterile zone” set up by the Secret Service along the motorcade route.

And when their attorney, Mark Messing, attempted to speak with them, he too was arrested.

Once in custody, Spaulding said, she was questioned in an intimidating way by a man who had a wire in his ear, but no badge, and said he was with the Secret Service.

“He said, ‘If you talk to me, OK. If you don’t talk to me it will start an investigation. He asked me: Who did you come with? Are you part of a group? … How you feel about the President?”

Messing said police told him, “Relax, they are just going to take them, remove them from the site, and when this is over they will let them go.”

Messing is outraged that Spaulding and DeFillipo were detained in this manner, forcefully questioned without an attorney present and that he was arrested for identifying himself to police and attempting to represent his clients.

“Clearly no one is paying attention to the Bill of Rights here,” said Messing of the arrest scenario, “…By arresting me they’ve compromised my clients’ abilities to have their attorney of choice. Messing said he intends to pursue this matter.

“Apparently, this president is not able to expose himself to anyone who doesn’t agree with him,” added Messing.

Many people photographed and videotaped the incident (video clips are available online at www.ventingmedia.com).

“I think it’s good that they were willing to put themselves out there,” said 14-year-old Emma Cook who participated in the demonstrations and witnessed the arrests, “(Bush) knew that we were out there and that we were willing to do a lot to get our message across …that’s why they drove so fast.”

Despite the arrests, representatives from the Traverse City Police, the Grand Traverse County Sheriff’s Department, the State Police and the Secret Service all said that the event turned out well — no security problems, no one hurt, no garbage left behind.

“It was a great day for Traverse City, said local attorney Blake Ringsmuth, who called Monday’s demonstration the most vibrant expression of First Amendment rights he’d ever seen in this town.

Ringsmuth said that in the past people with opposing views may have been hesitant to speak out because of the areas identity as a Republican stronghold but Monday’s Anti-Bush demonstrations were…“Rejuvenating. Galvanizing… a huge day for Democrats and for those who don’t believe in the way this country is going.”

— Glen Arbor Sun editor Jacob Wheeler contributed to this article

Posted by editor at 11:56 PM | Comments (0)

“Not in my backyard” — Homestead sewage issue seeps to the surface

By Jacob Wheeler
Sun editor

Preceding the creation of the Sleeping Bear Dunes National Lakeshore in 1979, and long before tumultuous conflicts over golf courses and land swaps divided the local community, The Homestead was given sewage easements on two parcels of land totaling 12.9 acres just north and east of the sprawling resort.

The larger parcel is currently being used for spray application into a woodland lot — the other for spray application onto a cleared field planted in alfalfa, as a means of sterilizing the sewage before it seeps into the groundwater and nearby Lake Michigan. But the existing application system and locations run afoul of Michigan Department of Environmental Quality standards, and have since 1998.

After maintaining a low profile for 25 years, The Homestead’s waste problem has bubbled to the surface and threatens to dominate local politics this fall. The local branch of the National Park Service is expected to release an Environmental Assessment by the end of September, paving the way for a public comment period of at least 30 days and at least one public meeting facilitated by the NPS. The Assessment will analyze alternatives for the sewage disposal and its impacts in response to The Homestead’s proposed Irrigation Management Plan that “calls for clearcutting and substantial earthmoving work,” according to a public letter written by the NPS a year ago. That plan also includes “subsequent planting of both parcels with grasses that take up the nutrients in the sprayed effluent more efficiently.”

Meanwhile, concerns over what the spray is doing to local groundwater prompted the formation this summer of a non-profit group called Advocates For Safe Drinking Water And Lakes. AFSDWAL is made up of homeowners on Sunset Shores and Thoreson Road — the areas potentially most affected by The Homestead’s sewage, if it isn’t brought up to code or if no alternative is reached.

“The impetus for this was our discovery of the sewage problems at The Homestead,” says the group’s president, Pamela Murphy. “We became concerned, and didn’t want to tackle this as individuals, so we all tested our groundwater.” AFSDWAL didn’t uncover any nitrate levels over the allotted limits stipulated by the Environmental Protection Agency, but testing will continue, periodically, into the fall, following the bulk of The Homestead’s spraying this summer.

Alternatives that might be entertained in the NPS Environmental Assessment and ensuing public comment period might include installing an underground seepage system on the existing parcels, relocating the easements to new locations on Park land and installing an underground system there, or, as the Michigan Land Use Institute’s Johanna Miller suggests, asking The Homestead to do on-sight treatment. The MLUI may also facilitate a public meeting once the Environmental Assessment has been released to the public.

The main problem with The Homestead’s current sewage system is that “groundwater flow from (the parcels in question) appears to intersect potable water wells on private property to the west,” at Sunset Shores, according to the NPS. But the DEQ’s standards would be more lenient if the groundwater “vented”, or emerged below ground, into the surface waters of Lake Michigan without intersecting those wells.

“No one in The Homestead would be directly affected by malfunctioning septic systems because they don’t have private wells,” says AFSDWAL’s Murphy. “But we have private wells and we are downhill from the system. We don’t want to be rabid-mouthed environmentalists, we just want to look at the facts and get the issues resolved. What we’re saying is that we want The Homestead to be a good neighbor. We’ve gone through many issues with them before, and we’ve been able to resolve them all.

“It would be win-win situation for The Homestead and for the National Park Service to have a drainage system below ground,” Murphy added.

The Advocates For Safe Drinking Water And Lakes asks 1) “that the Michigan Department of Environmental Quality act immediately to assure that The Homestead takes steps to obtain a valid groundwater discharge permit; 2) that the Glen Arbor Township reject applications for building permits for new housing units (using current septic lagoon system) until The Homestead is in compliance with state laws; 3) that the MDEQ enforce through fines or sanctions any further noncompliant activities by The Homestead; 4) that The Homestead demonstrate for a significant period of time (at least three violation-free years) that it can meet all operational standards of the permit and that all discussions and actions regarding exchange of easement cease until all these actions have been completed to satisfaction.”

The Sleeping Bear Dunes National Lakeshore (local branch of the National Park Service) can be reached at 326-5134 or by emailing SLBE_EA@nps.gov. The Homestead resort’s main telephone number is 334-5000.

Posted by editor at 10:06 PM | Comments (0)

Georgia or bust: Local couple braves the Appalachian Trail — Part 2

By Abby Noble
Sun contributor

Abby (Chatfield) Noble, of Leland, set out to hike the Appalachian Trail with her now-husband, Kenny, in the fall of 2003. She recounts their awe-inspiring journey in this (and in the next) issue of the Glen Arbor Sun. Abby honed her writing skills at the Interlochen Arts Academy. She and Kenny were married this year on June 27.

The Appalachian Trail is the oldest continuous long-distance hiking path in the United States, stretching over 2,160 miles through 14 states from Maine to Georgia. For six months, my fiancé and I studied stacks of maps and books in preparation for our first long-distance hike. The goals: To complete the entire Appalachian Trail, “thru-hike” it in hikers’ lingo, while we learned the challenges of subsisting outdoors and experiencing the East Coast’s physical geography.

We began the journey in San Francisco, overlooking the Pacific Ocean from our apartment balcony one last time before a long drive across the country. Everything we owned fit into our 1992 Nissan Pathfinder, but everything we would soon need fit into two hiking backpacks.

In Leland, friends helped us through 24 hours of vacuum-packing and boxing 500 pounds of dried food into 14 strategically planned mail drops. These goodie boxes could sustain us along the trek if we correctly calculated how much food we needed between drops. While studying maps in our cozy living room, we had to guess how far our legs could carry us each day for five months. Based on the terrain, our fitness levels and an obscure Knowles equation, we stuffed each box with enough food to last us until we received the next package. My mother would mail them to specific zip codes along the trail about two weeks before our estimated arrival at each town.

Just two weeks after leaving the west coast, Atlantic waters swept over our feet in Hampton, New Hampshire. A Connecticut friend volunteered to drive us to the Appalachian Trail’s northern terminus in Baxter State Park, Maine. The night before we began the hike, the three of us and a black lab stayed at a campground near the Atlantic Ocean. This campground more resembled someone’s backyard, and its occupants seemed solely there to hang out in comfort. It became obvious what liberal meaning people use to define the word “camp.” Our camping supplies consisted of two outfits each, rain suits, sleeping bags, a tent, water filter, propane stove, bug lotion and ten-day supply of dehydrated food. The Hampton campers stocked up on fast food, refrigerators, televisions, picnic tables, and full-size inflatable couches inside their nylon mansions.

Our reality struck hard the next afternoon when a park ranger refused to let our vehicle inside Baxter State Park as long as there was a dog present. The only viable alternative meant hiking for one and a half days from outside the park borders just to reach the Appalachian Trail’s actual start at Mount Katahdin’s summit. So, our friend and his dog left us at a green log cabin store under a fluorescent “Schlitz Beer” sign with no trails in sight. Immediately, we walked in the wrong direction and found ourselves only 200 yards from the general store just an hour later. Thanks to a passerby, we uncovered a trail that supposedly leads into the park, although no signs actually confirmed this. We did not know that we were on the right trail until we passed a sign four miles later. A local soon told us he was glad the trail was hard to navigate, because it kept the visitors away.

After seven and a half miles carrying 40-50 lb packs, we stumbled into Katahdin Stream Campground with bruised hips, tight shoulders and throbbing feet. Only one day down, and I had already learned some lessons. First, we can all survive, and even thrive, with much less than we carry. Second, always break in boots before beginning a 2,000-mile hike. Finally, flying insects are a great motivation to keep moving, even when the body feels like it might shatter under a heavy pack’s pressure. Trudging through forests of Paper Birch, Yellow Birch, Red Birch, Black Birch and Cedar along swampy grounds provided abundant mosquito breeding grounds but an entertaining show of diversity we would continue to find the entire trip. That day, as every day, we walked trails constructed of roots, rocks, boards, bridges, logs, dirt, pine needles and leaves. In just one day, we had already spotted moose, frogs, snakes and butterflies; wild raspberries and strawberries breaking into bloom. We saw six rabbits that first day, and I contemplated the potential meaning in this. According to some Native American tribes, rabbits symbolize facing one’s fears, so I made a note to remain brave and meet this adventure with an open mind.

I needed this insight the next morning, when we climbed 5.2 miles up the Appalachian Trail just to reach the actual terminus and then turn around and walk back down again. Mt. Katahdin offers some of the best views along the Appalachian Trail, but a grey mist surrounded us and limited our vision to 15 feet in all directions. We ascended through conifer forest, ash, maple, birch and cedar before reaching a mile of massive boulders at tree line. We scaled the rocks by gripping small cracks and strategically placed iron hooks. It occurred to me then, and many other times, how much the Appalachian Trail journey is based on faith. White blazes mark the entire trail’s route, and hikers just trust these spray painted lines will lead them to the intended destination. With such limited views on this mist-shrouded mountain, we threw our faith into the maze of white blazes. A week prior to our climb, a teenage boy died of dehydration on the mountain. We kept this grim fact in mind as we reached the Appalachian’s northern terminus, marked only by a peeling wooden sign that said, “Springer Mountain, Georgia: 2,100.2 miles.”

We made it back down safely, and figured that the 5.2-mile descent was the only distance that officially counted out of the 18 miles we had already hiked. The next day met us with another adventure into the 100-Mile Wilderness. At its entrance, a sign warns hikers who dare enter that they must carry at least 10 days’ supplies to safely complete the 110 miles of trail between the Penobscot River and Monson, Maine. Just minutes into the wilderness, all unnatural sounds cease as the conifer forest closes in around the trail. The trees increase in size and human interaction transforms into a novelty.

“Wilderness,” like the word “camping,” is malleable in definition. The 100-mile wilderness remains the most isolated stretch along the Appalachian Trail, but it is a far cry from the deep, mysterious wild one might expect. We followed the root and rock pathway through miles of forest and lowland lake areas, meeting our first friend somewhere in the middle.

Billy Flip-Flop inspired us to walk 16.3 miles one rainy day. He earned his name because he hiked in flip-flops but could still keep a pace twice as fast as anybody else. He carried an umbrella, which gave an appearance like he just walked out of his front door for an afternoon stroll. Although we were in so-called wilderness, the sound of boats carried across the ponds, and we crossed over several old logging roads. The biggest surprise was word of a secret camp two miles off trail across Pemadumcook Lake. After a long day with soar legs and wet clothing, we found a landing on the lake with an air horn strapped to a tree. A sign said, “Blow horn just once.” Within five minutes, a man in a plaid hunter’s cap snaked across the water by boat and motored us to his lodge and home called White House Landing, This man in the cap named Bill, his wife and son were the only folks who lived in the 100-mile wilderness but, contradictory to the sign at its start, there were other ways to permeate this wilderness besides by footpath. Bill made the point clear when he said, “Any place you can drive a Cadillac to five points is not a wilderness.” If this were wilderness, I would have slept in the rain that night instead of in front of a woodstove fire under a roof.

However, this might be the closest place to wilderness the Northeastern United States has, and it was still beautiful. The remaining stretch of wilderness led us out of the lowland woods onto several mountainsides that required free climbing, such as Chairback, Moxie Bald and Pleasant Mountains. Wild blueberries, strawberries, watermelon berries and Lilly of the Valley spilled over the trail. Loons yipped and wailed from the ponds. We found the best swimming holes in clear, snowmelt streams cut into granite and slate hill slopes, before we stumbled out of the forest into the blinding sunlight on the highway near Monson nine days later.

Maine’s Appalachian Trail passes through several small towns like Monson and Stratton, where we met some of the kindest folks along the entire hike. In one day, we met Monson’s preacher, postmaster and general store clerk, Tim. Just to buy a bag of groceries, Tim required us to pause between checking through each item and listen to in-depth stories. In Stratton, some locals invited us to play pool and join in their weekly Friday night karaoke party. Across the eight states we hiked, locals greeted us with unmatched kindness. After living in a city for almost two years, where people get accustomed to walking past each other without so much as a glance, the Appalachian Trail restored my faith in human kindness. Whenever we needed a ride into a town or a place to lay our heads, some thoughtful stranger pulled through.

In fact, the entire trail only exists because thousands of individuals volunteer to maintain it and fight constant legal battles to ensure the Appalachian Trail keeps a secure passage. Near Caratunk, Maine, the Kennebec River rolls with such force that hikers are required to canoe across it. This would not be possible without the volunteers who sit at the river’s edge in shifts and wait to paddle hikers to the opposite bank. One hiker, determined to walk even the rivers, declined the canoe ride and attempted to swim against the Kennebec current with his pack above his head. We met him a few days later and learned that a man had plucked the hiker from the water about a quarter-mile downstream of the trail and saved his life.

We opted to accept a canoe ride and safely reach the biggest physical challenge along the entire trail, Maine’s Mahoosuc Range. Our lowland travels, broken only intermittently by random isolated peaks, turned into the most continuous series of ups and downs on the Appalachian Trail. The Mahoosuc alpine territory offers extensive views on clear days. From The Horn, the Atlantic Ocean is visible. From all peaks, I could watch the approaching weather. On Saddleback’s summit, we leaned into the 30 mph winds and observed, far off, rain showering down in metallic curtains, connecting the clouds to patches of hillside basking in the sunlight.

— Abby and Kenny continue their trek down the Appalachian Trail in the September 16 issue of the Glen Arbor Sun

Posted by editor at 09:09 PM | Comments (0)

Local amateur discovers passion with the fungus among us

By Pat Stinson
Sun staff writer

First, a disclaimer. I am not a member of the esteemed Mycological Society of America, the North American Mycological Association, nor any organized amateur mushroom club. I am the lowliest of wild mushroom fanciers, a two-timing (spring and fall) picker of the rankest sort, perhaps best likened to a fisherman or woman who lazily drowns a worm once or twice a year in order to catch a common but tasty bluegill or rock bass.

I hunt and eat only two types of wild, edible mushrooms: spring morels and fall puffballs.

Of course, I’ve heard and read tales of edible wild mushrooms that taste like chicken or look like chicken, of “oysters” and “chanterelles,” and mushrooms with mysterious Latin names which, when translated in their common names, like “porcini,” sound like grocery store fare. Doubtless, I’m missing dozens of edible delicacies. I’ve also heard stories of self-proclaimed expert pickers poisoning themselves on mushrooms they’ve harvested “for years.” Even within my two preferred mushroom types are several indigestible and downright poisonous varieties. Armed with an Audubon field guide, a Michigan guidebook and sage advice from experienced pickers, I’ve managed so far to reduce the possibility of sprouting untimely fungi of my own.

Admiring colorful mushrooms of all sorts through a camera lens is my preferred way to make their acquaintance, with these two excellent exceptions.

I first learned about eating wild mushrooms when I was four, riding solo in the backseat of the family SIMCA. The old car and I were momentarily abandoned alongside a steep hill while my wool-clad parents foraged for fungi.

It may have been the bag of cookies they left to keep me company, or it might have been the mushroom-and-butter aroma later that evening which evoked my first and fleeting thought that my parents were onto something strange, but good.

Nineteen years later, a September camping trip in the Upper Peninsula’s Porcupine Mountains gave me my second taste of the wild mushroom variety. I had forgotten to pack the canned mushrooms for the Coleman-stove stroganoff. My companion disappeared in the woods for 20 minutes and returned with a half-full bread bag of white and creamy-looking ‘shrooms. Puffballs, he called them. Certain we would be poisoned and hospitalized for the rest of the trip, I ate sparingly of the cooked gems, (“gem-studded puffballs” they were), and spoiled my appetite instead on buttered noodles.

Two years later, a co-worker and friend discovered that I had moved north from suburbia and, breaking all rules of ‘shroom-picking secrecy, took me to one of her family’s favorite morel patches just south of the Leelanau County border.

My dumb luck continued when, shy of a month later, I met a stranger in a crowded Traverse City diner who took pity on my meager mushroom-hunting experience. He asked me which Leelanau County township I lived in and immediately disclosed the location of a bountiful hunting ground two miles from my house.

Many morel seasons passed. One day, I found myself standing in the checkout line at a local grocer’s. A busybody ahead of me took one look at my shrink-wrapped container of expensive mushrooms and declared, “You know, you can find those same things in the woods and they’re a whole lot cheaper.” In the space of 60 seconds, I met “Bob,” an amateur mycologist, (a person who studies as well as picks), who had recently retired to the area and was ripe for mushroom-picking companions. I smiled, wrote down “Bob’s” phone number and promptly misfiled it for what I thought would be future use.

Every year since Bob, spring and fall, I’ve trolled the edge of the woods near my home in search of the mother load of mushrooms, a fairy circle of black or yellow morels in spring, gem-studded puffballs in the fall, and the giant species of both types. The thrill of the search compares to finding hidden Easter eggs, but it’s the smell of the woods and the field, the call of the birds overhead and the dappled light under tall trees that is the true allure of the mushroom experience.

Mushroom resources for beginners and others: Audubon Society Field Guide to North American Mushrooms, the Mycological Society of America, the North American Mycological Association, and on the web: www.capsandstems.com, www.wildflowers-and-weeds.com, www.wildmanstevebrill.com, www.paghat.com, www.gloriamundipress.com

Posted by editor at 08:13 PM | Comments (0)

In addition to Carpe Diem, “Be Prepared,” in beautiful Provence

By Jo Anne Wilson
Sun international correspondent

SAIGNON, France — Greetings from Southern France . . . land of lavender, honey and heat! For the second year in a row this region is experiencing extremely high temperatures and no rain. Intense heat and low humidity create an oven-like atmosphere. My days are devoted primarily to being the guardienne of some local vacation properties. I take care of the five stone cottages on the Domaine de Claparèdes, a restored lavender farm outside of Saignon, the grounds and two swimming pools. I also watch the owner’s house and small stone Cabanon. So far we’ve had a broken window, a pulled out pool gate, a non-functioning hot water heater, and a melted down light fixture. I’ve had a slam dunk introduction to the various repair services.

I interact with hard-working service people as well as the couples and families who are here for holiday (we say vacation). It makes me think of how much this area has in common with Leelanau County. Life goes on at two levels. There are those who come for days or weeks to relax and enjoy, completely absorbed in having a good time. Also, there are those who live and work here. Like the workers in Leelanau, most workers here find great satisfaction in the beauty of the area that surrounds them, more than in the wages. Others, I suspect, stay because they were born and raised here and they do what they can to make a modest living.

July and August are fiercely busy. The French have a very strict government policy on vacations: 35-hour workweeks and four to six weeks of vacation. Everyone has time off. Many of the tourists I see are French. They come to Provence the way people from Ohio, Indiana, Illinois, and southern Michigan come to Leelanau. Others arrive from elsewhere on the European Continent as well as the U.K. There are also a few Americans around (usually detectible by white sneakers and loud voices — why do we Americans talk louder than the rest of the world?)

I’m meeting a sizeable group of English speaking expatriates for whom this area is home. Temporarily, I’m housed with Meg and Stephen Parker. Meg’s a Brit and Stephen an American. They’ve renovated what was a tumbled down old farmhouse into a lovely stone provençal home. The house is on the side of a hill overlooking a splendid vineyard with mountains and lavender fields in the background. I’ve been here four weeks and the view still stuns me. I’m in one of two apartments on the lower level of the house. There’s a terrace just outside the door. From dawn ‘til after sunset I am treated to a view that makes me feel as if I’m watching a travelogue on the big screen. With morning coffee or evening wine I stare, and still cannot quite believe such beauty.

I must add, however, that along with the beauty and the charm goes a huge assortment of bugs. The little old Michigan mosquito pales to the variety and abundance of provençal insects. These days with temperatures in the 90s, the chirping and humming of the cicadas is almost deafening and borderline annoying. I’m learning about jumping spiders, wasps, hornets, scorpions and other bizarre and grotesque looking beetles. The beetles are harmless, if the mere sight of them doesn’t cause cardiac arrest. And unless you’re allergic to bee stings, there’s no need to worry. They’re too busy with lavender nectar to bother with human flesh. With acres of purple blossoms, they’re consumed with gathering pollen. Talk about bee heaven. The most delicious honey is sold at local farms and in the markets. Ask Mary Rokos at Bittersweet to tell you about our visit to the honey farmer last fall. Wine tasting has nothing on honey tasting. Yummy and sticky!

Most of the lavender has been harvested. Today I passed two big farm carts, stacked high with tied up bunches of harvested flowers. These will be taken to local factories and processed into oil. There’s a distillery just outside Saignon and I can see the smoke from its chimney across the valley. Some lavender oil has medicinal purposes; it’s good for skin irritations such as bee stings.

Speaking of bee stings (I do seem to be dwelling on bugs, don’t I?), yesterday I stopped at the pharmacy. A pharmacy here can be like a walk-in-clinic in the States and pharmacists are much like our physician's assistants. I went for advice on medicine for my allergies. (I refuse to think I might be allergic to lavender.) In addition to the recommended allergy tablets, I also bought a small venom extractor. Meg says she and Stephen carry one when they hike in the countryside, in case of snakebite. “SNAKES, I YELPED! “ Meg quickly assured me they also work for bee, wasp and hornet, or spider bites, which I’m far more likely to get than a snakebite.

So from sniffles to snake bites, I am all set. Meg has invited me to go hiking with a group of friends and their dogs. We leave tomorrow morning at 7:30 a.m. and the venom extractor is already in my backpack. Not that I plan to need it you understand, however, to Sun readers who already know my motto: Carpe Diem, let me also add: Be Prepared.

P.S. Several of you have asked about the name of this village. It looks like Saigon, but it’s Saignon, and pronounced say-nyoh.

Posted by editor at 07:16 PM | Comments (0)

Sumacs offer a fuzzy, tasty local treat

By Codi Yeager
Sun staff writer

Many of us have seen or heard of the Sumac. It flourishes in much of Leelanau County, growing in large clumps of tropical looking green foliage. The Sumac is a small, twiggy tree with large compound leaves that turn bright red and yellow in the fall. The fuzzy branches and large clusters of red berries make it easy to recognize. The Sumac seems to prefer growing in fields or on the edge of forests, and is almost never seen in the middle of the woods. Typically, it only grows to be eight to 10 feet high, but some can become taller. Some of the tallest Sumacs in the county grow on the southwest corner of Benzonia Trail/County Rd. 677 and Glenmere Rd. near the Glen Lake Narrows. Their height reaches almost 35 feet.

The variety of sumac in Leelanau County is Rhus typhina, or “Staghorn Sumac”. The name refers to the stout, velvety branches that look similar to the antlers of a buck. These small shrub-like trees are deciduous, meaning they lose their leaves in the fall. They spread by sending out long runners underground that grow up into tiny Sumac shoots. The resulting affect is a clump of connected sumacs with the older, taller plants near the center and the shorter, younger plants near the edge of the patch. The berries of the Sumac tree are bright red when ripe and grow in clusters resembling those of grapes. They are almost as fuzzy as the branches and almost perfectly round. The bark of the Sumac is a light grayish brown and the trunk is rarely very thick. The taller the tree, the thicker the trunk. The trunk itself is not fuzzy, but smooth and hard, with no roughness to speak of. The leaves can be up to two feet long with 10 or 12 leaflets. The leaflets are about two to three inches long and have a jagged edge, or margin. The jagged margin is a major difference between the Staghorn Sumac and the Poison Sumac. Poison Sumac has white berries as well, so the two varieties should not be confused for one another.

Unlike the Poison Sumac, the Staghorn Sumac is edible. One of the most delicious lemonades is made from the small red berries of the Staghorn Sumac. In order to make this lemonade, the berries must be ripe, so the season for this recipe is limited to late August to early October. If the berries are harvested too early, they will not have developed their flavor yet and the drink will turn a sickly green color and taste bitter. The best time to harvest the berries is when they are a dark, almost purple, red. They taste the best if they are harvested before heavy rains wash away their flavor. The berries are edible just off the tree, so feel free to taste around before choosing some with which to make your lemonade. The lemonade, if brewed right, will end up a light pink color. You can add sugar to sweeten the drink if you like. Besides being used as a drink, the Sumac can be used as an herbal remedy also. The variety Rhus aromatica, or “Sweet Sumac” can be used to cure bed-wetting and other urinary disorders. The root bark is used in a tincture along with corn silk and horsetail. Sumac can also be made into a wine if left to ferment. Sumac lemonade can be made into a jelly, or other berries can be boiled in it to liven up their taste. The soft, green inner bark of the Sumac tree is sweet to suck on too. Sumac is a good source of vitamin C, so the health benefits of eating it are good too.

Recipe for Sumac Lemonade
1. Gather about half a dozen clusters of ripe sumac berries.
2. Place them into a bowl or pitcher and pour cold water over them. (Use more water for a milder drink and less water for a stronger lemonade.)
3. Take a spoon or fork and crush the berries thoroughly.
4. Place the bowl in a cool place and let it sit for a while to let the berries infuse into the water. Let it sit longer for a stronger taste.
5. When the taste is to your liking, cover the container with cheesecloth and drain the liquid into another container. You can then throw away the remnants of the berries that have been trapped in the cheesecloth.
• If you want to sweeten your lemonade, you can add sugar until it is to your liking.

So if you are out on a hike in, or driving around Leelanau County and you happen to spot a short, tropical looking tree with red berry clusters, give it a taste. You might be surprised at what nature can offer.

Posted by editor at 06:20 PM | Comments (0)

Row, row, row Tarot, gently down the stream of consciousness

By Stephanie Mills
Sun contributor

Purpose and intention are all very well and good, if a bit over-esteemed. They’re the starting blocks we adults kick off from in the forward hurtle over the hurdles of life. Purpose and intention are critical and only a teeny constituent of destiny. Over 500 years old, the Tarot deck is continually modified by individuals who’ve extracted much essence from the human experience.

This kaleidoscope of accumulated insights can show us dimensions and possibilities of personal reality that purpose and intention may overlook. The cards tender narratives unavailable to waking consciousness. Now I’m not talking spooks or ether, but those mytho-poetic journeys we each make from sunrise to sunset, from one new moon to the next, and from one solstice to another.

Only a fraction of the saga is rational or literal. Like its kindred, purpose and intention, rationality is a fine and necessary thing. But the whole story — of my life, your life, the life of our community, our life as a species — is vast and rich, complex beyond reason or literal comprehension.

The Tarot deck can serve as a wonderful commentary on life’s glorious, unreasonable immensity because it shows, rather than telling, and its syntax is pure chance.

The pack, consisting of what are called the major and minor arcane, is made of elemental images and symbols, signs that are as eloquent as the inquirer is able to allow them to be. That Tarot’s minor arcane, which, remember, is ancestral to our 52-card playing deck, gets its potency from the four elements: from the earth, symbolized by pentacles (today’s diamonds); from air, by swords (spades); from fire, by wands (clubs); and water, cups. There is a further wealth of symbolic correspondence with each suit, and perhaps we’ll be able to explore them in coming installments.

The meaning of the suits ramifies through the silent symbolism of numbers: Concepts like singularity, duality, trinity, and quaternity loom large in mind and nature Add to the 40 combinations of number and suit (the “pip” cards) the 16 personalities of the court. The pages, knights, queens and kings embody the qualities of the suits as those might speak through gender, rank, or stage of life.

Part of what makes us human is our longing to discern patterns and to have them make sense. The four elements, the first 10 numbers and the ages of man have been seed syllables of our phrasing of the life of the world and its ceaseless changing balances for about as long as we have been human. And there they are, those old archaic patterns displayed on the cards to be shuffled, spread, and scrutinized for guidance and understanding. In readings the pip and court cards speak to situations, pieces of the current story.

Each of us may be unique, but no one, I suspect, wishes to live in total free fall or to feel that her or his experience is entirely new under the sun. The trumps — the 22 cards of the major aracana are big-time symbolizations of pivotal moments or momentous conditions in the soul’s journey — symbols of virtues and complexes. Jungian psychologists call such images universals of inner experience archetypes. Among the archetypal trumps are the Fool, the Magician, the High Priestess, the Empress, the Emperor, the Lovers, the Hermit and the Hanged Man. There are strength, Temperance, Death and the Wheel of Fortune: the Devil, the Star, the Moon and the Sun. These are roomy metaphors, but not so spacious or generalized as to dissipate into some common ground of nirvanic existence.

Trumps in a Tarot spread point to larger realities overarching everyday events, disclose strong forces presently at play within the psyche. Sometimes the major trumps speak to societal and cultural forces bearing on a situation. There is a trump called the Tower. It shows a slender stone citadel struck by lightning. Two crowned residents are blown loose and sent tumbling. This trump, I heard, showed up in a lot of readings following September 11, 2001.

Tarot cards are not opinionated. The only opinion, implicit in the existence of the cards, is that the reality alluded to by a trump or pip card is worth pondering and acknowledging. Something needful, some useful intelligence may be presented in the singular combination of suits, numbers and trumps arrayed in a spread. One can read warnings, realism, dreams and encouragement in the cards. The deck works to suggest and to startle. The cards are a graven invitation to the larger self to stir within everyday life.

The Tarot incites that larger self to issue the piece of wit, the unexpected strength, or the feral inspiration that leaves those worthies, purpose, intention, and reason, choking in the dust at the starting line. Animated, the heart, lungs, mind and limbs of the whole being are set coursing swift and fine as a dream of flight.

Glenn Wolff’s sketch this time came about this way. It’s one song sung by the suit of wands, what his mind’s eye beheld and what his skilled hand replied.

Stephanie Mills’ waking consciousness is at work on a biography of a Gandhian activist. Glenn Wolff has just completed public prairie sculptures in Madison and Baraboo, Wisconsin.

Posted by editor at 05:23 PM | Comments (0)

When your teenage daughter wants in on Victoria’s Secret

By Erika Vidal
Sun contributor

You’re at the mall shopping for your teenage daughter’s back to school wardrobe. You’ve bought her the ever so necessary low-rise jeans, the shoes, and some basic tops. Everything is going surprisingly well. She has only pretended not to know you once, and that was because a group of boys that go to her school were walking towards her. You’re almost finished shopping, when suddenly she tells you that she could really use some new underwear, and while she’s at it, some bras.

“Okay,” you say to her, “let’s go to the nearest department store.” She looks at you as though you’ve just confused Lindsay Lohan with Hilary Duff, and slowly lowers her head like a bull getting ready to charge. You’ve seen this look before--the oh-mom-you-are-so-out-of-it look. She shakes her head.

“How about Victoria’s Secret?” she asks, very seriously. Your mind automatically flashes to those women in the catalogues, which by the way you are tired of getting in the mail every other day, and you wonder why she is suddenly interested in shopping at Victoria’s Secret. What’s wrong with department store underwear? What’s the difference to her? You don’t want her to sense your fear and discomfort — it’s how her attitude gains strength. “Sure,” you tell her, the palms of your hands beginning to sweat slightly. She knows exactly where in the mall Victoria’s Secret is located, which means she’s been there before, and not with you because when you shop for lingerie, you shop alone. You think back to all the Saturdays you’ve dropped her off at the mall with her friends and try to remember if you have ever noticed a pink and white bag lying around the cluttered floor of her room. What is her father going to think when you walk into the house and his little girl is carrying a Victoria’s Secret bag?

You walk into blinding pinkness and see that there is a sales associate smiling in her black suit, tape measurer dangled around her neck, eyeing you like a hungry tiger. This is where I come in. I’m the tiger in the black suit. “Hi, how are you ladies doing today?” I ask. When you say, “Fine thanks,” I reply, “What brings you in?”

“Just a little back to school shopping.”

“Oh, okay, great,” I nod, “My name’s Erika if you need help with anything.” I leave you alone — for a while, that is, until I see the looks on you and your daughter’s faces.

This situation isn’t new to me. Since I started working here, I have noticed that the mother/daughter experience of shopping for undergarments together is not always as bonding as one might expect, especially when their daughter is only 13 or 14. The majority of the time, mothers want full coverage bottoms and daughters want thongs, or at least low-rise bikinis; mothers want unlined, unpadded bras, and daughters want maximum cleavage. Mom is embarrassed and shocked at her daughter’s candid approach to underwear. There are arguments. Every 10 minutes I hear, “You’re 13 years old, you don’t need to be wearing that, yet,” and then the response comes, with that brutal teenage wrath behind it, “Whatever, you’re so unfair. I am not wearing granny panties to school. Just because you wear them doesn’t mean I have to.”

Granny panties. It is painful for mothers to hear their daughter refer to their taste in underwear as granny-like, because frankly, most moms don’t think of themselves as that old, and besides, what’s so wrong with having your rear end completely covered? So what if your underwear comes up to your bellybutton? Most women over the age of 30 weren’t raised in the low-rise era; in fact many of them think the trend is unflattering and ridiculous. They’ve never seen as many love handles or as much butt crack in their life as they have seen today in the mall, or when they go pick their daughters up from school. It takes every drop of restraint they have not to walk over and pull their jeans up. First it was the boys, and now it’s the girls.

I personally find myself caught in an in-between stage. I am no longer a teenage daughter, nor am I the mother of one. This does, however, make it easier for me to observe and understand both sides. Of course I can relate to the 13-year-old’s desire to feel a little older and to be accepted by her friends, or whatever the case may be. I was 13 not too long ago. But, I can also see the exasperation and concern in a mother’s eyes when her daughter is taking this next step, no matter how small, into the world of Victoria’s Secret, a store whose image revolves around sex, and on the beautiful, barely dressed models in the catalogues and commercials.

The company has recently launched a collection called “PINK” aimed towards girls ages 15-22, in which the colorful mix and match sleepwear is clearly aimed at the younger generation, and the bras only go up to a 36C. All of the “PINK” underwear is low-rise, and the thongs are even stringier (much to the dismay of many parents) than the regular cotton. Although the line is tying to reach the younger crowd, it is, inevitably, playfully sexy.

I try to neutralize many mother/daughter disagreements by bringing bras that aren’t necessarily padded but have some lifting power to them, and by introducing string bikinis, which aren’t “granny panties” but still cover what moms feel need to be covered.

One day, a woman starts talking to me while her daughter is trying on some bras — some lightly lined bras, not padded bras — and she tells me that her daughter is about to be a freshman in high school, and apparently all her friends went out and bought underwear from Victoria’s Secret. So, naturally, since all her friends are wearing the pale pink Victoria’s Secret tag, she has to, also.

“It’s like the cool thing to do now,” the woman says to me, “is to get your underwear from Victoria’s Secret. You can’t get your underwear from anywhere else. But I’m only letting her get the cotton ones.” Her daughter looks so young to me, like she’s 11 instead of 14. She is almost 10 years younger than me, which is disturbing because I still, despite my recent graduation from college, like to think of myself as a teenager. Mothers aren’t the only ones their daughters make feel old. Every time one of them calls me “Lady” or “M’am” I cringe. Her mother continues, “She’d love it if I let her buy those thongs, but she’s too young.” She is talking about the cotton v-string thongs, which are nothing more than a triangle with strings attached. I nod, and tell her that I understand.

Her daughter has settled for the bikinis, picking each pair out carefully. It’s not easy to find the perfect pattern for your particular butt. The horizontal stripes might make it look too wide, the flowers are way too “old lady-ish” for some and navy blue is simply boring. I have witnessed the “Helpful Mom Syndrome”, during which she might ask, “What about this one?” and hold up a pair, to which her daughter responds with a stare that says, “OhmiGod, I know you don’t actually think I would wear those.”

The girl’s mother tells her to hurry up, then looks at me sideways and tells me quietly that no one is going to see her underwear, anyway.

But, girls her age come in here all the time with their friends and head right over to the Very Sexy thong table, the most risqué collection in the store. All string, all slinky, impossible to fold. They usually buy one or two pairs at a time, since they’re $16 each. Black and hot pink are the two most popular colors, black no doubt being the official color of sexiness, and hot pink being the hottest color of the year.

I don’t know what these young girls buy them for, but I hope and believe that more than likely it’s just to show the tag off to their girlfriends. The fascination with thongs and padded bras is nowhere near over, and with magazines and television flashing the arcs of thongs all over the place, how can we expect it to be? As a 22-year-old woman and as an employee at Victoria’s Secret, it has long since ceased to shock me. I for one would like to give these girls the benefit of the doubt. I’d like to think that these girls want to wear Victoria’s Secret simply because it makes them feel more feminine and perhaps even more mature. Victoria’s Secret is after all, a cultural phenomenon that, let’s face it, is synonymous with the word lingerie whether you are 12 or 60.

Posted by editor at 04:31 PM | Comments (0)

August 12, 2004

Heavenly chocolates made by Grocer’s Daughter are so good, you’ll moan!

By Pat Stinson
Sun staff writer

Oh, divine chocolate!
They grind thee kneeling,
Beat thee with hands praying,
And drink thee with eyes to heaven.
-- Marco Antonio Orellana, 18th century

For three centuries after the Spaniards brought the first cacoa beans to Spain from Mexico, “chocolat” was known only as a thick beverage, full of nutrients, served at breakfast to royals and aristocrats while still in their beds. Today’s chocolate is no longer a beverage, (cocoa – a powdered form of chocolate without the cocoa butter – has replaced chocolat), nor is its present-day incarnation as a confection meant as a luxury exclusively for the upper classes.

And that’s the way Mimi Wheeler, a Glen Arbor-area chocolatier, thinks it should be.

“Good wine is not for everyone, because it’s so expensive,” she explains. “Good chocolate is for anyone; I like that idea.”

As the owner of “Grocer’s Daughter,” a new business specializing in making exquisite chocolate truffles with local flavor, Mimi has paired her love of fine chocolate with what she calls the “fun of the craft” to make what she hopes will be “…a piece of art that’s really special.”

“I think Americans are ripe for good chocolate,” she says, citing a recent article in The New York Times. Generously offering a ginger truffle for tasting, she adds, “It’s affordable at $1.25 or $1.50…I like that idea, too.”

On this mid-summer morning, Mimi’s blue eyes sparkle as she points to a sepia-tone photo of her mother, Mary Louise Leth-Soerensen, the “grocer” who served as inspiration for her business name. Watching as her mother quietly helped villagers on both sides of the counter, and growing up in a family of entrepreneurs, Mimi seemed destined to follow their lead – though the path that led her to where she is now may have meandered a bit.

“I like to serve people, make people happy,” she explains. “I think that’s why I became a social worker.”

For 10 years, Mimi was employed with Manistee-Benzie Community Mental Health, where she supervised a program for the developmentally disabled. An eight-year stint as a counselor for The Leelanau School followed, (where she would bring melted chocolate for dipping speared blueberries). For the last nine years, she also baked chocolate cake, brownies, scones and Danish pastries for various Glen Arbor establishments.

“What led me to that step was a visit to Art’s Bar. No one knew ‘Norm’s wife,’” she said, referring to Norm, her husband, a teacher at The Leelanau School. “I wanted to find something (to do) in my community.”

During this time, she says she also “played with truffles,” struggling for many years to “master the method,” making them for family and trading them among her friends.

After a spring trip to Provence this year, Mimi decided to take her truffle-making more seriously. While there, she says she stumbled upon a famous chocolate shop where the owner, sensing her excitement, gave her several samples. “He used fresh violet, lavender, mint and thyme — the Provence flavors. That fascinated me.”

Back home in her experimental kitchen, Mimi began using herbs in her own truffles. “I always cooked using things from my garden: thyme, mints, oregano. I get such a kick out of growing things and bringing them in and cooking with them. It’s such a magic process.” To the ginger, hazelnut, Grand Marnier and Courvoisier flavors already developed, she added truffles made with members of the mint family, rosemary, lavender and lemon verbena – one of her favorites.

Asked to name his favorite flavor, Norm diplomatically replies, “All are unique and delicious. I like them all. It’s like your kids; you don’t play favorites.”

Mimi pairs herbs with what she calls “constrasting” flavors: ginger with jalapeno, raspberry with black pepper. Asked whether or not these ingredients should be included in this story, for fear of divulging trade secrets, Mimi says matter-of-factly, “We all copy each other.” Then she adds, almost conspiratorially, that there’s “a lot of snobbery” in the world of chocolate.

“It’s quite hard to get information about truffles,” she explains, (with the exception of the chocolatier in Provence). “I talked to people in Denmark and they’re really secretive. It’s in your blood, so I’m not that secretive about what I do.”

In her homeland of Denmark, she remembers savoring her first fine chocolate at the age of nine, (at a cousin’s confirmation – her aunt was a pastry chef). During the early 50s and 60s, as a grocer’s daughter in the small, agricultural village of Hvam, Mimi recalls her parents’ store being stocked with “wonderful” European and Danish chocolate year-round. The rule for employees packing chocolate during those times was: you had to whistle while you worked, because you couldn’t whistle and eat at the same time.

In June, Mimi retired from her counselor position at the school and began making chocolate professionally. While she doesn’t whistle as she works, her enthusiasm and skill are evident as she prepares a small demonstration batch of ganache, (a mixture of cream, flavored with liqueur or steeped with herbs, heated with cane sugar and poured over chocolate – the “center” of the truffle), and tempers the chocolate that will coat the hand-rolled balls of cooled ganache. Tempering involves heating the chocolate, in this case using a double boiler (“baine marie” or water bath), to manufacturer’s specifications, then cooling it, (a marble slab or granite countertop works well), and re-heating slightly. “You can only ruin it by burning it or getting it damp,” she explains. “If it gets too hot, I add more chocolate to cool it.” The resulting product is known as a “couverture.” What you’re looking for in a truffle, she says, is a thin and crisp outer layer of chocolate with a very soft ganache inside.

Mimi prefers to use organic ingredients whenever possible because she says the flavor is better, and there are no hormones or other additives. She is also researching the use of fair-trade chocolate.

“I’m anxious to make new recipes; I think that’s the most fun.”

Mimi is studying edible flowers and has used orange calendula, (“it has a light, wholesome smell”), and rosa rugosa, (a type of rose), from her garden in her truffles. She says she wants to experiment with rose hips, too. She’s also making chocolate bark and working on a brownie mix and fudge sauces.

She says her goal is to sell directly to customers through a website, and she looks forward to catering special celebrations by personalizing the truffles for parties and weddings. For now, her truffles are on the dessert menu at the Good Harbor Grill and are sold individually or in gift boxes at Thyme Out, both in Glen Arbor.

Posted by editor at 11:55 PM | Comments (0)

Picking cherries during the Great Depression

By Helen Westie
Sun contributor

In the midst of the Great Depression, American families harvested the cherry crops here in northern Michigan. They were the forerunners of the migrants who came much later. It was 1931 and I was 13 years old when my family camped in the orchard of huge cherry trees (the trees are much younger today) at the tip of Old Mission Peninsula, which at that time consisted solely of cherry farms.

Our method of hand picking was a far cry from the cherry shaking described by Norm Wheeler in the July 29 issue of the Glen Arbor Sun. A pail was hooked onto our wide belts, leaving both hands free to scoop all the cherries from a branch into our pails. And we had to get them all. I wore my brothers’ overalls or slacks because girls wore only dresses then. Blue jeans would not come into wide use until several decades later.

We started at the top of the tree and when a pail was full, we would climb down from the high ladder and empty it into a cherry lug. We were paid 15 cents per lug — I was a good, enthusiastic picker and could earn almost a dollar a day. My father’s daily wage was $1.50 or a little more. My two brothers, a little younger than I, were not as productive or motivated. My mother stayed back at the tent airing our bedding and packing our lunches. When she delivered them, she would stay and pick for a while.

Right from the start, she became friendly with the farmer’s wife — they made an arrangement that my mother would bake two casseroles or two pie pasties (having been raised in the Upper Peninsula, she was an excellent pasty maker), one for us and one for the owner’s family, and we would eat dinner at our camp table.

Often after the day’s work, the farmer, Mr. Kilmurray, let us three kids ride on the truck loaded with full cherry lugs to the canning factory in Traverse City. For the records, the truck drove onto a scale and after unloading was weighed again. There was a story told to us about an incident one year before … When the farmers brought their loads to the factory, the price for sour cherries had gone way down. The farmers, in protest, dumped their whole day’s pickings into Grand Traverse Bay. The whole Bay was red with cherries as far as the eye could see, and the story and photographs appeared in newspapers throughout the United States.

One of the men who lived in the barn played a banjo. We would sit around a campfire at night enjoying s’mores, the first we ever had, and we sang and sang all the well-known songs, “Oh Susanna” and the like.

My brothers and I regarded the very first cherry-picking year as the most wonderful adventure of our young lives. We had left our home in Dearborn, MI in early spring of that year. My uncle Ed, who had hunted in this area, assured my parents that living was much cheaper and there was always fruit picking for a little extra income. My mother and father were feeling desperate; every insurance policy had been cashed, their life savings all but gone. There had been no work for my father for two years and now it meant going on welfare. My proud Finnish-American parents did not want to do that, so they bought a little Ford truck for 25 bucks, packed up our belongings and moved to Rapid City, near Kalkaska. Thus began the big adventure. Years later, the grandkids, grandnephews and grandnieces would ask, “how long were you in Rapid City?” We would say, “Well, almost two years,” and they would respond incredulously with, “and all that happened in two years?”

My brothers, now deceased, were better storytellers than I, and often regaled the kids in the family about the Rapid City characters (notably Helen’s boyfriends) or about skating parties, snowball fights, toboggan slides and pranks. Our lives could not have contrasted more with what they had been in Dearborn. It was life as it had been lived a generation or two before. The large house my parents were able to rent was furnished for $7 per month and was one of the nicest in town. Our Dearborn house was rented out for $10 per month. We were thrilled with our two-holed outhouse, but by mid-winter it had lost its fascination, and we longed for our city bathroom. We planted our big backyard at once with vegetables and berries. A number of chickens were fenced in for an egg supply and for special dinners. Mom had no qualms about cooking and baking on an old-fashioned cast-iron wood range. Dad was always busy chopping wood for the upcoming winter and the demands of the big kitchen stove. A pot-bellied stove with chrome fenders and isinglass windows was the only source of heat. In the bitter winter ahead, we dressed around this stove.

In Rapid City, we were intrigued by our new friends of the same age. At school we had farm friends; they knew so much, especially about taboo topics like reproduction, and they taught us plenty that we didn’t know. In turn, we intrigued them with our hints of urban sophistication. We were given lead parts in plays. We enjoyed a popularity that we’d never had before. We loved our new friends, and Mom and Dad also became acquainted in town. Often there was a Box Social, a picnic, or a Pie Social, and everyone in town participated.

After two years, we heard from friends back home that the factories were hiring again, so of course we had to move back. I shed bitter tears because I was smitten with a senior boy. We were “going together” it was told around town, though where this expression came from I cannot imagine. There was no place to “go” in this dating system except the walk home from Sunday night Christian Endeavor meetings when he walked me home. He never called my house. We had a sad goodbye and what I chose to think was True Love’s First Kiss.

None among us could ever, ever forget the evening before we left. The whole town and nearby farm friends gave us a potluck farewell party at the Rapid City Town Hall. All the way back on the long drive to Dearborn, we talked about the speeches, the presents and how sad we were to leave.

Posted by editor at 10:11 PM | Comments (0)

Hidden beneath all the hype exists a great Democratic divide

By Jacob Wheeler
Sun editor

Despite presenting a unified front at their convention in Boston last month, many politicians, delegates and progressive voters swearing allegiance to the Democratic Party to rid America of George W. Bush find themselves torn between the party line and their true beliefs on volatile issues like the war in Iraq and civil liberties. Glen Arbor Sun founding editor Jacob Wheeler was in Boston for the week of the DNC, reporting for Utne Magazine on the happenings at the convention, itself, but also chronicling the mood at progressive seminars, workshops, debates and organized protests elsewhere in Beantown.

BOSTON — By the time the 2004 Democratic National Convention kicked off in a puff of pomp and patriotic smoke, much of New England had already grown sick and tired of the whole ordeal. A three-city-block radius of prime expressways and urban thoroughfares around the Fleet Center downtown had been closed off, as well as sections of the city Transit line to deter any would-be terrorist mischief. Senior citizens living in the neighborhood were told to keep forms of identification on them at all times, lest they be mistaken for Al Qaeda sleeper cells. Worst of all, the state security apparatus had erected a “free speech zone” in damp quarters hidden under the train tracks and surrounded by barbed wire and netting, into which the authorities sought to confine the thousands of protestors expected to crash the big party.

Analogies to Guantanamo Bay — even Auschwitz — abounded.

“I would expect to see this in other countries, but not in America. This is not what we’re about,” said John Tompkins a Bostonian whose family of three was legging out a three-mile detour on their typical evening stroll for ice cream.

“It doesn’t sound very good,” echoed Ohio Congressman Dennis Kucinich, after speaking at a panel at the Boston Social Forum two days before the convention. “It doesn’t sound very consistent with a Democratic society.”

Before the Convention got under way on Monday, approximately 60 organized protestors gathered in the Free Speech Zone at 9 a.m. to act out scenes of oppression reminiscent of Abu Ghraib and Guantanamo Bay. Activists wearing DNC shirts ordered others in street clothes to don black hoods while their hands were bound behind their backs. The “prisoners” were then forced into the Free Speech Zone and forced to kneel in uncomfortable positions. Sound familiar?

According to Gan Golan, a graduate student majoring in urban planning at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and a local member of the Save Our Civil Liberties group, the “prisoners” wore civilian clothing and not the orange suits of Guantanamo Bay infamy to show that they are normal, everyday people.

“This insulting protest pen proves that Democrats are unwilling to differentiate from Republicans on issues relating to civil liberties and our inherent right to protest,” Golan said. “Many of us naively thought this wouldn’t happen in Boston, but the lockdown is becoming an established pattern at mass protests. Over the last few years we’ve seen police gradually increase security and the potential for violence, even though the U.S. protest movement is one of the most nonviolent in the world.

“By trying to put free speech in a cage, Boston has unwillingly declared the whole city a protest zone,” Golan foreshadowed.

Sure enough, roughly two hours after the powerful street theater display, city police used physical force to pry Medea Benjamin, founder of the women-against-war organization Code Pink, away from a “Bring The Troops Home” banner, before removing it from a fence adjacent to the Free Speech Zone outside the perimeter of the Fleet Center.

“First they give us a concentration camp, and then they won’t even let us hang our signs!” the well-known activist protested. “In this post-September 11 atmosphere, free speech is equated with terrorism.”

This journalist heard an officer radio in for reinforcements, and just when arrests appeared imminent, the banner was moved to a different wall, and Code Pink’s anti-war speech was allowed to continue. An emotional Fernando Suarez, of San Diego, told of losing his son Jesus, a Marine who was killed in Iraq on March 27, 2003 when he stepped on unexploded U.S. munitions. The Mexican family had emigrated from Tijuana in 1997 so Jesus could reap the benefits of serving in the American military.

“My son and 900 other boys and girls died for Bush’s lies, and my question is ‘why?’” Suarez asked in passionate, heavily accented English.

Why the Orwellian Free Speech Zone, Why the war in Iraq and Why not a just, democratic society are questions protestors were asking here all week.

Boston Social Forum

America’s attention naturally centered on the Fleet Center, where the whose-who of the Democratic Party and celebrities including everyone from Michael Moore, to Bono to Sarah Jessica Parker gathered for one big cheerleader session.

But Anyone looking for discussions on the direction the Democratic Party is taking, and exactly what kind of platforms should replace the Bush administration next year, should not have wasted their time listening to the canned and scripted speeches that lulled Boston’s Ground Zero to sleep all week. The real brain action kicked off the weekend before at the Boston Social Forum on the University of Massachusetts at Boston campus, where thousands of activists, intellectuals, anarchists — anyone who wants change and is willing to engage in dialogue about how to reach it — gathered for three days of convocations, panels, workshops and powerful open-air exhibits.

The Boston Social Forum is the first such forum in North America and builds on the model of the World Social Forum, first held in Porto Allegre, Brazil, in February, 2001. “This is a reaction to the International Monetary Fund, the World Bank, wealthier governments like the United States and their large corporations proposing economic policies that forced cuts to social spending and privatization of social services in an effort to reduce debt and encourage investment which results in humanitarian disasters and economic collapse,” said Sean Donahue, a BSF organizer. “We felt it was important to bring people from various social movements to Boston in an open-ended process. We wanted to encourage conversation between people from different social movements and different ways of life to try and share their ideas, experiences and strategies to build new coalitions, develop new ideas and hopefully move forward with more comprehensive responses to the problems we’re facing.

“What we want to do is find a common ground where someone who spent the winter working for (Vermont Governor) Howard Dean in Iowa or New Hampshire can get together with someone who locked out a Lockheed Martin plant or someone who traveled to Iraq to document the bombing. And when you find that common ground, you begin to find ways to move forward together.”

At UMass-Boston there were no delegates waiting on the edges of their seats for four cumbersome days to nominate the man we’ve known for months will run for President. Nor was there the menacing security in and around the Fleet Center that naturally curtails free speech. The Boston Social Forum featured no video monitors, no elevator music, no balloons waiting to fall from the ceiling at the climax of an anti-climactic week.

But it did feature spontaneous, original dialogue and conflicting opinions, and lots of them.

“Buying a lot of ketchup”

There was Peter Miguel Camejo — Ralph Nader’s running mate in 2004 — questioning John Kerry’s soul and the Democratic Party’s ability to survive if American voters began supporting third parties en masse. The controversial third-party candidate was both applauded and lambasted by the packed audience afterwards.

There was Winona LaDuke, Nader’s running mate four years ago who is focusing more on educating people about wind energy this time around. LaDuke called herself a critic of John Kerry and had words of praise for Nader, who “still sends little letters to me on his portable, manual typewriter.” But when asked who she would encourage people to vote for this November, LaDuke joked, “I’m a big Ralph supporter but I’m buying a lot of ketchup (presumably in reference to Teresa Heinz Kerry’s cash cow food product).”

There was former Marine Sergeant Jimmy Massey testifying to a stunned audience about how his platoon mowed down innocent Iraqi civilians amidst very little actual enemy resistance on the march toward Baghdad last year, followed immediately by the always cool and collected Dennis Kucinich — the only superstar Democrat to attend the Forum. The speaking styles of Massey and Kucinich differed like night and day.

There was the Frida Bus, an old Greenpeace school bus that runs on grease or straight vegetable oil. A contingent of activists from Maine drove her down to Boston where her couches served as an inviting space for “open dialogue and community connections,” as Alec Aman put it. The Frida Bus featured a Zine and literature distribution area and a lending library. Aman and his friends will help feed the Convention protestors in Boston this week. “We’re totally inclusive,” Aman said. “We believe everyone has something worthwhile to offer when they visit us here. We think this space appeals to people from all backgrounds.”

Aman added that just voting is not enough. “I think a lot of people become disempowered by voting because they feel that they’ve done their job every 2-4 years. They feel that they are affecting real change, yet we see the same rifts in society, the same fundamental problems, over and over again. Where you need to start addressing our social problems is at the local level, which is why the Boston Social Forum is so empowering.”

Shandra, a volunteer with the local chapter of Food Not Bombs, which is teaming up with the Frida Bus activists this week, took advantage of a blossoming discussion on the state of politics in the United States today and told how many Americans — especially minorities, the poor and those with criminal records — are excluded from this country’s political discussion. “It’s unfair. My friend Tanisha won’t vote in an election because three of her cousins have felonies and they are not allowed to vote.”

The Boston Social Forum wasn’t immune to criticism. Shandra noted that admission to the alternative convention cost $20 for those not part of the media or speaking at the panels — a burden to many African-Americans like herself and anyone struggling to pay the bills and a clear contradiction, given that the Forum was intended as a venue of open dialogue for all.

Still, the Boston Social Forum provided a breath of fresh air before the masses marched into the Fleet Center to the tune of “John Kerry, John Edwards, no questions asked.”

“Get a backbone”

Lauren Haldeman, a 25-year-old delegate from Iowa, felt the great divide within the Democratic Party in the pit of her stomach when she walked past anti-war protestors outside the perimeter of the Fleet Center on Monday afternoon to attend the opening ceremonies of the convention. The graduate student at the University of Iowa poetry program — one of the best in the country — was wearing a pink “Delegate for Peace” scarf around her right arm, and that immediately set her apart from most of her fellow Democrats.

“They asked me why I was going into that building if I supported peace,” Haldeman recalls. “It made me cry, and I felt torn over whether to go inside or join the protestors, because I agree with what they are saying. I said ‘I’m going in there because of Dennis Kucinich.’ I wouldn’t be here if it weren’t for him.”

The young woman was swept off her feet by the congressman from Ohio, an outspoken critic of the U.S. decision to invade Iraq even as most of his fellow Democrats crossed party lines and fell in line with their commander in chief. Haldeman discovered Kucinich on his campaign website and was so moved that she showed up at her precinct on January 19 to support Kucinich. She even plays the accordion for the “Kucinich polka” on his website’s culture corner.

But her faith in the party is not so crystal clear. And what she heard at the DNC did little to change that, as speech after speech and song after sterile pop song have buried the issue most important to many delegates — the decision to support the Bush administration in going to war. A Boston Globe report claimed that a whopping 95 percent of all DNC delegates oppose that decision.

“I think we need to get a backbone,” said Haldeman. “We’re not unified, though we should be unified around the idea of change. And our elected officials need to be courageous enough to question the status quo.”

She added that the decision to vote for a party devoted wholeheartedly to peace vs. unseating the current war-mongering president is a difficult one because she has two brothers of drafting age, and she is worried what will happen to them if Bush is reelected in November.

“First and foremost we need to focus on the giant elephant in the room. Though it’s racking me inside, we need to do as Dennis has done and give Kerry our support, for the sake of party unity.”

Keeping the pressure applied

Jim Hightower, the well-known progressive columnist and author from Texas, agrees, calling the battle ahead a two-folded one. “First we need to get Bush out of office, then we can fight for our progressive values again. But we can’t lay back and make the mistake we did in 1992 after Clinton beat the elder Bush and then ran away with our progressive values, untouched for eight years.”

This time around, with another Bush on the dartboard, Hightower is happy to say he sees profound differences in the Democratic Party. The Dean and Kucinich campaigns, the backlash generated by the current Bush administration’s Draconian foreign policy, but especially the role of the Internet have democratized the process and helped grassroots campaigns bypass those “good ole’ boy blockages,” he says.

On a national tour for his new book “Let’s Stop Beating Around The Bush,” Hightower can’t help but notice that people are organizing grassroots campaigns like he’s never seen before. Still buoyed by the fantastic turnout during global antiwar protests on February 15, 2003 as well as the legacies of Seattle, Cancun and Miami, progressive activists are proving themselves a force to be reckoned with at major political and economic events everywhere.

“Our ultimate goal may not be John Kerry in the White House, but to take back our country. We’ve got to work with the tools we have right now,” Hightower said. “We as progressives need to do the heavy lifting of democracy and apply the pressure, either with websites, blogs (online diaries) or even street action, if necessary.

In Boston the activists were out in gale force, breaking free from the oppressive, barbed-wire bonds of the Free Speech Zone and taking their act to the Boston Common park for the Real, Real Democratic Bazaar on Tuesday. The Black Tea Society activist group set up shop in a well-organized headquarters near Copley Plaza. Critical Mass cyclists biked all over Boston, distracting and confusing police officers.

Though not stated openly, one got the impression that the demonstrations were a prelude to a much bigger event — one that will be protested with even more fervor — the “hats-off-to-George W. Bush and his neo-conservatives” party coming at the end of this month to the Republican National Convention in Manhattan.

Stay tuned for street coverage of the Madness in Manhattan in a future issue of the Glen Arbor Sun. Jacob Wheeler can be reached at jacobrwheeler@gmail.com

Posted by editor at 09:14 PM | Comments (0)

Oomen’s memoir “Pulling Down the Barn” is Ripe in the Land of the Sleeping Bear

By Norm Wheeler
Sun editor

Empire poet, playwright, and teacher Anne-Marie Oomen’s memoir “Pulling Down the Barn” is being released by Wayne State University Press. A frequent contributor of poetry to the pages of the Glen Arbor Sun, Oomen has written several plays based on local history, including “Aral: A Folk Opera” (about a double murder near Otter Creek), “Barta’s Path” (about Barta Peth, resident of South Manitou), “Remembering Ruth,” and “A Stone That Rises” (about the Burfiends, the first settlers of Port Oneida). She has also published several chapbooks of her poetry, including “Seasons of the Sleeping Bear,” and Oomen’s skill as a reader is featured in the video of the same name available at the Visitor’s Center of the Sleeping Bear Dunes National Lakeshore in Empire. Anne-Marie is one of the founding members of the Beach Bards Bonfire held on Friday nights in summer at The Leelanau School beach where she performs many of her own poems, and she is chair of the Creative Writing Department at Interlochen Arts Academy.

Brandon Kelley at Wayne State University Press writes, “Pulling Down the Barn eloquently recalls author Anne-Marie Oomen’s personal journey as she discovers herself an outsider on her family farm located in western Michigan’s Oceana County, in the township of Elbridge — a couple hundred acres in the middle of rural America. Written as a series of heartfelt interlocking narratives, this collection of essays portrays the realities of farm life: haying, picking asparagus and cherries, the machinery of tractors and pickers; but each chapter also touches upon the more ethereal and rarely articulated: the stoic love that permeates a family, the farmer’s struggle with identity, the unspoken patriarchy of land passed onto sons (often at the expense of daughters), and the way land can shape a childhood. With its rich language and style, “Pulling Down the Barn” engrosses the reader in Oomen’s memories — setting beauty and wonder against work and loss — and paints a poignant portrait of growing up in rural Michigan.”

Author Jerry Dennis of Traverse City writes, “The wind sings through the pages of this wonderful memoir of coming of age on an American farm. You can hear the waves on Lake Michigan, feel snowflakes on your face, watch dust motes spiraling in the hayloft. This book is about courage and endurance and the grace to be found in simple moments.”

Pulitzer Prize winning poet Stephen Dunn exclaims, “’You can’t take the farm out of the girl’ is a statement that Anne-Marie Oomen would not only accede to, but has found ways to celebrate in this well-written memoir. She, the writer, has gone beyond her rural roots, but here she pays her loving debts to the people and the natural world that so inform her attractive sensibility.”

And author/teacher/editor Michael Steinberg writes, “Anne Marie Oomen utilizes a poet’s eye to lovingly depict the beauty of the northern Michigan landscape, while at the same time finding a kind of dark splendor in its sometimes harsh and raw climate. A must-read for those who love memoirs about setting and place.”

Anne-Marie Oomen’s memoir “Pulling Down the Barn” will soon be available on the shelves at the Cottage Book Shop, or you can get it straight from the publisher by calling 1-800-WSU-READ, 1-800-(978-7323), or going to their web site, http://wsupress.wayne.edu.

Posted by editor at 08:30 PM | Comments (0)

Religion corner: Never leave God at home

By Rick Leland
Sun contributor

A right turn and it’s two blocks to Lake Michigan. Three bicycle riders, looking ready for the Tour de France, opt to go left. Cruising past a small enclave of shops beckoning tourists to stop and spend, they find their Sunday morning destination — breakfast at Cherry Republic’s outdoor cafe.

Within whiffing distance of the cyclist’s breakfast, other people arrive at their Sunday morning destination. A traditional white steepled church stands out in looks and function among the tourist shops. Inside Pastor Paul Schneider of the Bethlehem Lutheran Church leads the congregation in its first chorus.

The cedar-toned wood sanctuary is filled with joyous voices: “In the morning when I rise give me Jesus. Give me Jesus . . . You can have all this world, give me Jesus.”

Pastor Schneider embraces the church’s shopping mall-ish setting. And spreading out from the church’s immediate surrounds is the majestic beauty of the Sleeping Bear Dunes National Lakeshore.

When he arrived at the church two and a half years ago he set his perspective on the church’s location by challenging the members. “Are you ready to make some changes which are really going to be dramatic in your lives? We have to turn this congregation from an institution into a missionary center.” And then he gave his formula for the conversion: “We need to take on the flavor and character of Christ.”

Pastor Schneider comments on another aspect of his Glen Arbor congregation: “An average of 110 to 130 people on a summer Sunday and then we’ll go as low as 30 during the off-season.” Pastor Schneider tunes into the Apostle Paul’s perspective on headcount. “It doesn’t matter if you’re preaching to many, it doesn’t matter if you’re preaching to a few; it’s the same message.” He grins, “And I’d get just as excited if two were here.”

For the people who do consider making the church a stop during vacation he says he tries to make Bethlehem Lutheran, “A safe haven for visitors to come anytime.” They play a vital role for the church: “If it wasn’t for the visitors, this church probably couldn’t exist.”

Yet he concedes that only a very small percentage of the vacationers and locals attend church. Michigan’s little finger tourist mecca offers many distractions from God. Undaunted, Pastor Schneider grabs a purpose driven outlook: “The mission field here is great—humongous.”

Pastor Schneider knows well the distractions from the things of God.

He has lived through them. But even when his life was misguided, he says, “I loved the Lord; I have to say that there was no question about my faith.”

He grew up in the Lutheran church and attended a Lutheran high school in Detroit. A stellar High school football career propelled him to a full ride scholarship at Western Michigan University.

“I played very successfully at Western,” Schneider says. “And I was even being considered by Dallas for the pro draft.” Bad knees crippled that pursuit, even though he tried to hang onto his it’s-in-your-blood dream for a year and a half playing semi-pro ball. He came to his, “enough is enough” decision as he looked up into the stands and saw his wife and two young children.

Pastor Schneider, who defines himself as a bullheaded goal pursuer, then plowed full tilt into his career as an automotive engineer. He confesses that during his high torque career chase, “I really started to drift from God.”

Eighteen-hour workdays in an atmosphere including the whole realm of what he terms, “Let’s just say . . . some very anti-Christian characteristics. I fell into that trap . . . it consumed me.”

Pastor Schneider then had what he coins his “Damascus road” experience. “I had a nervous breakdown, I had two ulcers, it all happened at one time — basically, I collapsed.” He adds, “I do believe the Lord did slam dunk me and turned my life around.”

He points to friends as the amazing-grace factor in turning his life around, with the simple message: “You need to come back to the Lord.”

Pastor Schneider recalls the initiation of his personal revival. “I just had a high experience with the Lord, seeing others who were praising the Lord in a way that was totally foreign to Lutherans.” The setting was a vibrant charismatic church in Kentucky. He had been coaxed to Kentucky to set up a multi-million dollar engineering project for a company he co-owned. He was invited to the church by a friend who had enlisted him to take on the project.

Over the next few years, Pastor Schneider says, “I had a renewed fervor to seek the Lord more closely.”

A steady progression in his faith journey culminated in the decision to attend seminary and become a pastor. He remembers his reaction the day when he felt the absolute call of God on his life: “I’m scared right now, I’m really scared.”

Upon completion of four years of seminary, Schneider was assigned to a mega-church in Fort Worth to be a church planter. He calls their target market, “White Anglo, Texas people churches.” So he was surprised when a refugee from Sudan came to him and said, “God told me, our people must be here to worship.” Initially Pastor Schneider balked until he came to the conclusion: “God, this is You, isn’t it?”

Refugee ministry developed into one of the major ministries of the church. Besides a church for refugees from Sudan being held at the facilities, separate churches for refugees from Bosnia, India and Sierra Leone were formed. An entire ministry developed to meet the whole range of refugees’ needs.

Pastor Schneider’s next assignment was senior pastor in Franktown, Colorado. He says of the venture, “I knew I was going into a hornets nest but I took it and ended up in a very troublesome ministry.” The church had just experienced a devastating church split—a wounded congregation.

Pastor Schneider was thankful for the tough-skinned personality he had developed in the high-stress automotive engineering field. He endured three years there, moving the church forward in the healing process.

It was a wearing process. He cried out: “I just need a break, Lord.”

God’s answer came via Pastor Schneider’s family connections at Bethlehem Lutheran and He was asked to pastor the congregation.

Glen Arbor, his need-a-break destination is a place of refreshing for many vacationing people. Pastor Schneider has his suggestion: “You should never leave God at home. You need him in your vacation.”

AT A GLANCE:
Pastor Paul Schneider, Bethlehem Lutheran Church, Glen Arbor
Age: 56
Married: To Karen for 37 years
Children: Kenneth- 36, Kevin- 33, Kimberly- 30
Training: Bachelor’s of Science in Mechanical Engineering from Western Michigan University, Master’s of Divinity from Concordia Seminary
Years in Christian Ministry- 8 years
Favorite Bible verse: Romans 8:28

Posted by editor at 08:20 PM | Comments (0)

Moving Beyond the courthouse debate: Smart Growth debate sparking interest

By Jim Lively
(Michigan Land Use Institute — Leelanau Smart Growth Coalition)
Sun Op-Ed Contributor

The Leelanau Smart Growth Coalition is disappointed but not discouraged by last Tuesday’s election. Yes, we lost on an issue we worked very hard to win: Keeping the county seat in Leland. But we, along with many other citizens, sparked a lively civic discussion about the county’s role in land use issues. Voter turnout was extraordinary — the highest, by county percentages, in the state. Citizens here are very interested in Smart Growth.

We believe we lost because most residents did not view moving the seat the same way they view building strip malls or poorly planned subdivisions. Many saw it as an issue of “efficient government” or as a way to finally settle a decades-old debate. But many did actually share our view — a move would unnecessarily harm Leland and some scenic countryside.

And that is exactly why we intend to keep working to promote Smart Growth. The people’s decision, which we respect, motivates us to work harder at our core goals: Education and vigilance.

Education because we must continue to inform people about what our research and the experience of many communities show: Building at the fringes and abandoning the core of a community almost always harms both places. Vigilance because now we must all make sure that the worst does not happen — either in Leland, where business people now face even quieter times nine months of the year, or along M-204 in Suttons Bay Township, where the pressure for more development near the new county offices will be intense. We’ll keep showing up alongside our fellow citizens to make sure local officials respect master plans, enforce zoning ordinances, and consider all options, not just the easy ones.

We believe in Smart Growth: Villages with tree-lined streets, sidewalks, and pedestrian-friendly stores are great places to live; rural areas should stay rural; farms need and deserve help; Leelanau can both grow and remain beautiful.

We see many reasons to remain optimistic. Empire’s New Neighborhood development is adding more people and yet retaining its small-town feel. Michigan State University Extension is working effectively to help local farms stay in business. Northport is contemplating a sewer system that allows more growth at its center. The Leelanau Conservancy is protecting thousands of acres of productive farmland and irreplaceable natural areas. And citizen groups in Elmwood, Empire, Bingham, Leland, and Leelanau townships are getting more involved in local community development discussions.

Powerful movements never travel in a straight line because life and politics are full of change. But we believe people who love Leelanau County are willing to work hard to protect it. And the Leelanau Smart Growth Coalition will work with our members, neighbors, and local leaders so that the next generation of Leelanau residents will thank all of us for saving the beauty and quality of life that brings us to this fine place.

Jim Lively is a certified planner and project director of the Leelanau Smart Growth Coalition, which is a project of the Michigan Land Use Institute. He lives with his family in Empire Township.

Posted by editor at 07:26 PM | Comments (0)

Author Judith Guest Is No ‘Ordinary’ Person

By Joanne Bender
Sun contributor

Judith Guest, author of the bestseller (and movie directed by Robert Redford) “Ordinary People,” has written a new book, “The Tarnished Eye,” and was at the Cottage Book Shop in Glen Arbor on July 2. Bookseller Barbara Siepker arranged for the author’s visit.

Guest met, charmed and talked with close to 100 guests who lined up to have her sign their newly purchased books and to add her signature to one or several of her previous books.

Proving that she has truly arrived as a top-notch author, Ms Guest’s name on her new book is printed in larger letters than the book’s title.

Guest proved to be a warm, chatty, accommodating and unpretentious person, more like native Glen Arborites than the celebrated author that she is. She took the time to converse at length with many of her admiring readers, and also talked with everyone in a group setting explaining background for her fiction.

Living in Detroit at the time (1968) of the Robison killings in Good Hart, Michigan, she was fascinated with this horrendous slaughter of an entire family, which is still unsolved. She was upset, too, with the concurrent rapes and serial killings happening in Ann Arbor.

So, she decided to base her fictitious mystery, ”The Tarnished Eye,” on these two events. Her research was extensive and she depended a great deal on the help of real life Alcona County Sheriff Doug Ellinger in order to incorporate correct police procedure in her story.

Hugh DeWitt is the fictitious sheriff, “a laconic, laidback guy,” and Guest admits to “falling in love with” him and his family, so much even that DeWitt will also be the protagonist in her next novel, already over 150 pages and counting, to be published when finished.

Guest introduces all members of the murdered Norbois family in the novel prior to the slayings so that the readers have some idea of who and what they were prior to their deaths. The Norbois’ were vacationing in “Blessed, Michigan” (like Good Hart in Northern Michigan) before the crime was committed.

Sheriff DeWitt travels back and forth between Blessed and Ann Arbor where his buddy Kevin Watkins, Chief of the Ann Arbor Police Department, and staff are hunting for the serial killer. One of the Norbois sons is a student at the University of Michigan and DeWitt is tracking histories of all members of the Norbois family whose residence was in Ann Arbor.

The rest of the story is a page-turner. In the end, Guest solves her fictitious murders but the reader may be surprised as to “whodunit” as she weaves in “family conflicts and sorrows” prior to her conclusion.

Guest admits a desire to explore the “anatomy of depression” which is not an unusual theme in her novels. She is interested in depression’s journey and just how people suffering from this can effectively re-enter the real world again.

Guest brags wholeheartedly about her family, saluting her husband Larry in “The Tarnished Eve.” Acknowledgments because his “careful reading and inspired suggestions enabled the book to finally come together for me.” She also speaks enthusiastically about their “three fabulous sons and seven fabulous grandchildren.”

To those who knew Edgar Guest, writer and poet, and his son Bud Guest, radio personality and actor in the Detroit area, yes, Judith Guest is related to them. Edgar Guest was her great uncle, her grandfather’s brother.

Did anyone besides WTCM-580 AM radio talk show host Ron Jolly realized that the fictitious “Norbois” is another arrangement of the letters in the name “Robison”? Guest told Jolly during a radio interview that he was the first to realized this connection.

Guest lives in Harrisville, Michigan during the summer months and in Edina, Minnesota the rest of the year. She graduated from the University of Minnesota.

Posted by editor at 07:23 PM | Comments (0)

Olsen house, farmsteads in Port Oneida district, deserve to be preserved

By Susan Pocklington
Sun contributor

“We’ve been driving by this house for 20 years…we love it,” beams one woman who couldn’t be older than 35. A gentleman positions his tripod in front of the orange poppies blooming in the side yard. He grins at me and pauses. “I’ve taken many trips out here and have several photographs of this farm,” he explains with an air of accomplishment as he continues to adjust his camera angle. Laced with sentiment, these are comments I hear often, now that the public is coming through the doors of the restored Charles and Hattie Olsen house on M-22, which opened on July 2. The thrill of finally stepping inside this house that has quietly and stoically sat vacant through too many seasons is obvious.

Somehow this clapboard house with the signature sunburst design at the top has touched people over the years, and they feel a secret kinship with it. It’s “their house” some remark rather proudly. Perhaps its location on a well-traveled road has made it one of the most well known farms in the Port Oneida historic community. Even though the main farmhouse and barn are all that have “survived” of this once-thriving farm that included a house for Grandma and numerous outbuildings, it has retained its charm to passersby.

Standing near the entrance to Port Oneida with mature maple trees flanking each side of the road, the house now welcomes visitors in to tell the story of Port Oneida settlers through displays of historic photos and maps. It boasts of restored oak floors and trim, and original flour and sugar bins in the pantry. Ornate woodwork with glass cabinets dividing the front rooms showcases beautiful craftsmanship.

Yet, in addition to the architecture and restoration that we appreciate, now there seems to be an even greater purpose for this house — to be the voice that pleads to save its neighbors — the Kelderhouse, Burfiend and Basch farms, to name a few; those on North and South Manitou Island, and more distant historic buildings and landscapes south of Empire, all part of Sleeping Bear Dunes National Lakeshore. There is much to be done.

In all, there are 369 historic structures in Sleeping Bear Dunes National Lakeshore that qualify for, or are already listed on the National Register of Historic Places. They tell the story of our pioneer, maritime, logging and tourism past. Of Port Oneida’s 18 farmsteads, historians have called it the only intact agricultural community in the Midwest and perhaps the nation, in public ownership. That’s impressive. The non-profit organization, Preserve Historic Sleeping Bear was organized in 1998 to help Sleeping Bear Dunes National Lakeshore in the massive undertaking to save these historic treasures that are in our backyard.

The restoration of the Olsen house, which was completed with funding from two grants written by Preserve Historic Sleeping Bear, is one example of projects accomplished directly or indirectly through this partnership. PHSB is now the adaptive-use partner for the Olsen house, which includes maintaining the building. Fortunately, other farms have been or may potentially be adopted by other non-profit partners. Under a new management team, the Park is actively doing what it can, and has been successful in competing for funds from National Park resources for several stabilization and restoration projects. Still, they don’t have enough time or money to do it alone.

Looking beyond the freshly painted walls of the Olsen house you will see buildings in need of repair, like the Martin Basch granary whose skeletal east wall leans toward the foundation of a building now gone, or the collapsed porch roof at the Theodore Beck farm on South Manitou. Seven buildings in the Park were either lost or sustained considerable deterioration just this year. Winters are still harsh here, and once they’re gone, they’re gone.

Perhaps the Olsen house never knew how many friends it had. I suspect that each farm is someone’s favorite. But I’ve come to understand that people do care about these places. A few years out of college when I worked at The Leelanau School, I used to ski past Thoreson farm and sigh despairingly over the empty, weatherworn buildings, sad that they could be lost over time. What is it about these farmsteads that evoke such sentiment? We like their beauty. We like their reminders of times past. We like the peace that comes when you walk their meadows. Let us hope that the Olsen house speaks through its new family, Preserve Historic Sleeping Bear, and will draw to it folks with hands ready to repair and pockets willing to give so that these conduits to our past — barns, farmhouses, corn cribs, lighthouses, log cabins, meadows and inns that tell of Great Lakes history — are not lost.

I heard a different comment the other day. There was a knock on the door. “I used to live in this house … I really did,” the woman said, head lowered, and voice quivering. She was a granddaughter of Hattie and Charles, in town from California for her sister’s memorial service. Together we walked through the house and grounds, her eyes brightening as she saw her childhood home restored as a place where the history of Port Oneida and surrounding farms would be told. I think she felt that peace I mentioned, as her face seemed more tranquil when she left. She promised to send pictures too; maybe there’ll be one of Hattie’s garden with the orange poppies. Come visit the Olsen house and let it tell you her stories.

Located on M-22 about 3 miles north of Glen Arbor, the Olsen House is open Tuesday – Saturday from 11-4 and Sunday from 1:30 – 4 through August, with Fall hours yet to be determined. For more information about Preserve Historic Sleeping Bear, call 334-6103. Susan Pocklington is the Administrative Coordinator for Preserve Historic Sleeping Bear.

Posted by editor at 05:29 PM | Comments (0)

Shuffle, Cut, and Deal: The Random Wisdom of the Tarot

By Stephanie Mills
Sun contributor

I can’t remember when, exactly, I first met the cards. Maybe I was in high school, or perhaps just out of college, enjoying some good 70’s in the Bay Area. I didn’t start going steady with them until about 1990, after my divorce. I was back out in San Francisco for a visit, staying with some longtime bio-regionalist friends, Peter Berg and Judy Goldhaft. One night after we’d had a good cheap meal out in the Mission District and Peter and Judy had probably heard enough of my fulminations on marriage gone awry, they offered me a Tarot reading.

I remember sitting in suspense and fascination at the kitchen table, flanked by two consummate storytellers, watching and listening as each of the 10 cards comprising a Celtic Cross spread showed its face and assumed its position and interpretation relative to the others.

I don’t remember much of that reading except that the Star, one of the loveliest of the major trumps, showed up. The Star can mean a coming of clarity, peace and relief after tribulations. It may not be the brightest object in the sky, but the Star shines with its own light.

At that point I became a Tarot junkie. “Seventy-eight Degrees of Wisdom” Tarot scholar Rachel Pollack calls these cards in her two-volume work of that name. Pollack’s books obtained on that trip at Field’s, alas a defunct occult bookstore, were my first guides to Tarot interpretation … the beginning of my studies. Wisdom, coming from a venerable, impartial, and, I will say, pagan source was something I sorely needed.

The use of the Tarot cards is a practice of gaining wisdom through acceptance about both the inner and outer dimensions of this life. The images on the cards are often challenging and sometimes baleful. Along with cards like the Star, which betoken light and shining, there are cards whose appearance in a spread causes me to flinch, wince, and brace myself. With its appropriately ambiguous and abundant portrayal of existential possibilities, the Tarot is a kind of Shrink in a Pack, a good ally in the work of maturity.

The Tarot emerged in western Europe about 500 years ago, not long after playing cards themselves, which are thought to be of Arabic origin, showed up. There are two parts to the Tarot deck, the minor and major arcana, or major trumps. Arcana means secrets, but the secrets of the Tarot are hidden in plain — or second — sight.

The minor arcana corresponds to the familiar playing card deck, with ten “pip” cards and an additional face card, the page, making a powerful little court for a total of 14 cards in each of the four suits, thus the first 56 degrees of wisdom. The Tarot suits — cups, wands, swords and pentacles, correspond with the hearts, clubs, spades and diamonds upon whose presence or absence in a hand has hinged the fate of many a poker player.

The luck of the draw is a large part of the power of a Tarot reading. Consulting the cards is a raid on the random. Once that deck’s been shuffled and cut the requisite nine times, it’s fully mixed and the universe alone decides what to show you.

Last February when Glenn Wolff and I began our project to make a Tarot deck with commentaries on each of the cards, we shuffled one of the classic decks, the Rider Pack, to let it determine the order in which we’d create our variations on the themes of the Tarot. Every week I’d turn up a card and write a letter about it to Glenn, who would then draw the card, in the pen and ink sense. Thus the work progresses.

“Guard the mysteries! Constantly reveal them!” said the late Beat poet Lew Welch.

In future issues of the Glen Arbor Sun, we’ll talk about the history of the Tarot, the symbolism of the suits, the pips and the court cards; we’ll introduce the major arcana and continue the excursion through this venerable pasteboard realm of wisdom.

Stephanie Mills is a journey gal, cartomancer and author whose books include “Epicurean Simplicity” and “In Service of the Wild”. Glenn Wolff is an artist and illustrator whose work appears in books, periodicals and public places too numerous to count.

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