Durango Telegraph e-edition June 4, 2020

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June 4, 2020

Vol. XIX, No. 20 durangotelegraph.com

inside

T H E

O R I G I N A L

I N D I E

W E E K L Y

L I N E

O N

D U R A N G O

&

B E Y O N D

Making contact

The Animas Quill

Lucinda unplugged

State steps up COVID contact-tracing efforts p8

Graduation at a distance, Cheez-Its & sad goodbyes p9

Americana queen sounds off on new album, love & that guy p13

Sure to float your boat.

Issue 13 is out next week!

Wherever you find the Telegraph or at www.gulchmag.com.

To find out about advertising opportunities, email: steve@gulchmag.com

2 n June 4, 2020

telegraph

lineup

8

4 La Vida Local

Stepping it up State increases contact-tracing efforts with help of Americorps members

4 Thumbin’ It

by Sam Brasch, CPR News

5 Word on the Street

9-12

6-7 Soapbox

The Animas Quill

8 State News

Graduating at a distance, counting Cheez-Its and sad goodbyes

9-12 The Quill

13

13 Top Shelf

No apologies

15 Flash in the Pan

Lucinda Williams has a lot to say, on the record and off

by Chris Aaland

16 Murder Ink

15

17 Ask Rachel

Just desserts Who couldn’t use a little strawberry parfait right about now?

by Ari LeVaux

19 Classifieds

16

19 Haiku Movie Review

Losing sleep

On the cover: A cactus seemingly blooms from the rocks recently in Horse Gulch./ Photo by Missy Votel

Think your summer’s bad? You might not after reading these ...

by Jeffrey Mannix

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EDITORIALISTA: Missy Votel (missy@durangotelegraph.com) ADVERTISING AFICIONADO: Lainie Maxson (lainie@durangotelegraph.com) THE GUY WITH THE CAMERA: Stephen Eginoire steve@gulchmag.com

T

he Durango Telegraph publishes every Thursday, come hell, high water, beckoning singletrack or monster powder days. We are wholly owned and operated independently by the Durango Telegraph LLC and

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We’re only human. If, by chance, we defame someone’s good name or that of their family, neighbor, best

friend or dog, we will accept full responsibility in a public flogging in the following week’s issue.

Although “free but not easy,” we can be plied with schwag, booze and flattery.

telegraph

Ear to the ground: “Florida thanks you.”

– Native Floridian expressing gratitude to a Minnesotan that for once it’s not her state in the global hot seat

About face

thepole

RegularOccurrences

Skis, boots, poles … mask? Yep, PPE has now been added to the outdoor gear checklist, at least for the foreseeable future. But some of the big outdoors companies don’t want to send you out there with any old Walmart bandana. Which is why many have shifted gears to add technical – and arguably more stylish – facemasks to their quiver.

Outdoor Research and KEEN are just two of the heavy hitters cranking out face masks for the discerning outdoorsperson. The Seattle-based OR expects to start churning out 200,000 reusable, nonmedical masks a day by early summer.

But Liz Wilson, VP of product at OR, insists it’s not about jumping on the pandemic profiteering bandwagon. “Rather than approach this opportunistically by asking what we had lying around that we could make into masks, we set about making a really great new product,” Wilson told SNEWS outdoors, a trade news site. “What happens when people go back to work, back to gyms?

They’re going to want something that fits really well, that they can exercise in, that they barely realize is there.”

To meet that demand, OR is launching its Essential Face Mask, an adjustable, microbe- and germ-resistant washable mask, which comes with 3 filters and a protective storage pouch. OR was supposed to start selling the $25 masks on its website June 1, but as of this week, they were still out of stock. By fall, the company plans to expand its offering to gloves, balaclavas and face shields designed for high-output aerobic activities. And the packaging will be thoughtfully designed as well: the plastic sleeves will act as reusable sterilizing devices that harnesses UV light to kill viruses and bacteria.

“This isn’t a one-hit wonder for us. People are going to be concerned about safety for at least a year,” Wilson said. “In this, you’re either the ostrich sticking your head in the sand, you go into panic mode, or you adapt. We are adapting.”

As for footwear maker KEEN, it expects to debut washable cloth masks, in seven different colors, on its website starting mid-June. And despite the range of fashionable colors, there is plenty for the tech weenie to geek out on. OR’s masks are treated with the Swiss HeiQ antiviral textile technology. Meanwhile, KEEN’s cotton version is “consciously created” with BCI-certified canvas. The company is also making a “Hyperlite” version ($20 for five) that, like the OR version, is billed as durable, breathable and water-repellant. Both brands come with adjustable ear loops as well.

“We’re not looking to make a huge profit, we’re just looking to make a great product at a fair price,” OR’s wilson said.

No word from Patagonia on its facemasks but we wouldn’t be surprised if a synchilla one is in the works.

June 4, 2020 n

3

opinion

LaVidaLocal A more perfect union?

I thought that my last La Vida was hard to write, but this one might be even more difficult. Last time I wrote about the passing of my friend Dan Escalante, who was killed in an avalanche in Crested Butte. I cried the whole time I was writing it. In some ways, I could say Dan helped me through that; his spirit guided me to find the right words.

There is a singular similarity to my last column and this one: I have only one thing I can write about. And in this moment, it is another death. The death of George Floyd and the subsequent protests following it.

There is an emptiness that I feel while writing this, and not because it’s early afternoon and I haven’t eaten anything besides a smoothie. That’s my normal morning routine. Have a smoothie, get jacked up on caffeine, and do my business for the morning.

I just finally watched the video of the police killing Floyd while he was in their custody. I wasn’t going to watch it, because I knew what happened, and I these days, I find myself getting disturbed by videos like this. But, if I was going to write about it, I figured I should watch it.

I have a police officer in my family – my future brother-in-law – so I cannot simply bash police officers. They have difficult, often

thankless, jobs, and the bad apples seem to define their work in the last few years.

To me this murder by the hands of police officers is a continuation of the oppression of black people that has taken place since the United States was born. We are a country that was created on the foundation of slavery and genocide. And our president seems to represent a last grasp of power based on that foundation.

Protests – both peaceful and violent – are in their seventh day as I write this. One day our country is being told to practice social distancing, and the next, thousands upon thousands of people are gathering in the streets.

Leaders who were preaching social distancing are now telling people to go out and protest. Just when we thought things couldn’t get any worse, this happens.

Angry people want justice. As I write this, only one of the officers has been charged in Floyd’s murder. I am at a complete loss as to why those other officers have not been charged.

I am also at a complete loss for any more words to write about this. For many years now, since I became an educated adult, I’ve felt ashamed of the history of our country but also hopeful that we could become a more perfect union. I am still hopeful, even while we are at another low point in our country’s history. Things are likely to get worse before they get better. Violence only leads to more violence. People want justice. Are we as a people and nation capable of that? Only time will tell.

Thumbin’It The State of Minnesota launching a civil rights probe into the long history of abuse and excessive force against people of color by the Minneapolis Police

All the protestors, including hundreds locally, who turned up to peacefully decry the murder of George Floyd as well as decades of racial injustice

A record number of endangered Mexican wolf pups fostered into wild wolf dens in New Mexico and Arizona in an effort to increase genetic diversity, one of the wolf recovery program’s biggest hurdles

4 n June 4, 2020

– Luke Mehall

Sign of the Downfall: Predictions of a summer coronavirus surge coming to bear, with a recent outbreak at a Durango construction site and fears more cases will surface in coming days and weeks

Reports of journalists, particularly those of color, being targeted by police with tear gas and rubber bullets during the George Floyd protests

More local economic trickle-down from the pandemic, with furloughs and lay-offs of city and Fort Lewis College employees

telegraph

Hey, Zeus!

Jesus was recently arrested in a cemetery for vandalizing a church (that’s the best sentence ever). He probably doesn’t pronounce it that way given that his full name is Jesus Jose Arellano, but either way, he took a huge piece of sandstone (totally biblical) and threw it through a 100-year-old Tiffany stained-glass window in a North Carolinian church. The window was protected by 6 inches of Plexiglass designed to stop such a feat, and the hole even ended up looking like an angel’s wing, which somehow makes it all OK.

WordontheStreet With a young bull moose spotted in north Durango, the Telegraph asked, “What would you name Durango’s newest mascot?”

Q

’ ’ check our website for hours: www.jimmysmusic.supply 1480 E. 2nd Ave. & 15th St. • 970-764-4577 Gina

"Tip, to tip the scales and bring them back to balance. Since we’ve all tipped over."

Kynan

"Peter MooseBridge-toNowhere."

Charlie

"Ann Coulter with a face lift."

Shea

"Kibou, it means hope in Japanese. It’s the perfect name for a rarely seen creature that it must be a sign of hope. "

Zach

“Knuckles.” telegraph

June 4, 2020 n 5

SoapBox

ReTooned/by Shan Wells

Stop USA’s downward slide: vote To the editor, Had the Minneapolis chief of police paid attention to previous egregious behavior by the officer that used deathly force by knee, there would not have been numerous days of coast-to-coast mayhem.

Chaos turned many protesters into looters, which is a national embarrassment. Good cops were taunted and injured by brick-throwers and expected to restrain from arresting them.

Countries abroad have lost respect over the last few years because of how corrupt our government has become. The USA is rated as pathetic and no longer considered a good role model.

Our vote counts more than ever, and hopefully the choices made on ballots will not be rigged by ego-powered, old, bald-headed politicians. We need term limits and can’t last as a democracy with more of the same. A Third World nation will be our new identity unless there is common sense management throughout all levels of state, county and city government.

– Sally Florence, Durango

Lack of safety scares off shoppers To the editor, I tried to patronize several local businesses last weekend, however, the bare minimum of public health precautions, including social distancing and masks, were not being used, so I left. But I still need the things I had hoped to buy, so now I’m trying to figure out how to get them.

Local community members would love to spend their dollars here, just like we always have. But we can’t do that if businesses are so cavalier as to think that their businesses could not be COVID transmission hotspots.

In order to buy things without transmitting COVID, people need employees and customers to wear masks, and businesses need to help customers social distance

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telegraph

with clearly marked in and out doors, clear one-way aisles, and clearly marked que spaces in all lines. Customers also need to be provided hand sanitizer after 4

they touch public pay keypads.

And workers should be protected from customers, including by using plexiglass screens at registers. No worker should be asked to continually risk infection for their job, and no community member should be asked to put employees at risk.

These precautions are respectful, sensible and could have been implemented this winter. Instead, we’ve seen infections continue to spread in our communities, killing some and sickening many. Because businesses have not implemented basic, simple, free and inexpensive sanitary practices, locals are forced to do without or shop outside of the community, often online.

– Rachel Shockley, Durango

I have never known the anger of being part of a group who hasn’t been listened to for hundreds of years. I have never feared being arrested, simply because I was walking, shopping or sitting on a college dorm couch. Or bird watching. I have never been instinctually frightened when I see a police officer walking toward me on the sidewalk.

My privilege of being born white, a privilege over which I had no control, has sheltered me from the reality right in front of me every day, the reality that people of color (POC) have very different struggles in life than I do.

I have always said I understood, and I have always said I am not a racist. But, admittedly, I hadn’t joined others during that peaceful protest Thursday night, and I don’t always try to see issues from the POC point of view.

I read two books this year that opened my eyes: The New Jim Crow: Mass Incarceration in the Age of Colorblindness, by Michelle Alexander, and White Fragility: Why it’s so Hard for White People to Talk About Racism, by Robin Diangelo.

These are not the typical books a white woman who lives in rural Colorado reads, I suspect, but I wanted to learn. From the Jim Crow book, I learned about the history of black America, and how our justice system and the war on drugs have targeted poor people of color. The White Fragility book taught me about me. Every person who believes they are not racist, and who isn’t afraid to hear the answer, should read it.

As a white person, I need to publicly acknowledge the injustice. Innocent black citizens are killed regularly; we can barely keep up with remembering their names. People of color are routinely stopped, questioned and arrested, and they do not have the power to stop it. White people hold the majority, and we end up making and enforcing the laws that hurt our fellow black citizens. We have the power to stop it.

I am channeling my grief to be more proactive. I am asking my fellow representatives of color how bills affect their communities, and I am working with them to create solutions, not assuming I know what they need. I will continue

A story of two Americas To the editor, My column this week was going to review the work we were doing at the Capitol as we rejoined other legislators after so many weeks of working at home. But, instead, it is about my heart.

I am grieving.

My apartment in Denver is just blocks from the Capitol, so while convenient, it is very close to the action happening there this week. We knew a protest demanding justice for George Floyd of Minneapolis was happening, but we didn’t understand until late Thursday that the peacefulness would be disrupted with riots, vandalism and violence.

We tabled our work finalizing the state’s budget on Friday and Saturday in order to provide space to let the protesters have their voices heard.

At home, I could hear helicopters buzzing all night, yells from the streets below and could smell tear gas when I opened my window. I listened to my fellow representatives tell stories and cry, and it struck me how differently I see this tragedy as a white person. A person of privilege.

to show leadership by defending their rights to be heard and correcting the false claims made against them.

While I condemn all acts of violence and vandalism that occurred this weekend, let’s remember the words of Martin Luther King Jr.: “a riot is the language of the unheard.” Let’s listen.

– Rep. Barbara McLachlan, D-Durango

Labeling starts, learning stops To the editor, Last week’s “La Vida Local” opinion piece “Us and Them” seemed intent on building walls between us rather than curiosity as to why people might think differently. If we immediately put people into categories such as “conspiracy theorist” or “redneck,” assumptions rule and communication and learning ends. I know so-called rednecks that would risk their life to save a stranger. I know intelligent caring people who would not allow their children to be vaccinated.

World changes are happening fast. We all make decisions based on incomplete and often slanted news, even at the highest levels. We desperately need communication, not finger pointing.

– Louise Teal, Durango

“We’ll print damned-near anything” The Telegraph prides itself on a liberal letters policy. We offer this forum to the public to settle differences, air opinions & undertake healthy discourse. We have only three requests: limit letters to 750 words, letters must be signed by the writer; and thank-you lists and libelous, personal attacks are unwelcome. Send your insights by Tuesday at noon to: PO Box 332, Durango, 81302 or e-mail your profundities to: telegraph@durangotelegraph.com. Let the games begin ...

You You deserve deser choice. e. eserv ve a choic

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These events are approved by San Juan Basin Public Health and La Plata County’s Clerk & Recorder.

More information at e lectjackturner rner..com and minklerforcommissioner.com Paid by the Charly Minkler and Jack Turner Campaign Committees.

telegraph

June 4, 2020 n 7

StateNews

Making contact State enlists Americorps members from Durango, Denver to help with tracing

by Sam Brasch Colorado Public Radio News

COVID testing on the go: Mercy opens free, drive-thru site

A

fter struggling to hire contact tracers to slow the spread of the novel coronavirus, Colorado is getting some major help from Americorps and Senior Corps.

At a press conference Tuesday, Gov. Jared Polis said 800 members of both programs, which are overseen by the Corporation for National and Community Service, would join the state’s efforts to monitor the disease.

Not all of the corps members will start right away. The governor said 300 Americorps members, from Denver and Durango’s VISTA program, are set to work immediately. The timeline for when all of the new recruits will be on the job is not yet clear, but the state is already taking applications.

Many epidemiologists agree that contact tracing will be essential as the state reopens. As more people interact, it’s the tracers who will interview anyone with a positive test to figure out who else may have been exposed to the virus. Those people are then asked to get tested themselves and quarantine if necessary.

Public health experts have reduced the process to a mantra: test, trace and isolate.

“It’s hard to underscore how important this is,” Polis said. “With hundreds of contact tracers working in the state, we will have a much better response to the virus and we will be able to address outbreaks more quickly, which will reduce infections, save lives and allow us to be open with our interactions.”

The announcement came as Colorado had fallen far behind other state’s efforts to expand contact tracing. Massachusetts recruited 1,000 contact tracers in April.

Ohio, New York, Washington and Oregon quickly followed with their own efforts to

A customer awaits her coffee at Trident Booksellers in Boulder on May 18. As the state begins to cautiously reopen businesses, it has beefed up its contact-tracing efforts, with the help of Americorps members from Denver and Durango./ Photo

by Hart Van Denburg/CPR News build contact-tracing armies.

Just after California announced a plan to train 20,000 tracers in late April, Polis lauded Colorado’s public health department for doubling its contact tracing staff from 31 to 56. Local public health departments have also built up their own contact-tracing systems since the start of the pandemic. In total, state epidemiologist Rachel Herlihy estimated about 300 contact tracers were at work across the state in mid-May. Those numbers are far short of what experts say is needed to actually impact the spread of the virus. One report from the National Association of County and City Health Officials estimated a state should have 30 tracers per 100,000 people during

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a pandemic, which would translate to about 1,740 tracers in Colorado.

The announcement puts Colorado within striking distance of that target.

Polis said the 300 initial tracers would come from Americorps’ Southwest Region Campus in Aurora. Another 350 would come through the VISTA summer associates program in Denver and Durango, which Americorps operates to offer short, intensive terms of public service. An additional 100 to 200 Senior Corps volunteers would join in Denver.

Polis said anyone interested in joining the effort could see details at the state’s website.

For more news from Colorado Public Radio, visit www.cpr.org. n

Free drive-thru COVID testing has come to Durango. Mercy Regional Medical Center announced this week it will be offering the service to symptomatic and asymptomatic members of the public at its main campus. The site, located in the parking lot on the east side of Mercy Hospice House, will be open from 8 a.m. - 3 p.m. Monday - Thursday and 8 a.m. - noon Saturday.

The testing site is being done in conjunction with San Juan Basin Health Department. “Diagnostic testing is the cornerstone of controlling the spread of COVID-19 and a key factor in keeping communities safe and healthy,” SJBPH Executive Director Liane Jollon said. “We acknowledge the work of community members to take precautions to prevent the spread of COVID-19 and encourage them to continue to do so by taking advantage of this testing opportunity.”

Testing previously had taken place at Mercy’s Horse Gulch campus in town.

The new test site provides adequate space for traffic and is able to accommodate drive-thru testing where individuals remain in their vehicles.

The free testing is open to anyone – no appointment or physician order are needed. Results will be available 24 - 48 hours except after weekends, in which case individuals will be notified the next business day.

Cedar Diagnostics also provides COVID diagnostic testing as well as COVID antibody tests.

For more information on the Mercy testing site, call (970) 385-9850.

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telegraph

thesecondsection

Lucinda Williams plays a living room set for KSUT’s Virtual Pagosa Folk ’N Bluegrass this Friday night.

Lucinda unplugged Queen of hard-hitting Americana on new album, finding love and that guy in the White House

by Chris Aaland

D

on’t question the compassion of Lucinda Williams. Ever since her mid-teens, she spoke truth to power. She was booted out of high school in the late ’60s for refusing to recite the Pledge of Allegiance during home room. A child of the South, she embraced the sounds coming out of the Mississippi Delta and New Orleans as much as she did British Invasion bands like the Beatles, Rolling Stones and Cream.

Williams, the three-time Grammy-winning Americana singer/songwriter, will perform an intimate set from her living room as part of KSUT’s Virtual Pagosa Folk ‘N Bluegrass Festival at 7 p.m. Friday night. Tim O’Brien and his partner, Jan Fabricius, follow at 8. The concerts will be broadcast over the airwaves as well as Facebook Live. The event is free, but a virtual tip jar will allow listeners to support the local NPR affiliate and artists, who have lost a summer’s worth of touring revenue. (Full disclosure: I’m the virtual emcee of the event, meaning I might even have to wear a sport coat and – shudder the thought – pants.)

Williams just released the 14th album of her career,

JusttheFacts What: KSUT Virtual Pagosa Folk ’N Bluegrass with Lucinda Williams and Tim O’Brien When: Fri., June 5, 7-9 p.m.

Where: Facebook Live and ksut.org For info.: www.ksut.org “Good Souls Better Angels,” on April 26. It’s her first overtly political record, although tunes like “Blessed” and “Soldier’s Song” pointed to a shift in her songwriting a decade ago.

“It’s right in your face,” she said of “Good Souls” in a phone call Tuesday afternoon. “It’s not going to please everybody, that’s for sure.”

Williams was spending the first few weeks of quarantine at her new Nashville home with her husband and manager, Tom Overby. A few weeks after moving in, their house was damaged by a tornado that ripped through Nashville, knocking down her backyard fence, wrecking her back porch and damaging the roof. Then, a week or two later, the COVID-19 pandemic meant sheltering at home – less than a month before the

telegraph

scheduled release of her record.

The extended break from touring allowed Williams to do more interviews than normal, since spring and summer concerts were being cancelled. And it gave her time to gauge fan reaction to “Good Souls” on social media.

“One of the things that happened was an article in the New York Times a couple of weeks ago,” she said.

Times columnist Frank Bruni’s piece, “Has Anyone Found Trump’s Soul? Anyone?” was in the same vein as Williams’ new single, “Man Without a Soul.”

“I saw that and it was like, wow, has he heard the song? What a coincidence. We thought it would be cool to post a link to the article on my fan page along with a link to the song. Sure enough, here come the comments.

“The majority of the feedback has been overly positive. I like to think the majority of my fans are of like mind,” she said.

But not everyone shared those sentiments. “One guy said, ‘I thought Lucinda Williams was a compassionate person, but this isn’t compassionate. She shouldn’t be writing a song like this.’ That one really got to me because it attacked my character. I’m one of the most4

June 4, 2020 n 13

LucindaWilliams from p. 12

compassionate people you’ll ever meet in life. I’m probably overly compassionate. I wrote these songs because I care.”

With titles like “Pray the Devil Back to Hell,” “Down Past the Bottom” and the follow-up single, “You Can’t Rule Me,” there’s no doubt who is Williams’ muse. “There’s been so much upheaval since the country was settled, really,” she said of America. “It’s reached a crescendo now with the guy who is in the White House. I really don’t even like to say his name.”

Angry words call for an edgy band, and Williams’ touring outfit, Buick 6, brings a gritty, greasy and raucous noise.

The trio of guitarist Stuart Mathis, drummer Butch Norton and bassist Davis Sutton has backed Williams for more than a decade, providing an energy similar to what Crazy Horse did for Neil Young.

She has no concern that the group will be able to arrange the new material for a tour once large gatherings are allowed again. “I don’t think any of us really worry about that because we’ve been together so long and we’re so connected. We tracked those songs in about 14 days.

We’d go in for a few days, leave and go out on the road, then come back in. No frills. Lay it down. This album was different in a lot of ways.”

Williams is notorious for being a perfectionist. Careerdefining masterpieces like “Car Wheels on a Gravel Road” and “Sweet Old World” took years to record, mix and master, often being re-recorded with different producers and musicians until they met her satisfaction. That meant having hired guns like Bob Dylan’s axe-man, Charlie Sexton, try out one slide after another to get the right sound on his resonator guitar.

But “Good Souls” was an urgent album and recorded quickly and passionately. “We’re all really looking forward to getting back together and getting out there,” she said of a future tour. “I can’t wait to get out and do this stuff live. It’s very empowering.”

14 n June 4, 2020

The road has certainly been long and winding for Williams, who dropped out of college after one semester to pursue a career as a songwriter in New Orleans. The daughter of a poet, Miller Williams (who spoke at Bill Clinton’s inauguration), she learned from the noted beat poets and authors of the time who dropped by her father’s house and assessed her lyrics and songwriting.

Williams recorded a pair of records in 1979 and ’80 – the collection of traditional covers called “Ramblin’” and its follow-up, “Happy Woman Blues,” which contained her originals. Trouble was, producers and record labels often disagreed with her direction and polished the finished product by adding instrumentation without her consent. They’re certainly fine records, “Happy Woman Blues” in particular, but just not quite what she envisioned.

For the better part of the next decade, Williams searched for a label to record her third album. It became an eight-year experiment that saw rejections by both major labels and indie imprints – she was too country for Bleecker Street and too folksy for Music Row. Finally, the English punk label, Rough Trade, took a chance on her. Critics gushed at the end result, which contained songs like “Passionate Kisses,” “Crescent City” and “Big Red Sun Blues,” which became standards for artists like Mary Chapin Carpenter, Emmylou Harris and Mollie O’Brien, respectively.

It also cemented Williams’ reputation as a hopeless romantic. “I’m an artist first and foremost, so I’m writing from the deepest parts of myself,” she said. “I get it on paper and then the next phase is to get it to the people and have it translate to everybody … and hope they get something out of it. That’s what art is. It’s self-expression.”

Unrequited love songs became Williams’ specialty.

telegraph

“Those kinds of songs for me are easier to write. And that’s mainly what I’ve been writing about. But it’s all about meme-me,” she lamented. Once she found true love in Overby, whom she married onstage after a show in 2009, she really couldn’t write much more about love and loss.

“When I met my husband, who is my soulmate, I realized I’ve really got to branch out,” she said. “It was a real turning point. It was like a big dose of reality. I’m with someone now. I’m in a committed relationship. I’m going to be with this person for the rest of my life.

“It’s harder to write a really good topical song,” she said, preferring to call them topical instead of protest songs. “The topical songs that I grew up listening to were so good – like the songs Bob Dylan wrote. ‘Masters of War.’ ‘A Hard Rain’s A-Gonna Fall.’ Then later, Neil Young’s ‘Rockin’ in the Free World,’ which is one of the all-time best. My band and I do that song a lot of times at the end of the night and everybody has their fist in the air.

“I just find them harder to write,” she said. “I had to build up to it.”

I asked if the backlash from conservative listeners is harder on female artists like the Dixie Chicks, Rosanne Cash or Mary Gauthier than it is on men like Dylan, Willie Nelson, Steve Earle or Jason Isbell, who are often heralded for their outlaw views.

“Women are supposed to be docile and shut up and sing,” she said, although she quickly pointed out male artists like Jesse Dayton, a Texas Gulf Coast native and outspoken redneck lefty who just so happens to be one of my own favorite guitarists and songwriters. Dayton has seen plenty of scolding on social media for his politics.

“People don’t want to hear the truth. They want everything to be sugarcoated,” she said. “I’ve always loved getting into the heat of an argument. It’s healthy. n

FlashinthePan

The parfait solution

by Ari LeVaux

S

trawberry shortcake will never change.

Why should it? The perfectly balanced trifecta of strawberries, cream and cake make it hard to improve upon but next to impossible to screw up. I should know. It’s the first cake I mastered. It’s also the official cake of my birthday season, and a sharp, creamy, highlight of summer.

My first strawberry shortcake recipe employed a Sara Lee All Butter Pound Cake. I sliced the rectangular loaf in half along a horizontal plane into top and bottom layers, plastered them with vanilla whipped cream and strawberry slices, and stacked them into a two-layer cake. It was a great starter recipe for a 9-year-old boy. The hardest part was waiting for the frozen Sara Lee to thaw.

Like a fine gazpacho, my memory of that recipe has improved with age, even though I haven’t made or eaten a Sara Lee pound cake in four decades. So as part of my 50th birthday festivities, I staged a Strawberry Shortcake showdown: Sara Lee vs. what I’ve learned since.

Given the delicate architecture of strawberry shortcake, any adjustments must be subtle. Every addition must be in support of the existing three pillars: strawberries, cream and cake. Thus, I take a redundancy based approach, only adding similar flavors.

Redundancy is a quality that can be annoying in some contexts, like say, a Powerpoint presentation. But in the kitchen, it’s a powerful tool, and I use redundant ingredients in almost all my recipes, sweet and savory. Think of it as background singers framing the lead vocals.

My friend Sue adds yogurt to her whipped cream, which is redundant in terms of both tartness and creaminess. Years back she used yogurt instead of whipped cream, a borderline violation for which her kids would eventually bust her. “As the kids got older and wiser, they began demanding whipped cream, so now we use 50/50 full fat yogurt and whipped cream,” she says.

Sue is as no-nonsense as a heart attack. When she enters the kitchen to make lunch, everything better be in its place. Dessert after lunch is part of the daily bargain on the farm when you have a crew of child laborers, and if dessert is strawberry shortcake that day, she mixes the cake batter while the oven preheats and gets it in before starting to fix lunch. No butter or eggs and hardly any sugar, her cake is a far cry from Sara Lee’s, but the kids never corrected her on that one, Sue says. And it takes less time to bake than a Sara

Lee does to thaw. “You don’t even have to crack an egg.”

The other redundancies to my recipe include lemon, which adds a little sweetness, a lot of tang and an aroma that dances gingerly with vanilla. I could have added the lemon to the pound cake but decided to put it in the already sweet and tangy strawberry sauce and put little chunks of tart rhubarb, rolled in sugar, into the cake. I also replaced the milk in Sue’s cake recipe with buttermilk, for yet another shade of acid.

The Sara Lee version looked sharp. The smooth, golden pound cake was juxtaposed against the stately whipped cream, stiffer without yogurt, keeping everything perfectly in place. Eating it was nostalgic, transporting me instantly across the decades. But with a life of experience behind me, the Sara Lee was, alas, Plain Jane. It was stiff, and the flavors stayed separate when they should have mixed.

My relatively slovenly looking homemade version, with buttermilk rhubarb cake and lemon strawberry sauce, came together like a strawberry shortcake should.

The flavors contrasted one another brilliantly, and the textures created a place of divine creamy sogginess that you could fall into forever, if only your belly could handle it. And while the cake took on moisture, it didn’t wilt under the creamy berry infusion. It held its shape, and even retained a measure of dry crumbliness.

The kids agreed and were particularly impressed with the whipped cream and yogurt combo. At first they mis-

took it for store-bought whipped cream and sprinted to the fridge in search of the can.

Since my new formulation is messier and harder to contain than the original Sara Lee, I served it as parfait, in glasses. Parfait happens to mean “perfect” in French, and strawberry shortcake parfait turns out to be the perfect way to combine the three pillars of shortcake, with every component mixing perfectly in each bite. It’s the parfait solution, if you’ll excuse my French, and a reminder that with a little redundancy, you can teach an old recipe new tricks.

Buttermilk Rhubarb Cake Serves 4-8 2 cups flour ½ tsp. crème of tartar 4 tsp. baking powder 2 Tbls. sugar ½ tsp. salt 1⅓ cups buttermilk ½ cup oil (I use a mild, fruity olive oil) 2 tsp. vanilla extract or equivalent 2 more Tbls. sugar (redundancy is my friend) 1-2 sticks rhubarb, peeled, sliced into 1/4–inch thick discs (about ⅓ cup) Combine and mix dry ingredients except the second bit of sugar. Mix buttermilk and oil and, before they separate, immediately add them to the dry ingredients. Toss the rhubarb slices in the second sugar and add it to the mix, and stir it all together. Add to a 9-x-5-inch loaf pan. Bake at 375, checking periodically, for about 45minutes or until a knife comes out clean.

Whipped Cream 1 pint heavy cream ¼ cup full fat yogurt 1 tsp. vanilla extract 1 Tbls. sugar Whip the cream. Add the vanilla, sugar and yogurt and gently stir.

Strawberries 1 pound fresh strawberries, sliced 3 Tbls. sugar (more to taste) Juice of one lemon (about 4 Tbls.)

Add the sugar and lemon juice to a small sauce pan and stir to dissolve the sugar. Add the strawberries and turn the heat to medium, stirring steadily once it starts simmering. Cook for about 10 minutes, or until the strawberries fully soften.

Assembling the parfait: When the cake has cooled, cut it into one-inch cubes. Add layers to your parfait cup in this order: cream, cubes of cake, sauce, until the cups are full. n

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June 4, 2020 n 15

MurderInk

Summer a bummer?

Two books to lift your spirits – or at least make you feel better about your life

by Jeffrey Mannix

D

uring these times of chaos, disintegration and foreboding, you may be able to avoid the ennui by immersing yourself in solitary frivolities, booze or drugs, or ignorance. But as your trust in the flashing reset button fades while watching cities burn and people die, and fixers seek shelter below ground and behind ranks of polymer-encased space cadets with vicious dogs and ominous weapons, you may need more support.

I can’t help you make sense of it all – perhaps there’s no understanding to be had. But before it all bursts into flames or everyone exercises their right to die instead of being told how to survive, I have two appropriate books written by talented Scandinavian novelists. They won’t cheer you up, but they will focus your anxiety on deeper, existential doom that may devolve current events as simply life-ending instead of a more fatal erosion of the soul.

The torchbearer of this duo is Dutch writer Bram Dehouck with his undulating Sleepless Summer, a clinically perfect development of mania from annoyance published by the exclusive World Editions and translated insightfully by Jonathan Reeder.

Sleepless Summer is the creation of imag-

inative fiction from a competent Flemish writer seemingly uninfluenced by standard American theatrical aspirations. Dehouck is writing literature with weight that can be measured in carats: literary standing, peer recognition and a reading experience that is visceral to write and read. Sleepless Summer is a humble and appreciated softcover of 175 pages at a price below the cost of unsheltering with a friend on bad wine in big glasses. And it will, I promise, upgrade present chaos to a level of theater.

Belgium’s first wind farm was inaugurated on the outskirts of the small town of Blaashoek. Ten wind turbines were being erected along the Blaashoek Canal, and this is where the trouble begins and why it ends so wretchedly for local butcher Herman Bracke.

Herman and his wife, Claire, were conspicuously prominent in Blaashoek primarily for Herman’s famous pâté. Herman was hardworking, professionally grouchy in the way of master craftsmen and honest to a fault – his eponymously named pâté carries a reputation region wide, and Claire drives a swanky Audi. They take vacations in Spain, and the hamlet of Blaashoek would be bereft for the want of Brake’s Blaashoek Pâté.

After the installation of the closest wind turbine, Herman becomes more and more agitated hearing the humming of the turbine blades that soon escalates to the sound of a constantly idling truck.

He’s jarred awake sweaty most nights and goes to the shop downstairs to check if there’s something wrong with his refrigeration. Herman becomes sleep deprived, then forgetful from being so disquieted by the noise and palpable fear that one of the giant blades will break off and whirl through his shop.

Herman Brake’s life becomes chaotic with annoyances: His teenage son Wesley declares he’s now a vegan; Walter the postman spreads news of Herman’s instability; the pharmacist, Ivan Camerlynck, is peeping on the young farm girl Siskia Maes, who moved into number 27 above his clinic; Bienvenue, an African asylum seeker, is having a lurid affair with the veterinarian’s wife Catherine. Meanwhile, the blades spin round and round. Herman forgets to cover his leftover pâté one night, and in two days, everyone in town is horribly sick. Herman sees his life’s work ruined with the arrival of a provincial health inspector.

Dram Dehouck has written a gem of a book, in the rigorous form of Scandinavian noir fiction. Sleepless Summer of course doesn’t end triumphantly, as you might have guessed. But, by comparison,

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it will make June 2020 feel like the vacation you’ve known you always needed, and you’ll lend and recommend this book.

The Summer of Kim Novak, releasing in the US this week, is another extraordinary tale of intrigue from Sweden’s preeminent crime writer Håkan Nesser. The book is a first-person account by 14-yearold Erik Wassman of a summer at the lake with schoolmate Edmund Wester and chaperoned by Erik’s older brother Henry.

Henry is taking the summer off from beat reporting for the hometown paper to write a novel. He pays little attention to much else except Ms. Ewa Kaludis, the spitting image of Kim Novak to the young, horny, bored teens, and the fiancee of star handball legend Berra Albertsson.

It turns into an adventurous summer for Erik, Edmund and Henry. Nesser’s writing is alive with summer heat and the buzzing of cicadas, the whiff of perfume unexplained, and the storm clouds of trouble growing darker as the days and buggy nights fade into one another and somebody is killed.

Again, The Summer of Kim Novak is a considerate 224 pages paperbound, and the cost of lunch in town you haven’t been having.

Remind Maria’s Bookshop of your 15 percent Murder Ink discount, and now we’re down to the price of lunch with a glass of bad wine in a big glass for two books that will improve your mood by comparison.n

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AskRachel 5G, what to expect when you’re expecting & pineapple pizza Interesting fact: My favorite conspiracy theory is that the coronavirus communicates via 5G. If that were true (which I hate to say it’s not) then coronavirus would probably order pizza delivery with extra pineapple, just to tick you off.

Dear Rachel, I love all these conspiracy theories about 5G. Seriously, 5G apparently causes everything from riots to Trump to AIDS. My personal favorite is that 5G causes chemtrails. But what is 5G, exactly? All I know is my phone doesn’t have it, so I’m safe (or so they tell me). Can you explain it to me, and why 4G and 3G aren’t the culprits for everything wrong in the world?

– 5G in the Brain Dear Five Thousand, I just realized that both K and G mean a thousand.

Mind: blown. I also want 5G to have a completely useless mnemonic device. Something like, Good Girls Give Generous … Giggles? Anyway, all 5G means is that it’s the fifth-generation cell phone technology. We had original cell phones, then Cell Phones: TNG, then dot dot dot, 5G. The frequency is apparently higher for 5G, and I thought conspiracy folks were all about raising our vibration? Go figure.

– Don’t trust the gubmint, Rachel Dear Rachel, My sister-in-law is pregnant and expecting this fall. Of course I’m excited. I see her online asking friends for hand-me-down maternity

StufftoDo

clothes. Which is all good. I’m all for reusing and reducing waste and all that. But the thing is, my brother is also posting about all his new woodworking tools. Spoiler: he’s not a woodworker, and they’re not hand-me-down tools. I feel mad at him, and I need someone to tell me I’m OK being mad at him.

– The No-Tool Man Dear Not Tim Taylor, Hell yeah you should be mad at him! Pregnancy is the time where a decent man would spend money not on his own blatantly selfish desires, but on his covertly selfish desires. Upgrade the house and pretend it’s for the baby.

New grill without cancer-causing buildup. New TV without cancer-causing ionizing radiation overflow. New soundproofing in the master bedroom. New reading material in the bathroom. And maybe even a fresh paint job in the nursery.

– Goo goo gah gah, Rachel Email Rachel at telegraph@durangotelegraph.com Dear Rachel, Man, who puts pineapple on pizza? This is not a new complaint, I’m well aware. But it’s something I tried to tolerate for years and now I can’t because it’s just disgusting. The texture doesn’t belong on pizza. The flavor doesn’t belong on pizza. I guess the color’s OK, because it’s yellow and so is cheese. But this should seriously be outlawed to make the world a better place!

Will you join me in solidarity?

– Pine-Nope-ll

Dear Spongebob, You’re living in a pineapple of your own creation.

Who cares what other people eat on their pizza? It doesn’t affect you in any way. Period. This false-martyrdom is the 5G that actually infects our society. Who someone marries or screws or makes butterfly kisses with affects you zero. Which deity someone worships affects you zero. Which City Market someone shops at should matter to you zero. Don’t like pineapple on your pizza?

Don’t come to my house, and don’t you dare judge my pie.

(no, for reals!)

Friday05 Virtual Pagosa Folk N’ Bluegrass with Lucinda Williams and Tim O’Brien, 7 – 9 p.m., June 5, presented by KSUT. Streamed on Facebook Live, tune-in to KSUT on the radio or on your smart speaker at www.ksut.org.

Pine River Library is offering curbside checkouts Monday-Friday, 2-6 p.m., and Saturday, 10 a.m.- 2 p.m. For info, call 970-884-2222 or visit www.prlibrary.org/curbside-checkout-program/

Upcoming:

Larry Carver & The Rando Zone, with Larry Carver and Randy Crumbaugh, 7 – 10 p.m., Derailed Pour House.

Navajo Nation Supply Drive, 3 – 6 p.m., June 13, Unitarian Universalist Fellowship, 419 San Juan Drive for most needed items. For more information go to durangouu.org and click on “upcoming events.”

Saturday06

Rocky Mountain UkeFest Online Ukulele Jam, 6:30 – 8 p.m., June 15. For info. or Zoom link email: denise.leslie@gmail.com or call 970-903-6417.

Durango Farmers Market, Saturdays, 8 a.m. – 12 noon, in TBK Parking Lot, across from the Transit Center. Facemasks required. www.durangofarmersmarket.com.

Drive-thru petition signing for independent La Plata County Commissioner candidates Jack Turner (District 2) and Charly Minkler (District 3), 8 a.m. – 10:30 a.m., Lewis True Value Mercantile, Bayfield, and noon – 4 p.m., Durango High School

Josh Hoyer & Soul Colossal perform soul, funk and R&B for Virtual Concerts @ the Park, 5:30, Thurs., June 18. Livestream at www.durangoconcerts.com.

3rd annual Veterans Picnic & Raft Trip, free picnic and raft trips to honor veterans & their families, Sun., June 28, 11 a.m. – 3 p.m., Santa Rita Park. For info., go to www.DurangoRafting.com or email info@DurangoRafting.com

Wednesday10 “Sleep: What You Need to Know,” 6 p.m., a Zoom talk led by Dennis Aronson, retired senior instructional designer and Peace Corps alumnus. For info., call 970-563-9287 or go to ignaciolibrary.org.

Durango Public Library’s Summer Reading Program for kids, teens and adults begins and runs through Aug. 1. Register online at DurangoGov.org/library or call 970-3753380.

Ongoing Meditation and Dharma Talk, Mondays, 5:30- 7 p.m. online at www.durangodharma center.org/

telegraph

Deadline for “Stuff to Do” submissions is Monday at noon.

To submit an item, email: calendar@durango telegraph.com

June 4, 2020 n 17

FreeWillAstrology

by Rob Brezsny ARIES (March 21-April 19): Aries poet Paul Verlaine wrote “Autumn Song” in 1866. It became a well-known French poem, and eventually played a role in a historical turning point. In June 1944, a top-secret British spy organization used the poem as a code to communicate crucial information to the French Resistance, via BBC radio, about the allies’ upcoming D-Day invasion of Normandy. In the spirit of poetry being used to accomplish practical actions, I’m now sending out a burst of code to you, Aries. It’s adapted from another poem by Verlaine: “Delight in good-omened fortune, baptized by the bristling scents of mint, thyme, and clover on the wind of dawn.” Regard this as a signal for you to acquire a necessary resource, strengthen connections with key allies, and intensify your current quest.

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A river runs through it Gorgeously rustic 5-bed, 2-bath 10 miles east of Durango in the Florida River Valley Listen to the sound of the river from the large back yard Large covered patio, attached garage

$350,000 MLS #768658

18 n June 4, 2020

TAURUS (April 20-May 20): Taurus philosopher Bertrand Russell observed, “The best life is the one in which the creative impulses play the largest part and the possessive impulses the smallest.” That is always an important principle for everyone to embrace, in my opinion.

But it will be an especially essential truth for you in the coming weeks. Your creative powers will thrive, even soar and generate blessings, to the degree that you downplay and outwit your possessive inclinations.

GEMINI (May 21-June 20): “It’s OK to live a life others don’t understand,” author Jenna Woginrich writes. That’s a healthy attitude for an eccentric person like her, who taught herself by trial and error how to run a small farm with a meager budget while all alone in the middle of nowhere. But does her advice apply to everyone? I say yes, it does.

All of us have quirky behaviors and idiosyncratic ideas and odd feelings that other people find hard to understand, let alone appreciate. I bring this to your attention, Gemini, because the coming weeks will be a time when it’s best for you to emancipate yourself as much as possible from the need to be perfectly understood as you express your raw, pure, unique self.

CANCER (June 21-July 22): I’m one of the lucky people who has never been addicted to alcohol or drugs. What’s the source of my great fortune?

Two kinds of grace are key: I suffered no abuse or trauma when I was growing up, and my genetic make-up doesn’t predispose me to self-medicate. But I am a bit addicted to other things, like fearful fantasies, sexual feelings and the urge to win arguments. I’m blessed in some ways, cursed in others – just like all of us! In honor of our season of introspection, my fellow Cancerian, I invite you to do what I just did: Count your blessings and curses. Doing so will bring you just the right kind of healing.

LEO (July 23-Aug. 22): “Jacquemus Mini Le Chiquito” is the name of a tiny purse you can buy for $522. It fits into the palm of your hand, and won’t hold much – maybe a single-use strand of dental floss, a shoe from a Barbie doll, a snippet of a loved one’s hair, an aspirin, maybe a few crumbs from a potato chip. In any case, I don’t recommend it for you. You should be surrounding yourself with symbols of capaciousness and roominess. You need influences that inspire you to be a spacious container. It’s time for you to welcome and receive an abundance of blessings, inquiries and invitations.

VIRGO (Aug. 23-Sept. 22): “Worry is a way to pretend that you have knowledge or control over what you don’t,” author Rebecca Solnit writes. “And it surprises me, even in myself, how much we prefer ugly scenarios to the pure unknown.” Your assignment in the coming weeks is to thoroughly incorporate Solnit’s wisdom – and then wield it with tender ferocity as you reshape your relationship with the future.

See if you can manage, if only for 10 days, to fight off and dissolve the reflex to worry. Here’s a tip: Any time the agitated fantasy of an ugly scenario rises up in your imagination, remind yourself that it’s not objectively true and immediately replace it with a fantasy of a desirable scenario.

LIBRA (Sept. 23-Oct. 22): Nobel Prize-winning Libran author William Faulkner was asked by a cousin if he was drunk when he dreamed up the imaginative stories and characters in his novels. The truth was that on occasion Faulkner did indeed consume alcohol in excessive amounts. However, he rarely indulged while actually writing.

His creative ideas mostly came from his fertile imagination, not an unhinged spirit. In the coming weeks, I hope you will be like Faulkner during the inventive phases he enjoyed while sober and disciplined and driven by focused intention.

The astrological omens suggest that’s the best recipe for generating original ideas and productive visions.

SCORPIO (Oct. 23-Nov. 21): “What use is this howling tenderness?” eighth-century Tamil mystic poet Andal wrote. My research on Google reveals that no one has answered her question until now. I decided you would benefit from hearing my response, since you are in a chapter of your life story when howling tenderness could work to your benefit. So here’s my counsel: Howling tenderness is useful because it has the power to shatter mysterious barriers that have been at least partially obstructing you from exploring the frontiers of sacred intimacy.

telegraph

SAGITTARIUS (Nov. 22Dec. 21): Buddhist teacher Jack Kornfield articulates the spiritual medicine I think you should seek in the coming weeks. You especially need it, and by happy coincidence, it’s likely to be available. Kornfield writes: “When we have for so long been judged by everyone we meet, just to look into the eyes of another who does not judge us can be extraordinarily healing.” I urge you to identify the people who can perform this service for you, then ask them point-blank to perform this service, even if it has to happen over FaceTime or via Zoom. To generate the good karma that will ensure this happens in just the right way, offer to perform the same service for others.

CAPRICORN (Dec. 22-Jan. 19): “The changes we dread most may contain our salvation,” author Barbara Kingsolver writes. Although I mostly agree with her conclusion, I’ll also suggest that we could come up with less melodramatic versions of it. For example, we might say, “The adjustments we’re resisting may actually be healthy.” Or “The uncomfortable transitions we’re avoiding might ultimately lead to a better version of comfort.” Or “The revelations we’re attempting to ignore and deny could eventually be the source of relief and release.”

Do any of these work for you right now, Capricorn? I bet at least one does.

AQUARIUS (Jan. 20-Feb. 18): Some people seem to think of sacredness as being pristine & pious – an immaculate & orderly transcendence of earthly concerns. Author & minister Marilyn Sewell has a different perspective. “Who can order the Holy?” she asks. “It is like a rain forest, dripping, lush, fecund, wild. We enter its abundance at our peril, for here we are called to the wholeness for which we long, but which requires all we are and can hope to be.” I recommend Sewell’s version of holiness to you in the coming weeks, Aquarius. You’re primed to upgrade and deepen your sacred lust for life.

PISCES (Feb. 19-March 20): When Europeans arrived in the New World, the Iroquois Confederacy in what’s now northeastern North American had been practicing participatory democracy for 350 years. The visionary principles of these native people ultimately influenced the formation of the United States and its Constitution.

Now would be a good time for you to be inspired by these facts. How? You could draw teachings from the past and use them to create your future. You could study the perspectives of indigenous people and incorporate their wisdom into the way you live your life. You could tune in to and explore the traditions of people you respect and adopt them for your own use.

classifieds

Deadline for Telegraph classified ads is Tuesday at noon. Ads are a bargain at 10 cents a character with a $5 minimum. Even better, ads can now be placed online: durangotelegraph.com.

Prepayment is required via cash, credit card or check.

(Sorry, no refunds.)

Ads can be submitted via: n classifieds@durango telegraph.com n 970-259-0133 n 679 E. 2nd Ave., #E2 Approximate office hours: Mon: 9ish - 5ish Tues: 9ish - 5ish Wed: 9ish - 3ish Thurs: Out on delivery Fri: Probably skiing or riding, please call ahead, 259-0133.

Announcements

Tap Room Manager+ Seeking responsible person to manage tap room. You will hire, train and schedule staff, oversee operations, ensure sanitation and safety, serve customers, and work with kitchen manager to deliver a high-quality experience to customers. You need to be honest and dependable, with knowledge of POS system operation (Clover ++). Verifiable experience and positive references required. Send resume and salary history to 3000 Main Ave, Durango CO 81301. No phone calls please.

Tutor wanted Looking for bright, articulate, fun loving tutor for 7 year old boy and 10 year old girl Both children are gifted and well-behaved.

Would prefer teacher ed. major. Send resume and letter of interest to: mevelync@mail.com. Job will continue through summer and next school year.

Himalayan Kitchen 992 Main Ave., 970-259-0956, www.himkitchen.com. Bringing you a taste of Nepal, Tibet & India. The dinner menu offers a variety of tempting choices, including yak, lamb, chicken, beef & seafood; extensive veggies; freshly baked bread. Full bar. Get your lunch punch card – 10th lunch free. Hours: 11 a.m. - 9 p.m. Tues. Sun., closed Mon. The Perfect Gift for your favorite dirtbag. Literature from Durango’s own Benighted Publications. The Desert, The Climbing Zine, The Great American Dirtbags, American Climber, Climbing Out of Bed and Graduating From College Me are available at: Maria’s Bookshop, Pine Needle Mountaineering, the Sky Store, or on the interweb at www.climbingzine.com.

HelpWanted Cellarman / Assistant Brewer Seeking brewery laborer/helper. Work with our Head Brewer to assist in making beer, cleaning tanks and kegs, packaging, beer transfer, and other duties related to day to day operations. Must be physically fit with the ability to read and comprehend Safety Data Sheets. Please send a resume and or letter of interest w/ work history to 3000 Main Ave, Durango, CO 81301. No phone calls please.

Wanted Cash for Vehicles, Copper, Alum, Etc. at RJ Metal Recycle. Also free appliance and other metal drop off. 970-259-3494.

Harmony Organizing and Cleaning Services Home and office 970-403-6192

HaikuMovieReview ‘My Entire High School Sinking into the Sea’ An animated exploration of teens in tragedy that drowns – Lainie Maxson

Marketing Small and Local Businesses Media, social media, website content, SEO, etc. for businesses. Email jnderge@ gmail.com

ForRent Bright & Beautiful Office Space available inside natural health care office. Perfect for body worker or therapist.

Private entrance with shared waiting area & bathroom. Free: pkg, wifi & util. $550/mo.

Call 970.749.2815

ForSale Reruns Home Furnishings New arrivals: Garden items and trellises.

Cute 1950’s record cabinet, end tables, lamps, Midcentury-style bar stools and so much more. 572 E. 6th Ave. Open Mon.Sat. 385-7336.

RealEstate Radon Services Free radon testing and consultation. Call Colorado Radon Abatement and Detection for details. 970-946-1618.

CommunityService Food Drive June 6 Help La Plata County residents in need.

Food can be dropped off June 6 from 8 a.m.

- 12:30 p.m. on Mill Street in Bayfield. Sponsored by Marsha Porter-Norton, candidate for La Plata County Commissioner (District 2.) For info, email: marshaporternorton@gmail.com.

NewspaperOrigami

Services Writer’s Coaching Have you got a story to tell? Fiction, non-fiction, memoirs and scripts. Accepting new virtual clients. All ages welcome. Call published writer’s coach Michael Thunder 769-1022 for details and an intake interview.

Custom Made Garden Gates Hand crafted in Durango Call 970-3980418 for a free consultation appointment.

Need a Medical Marijuana Card?

Durango’s Family Health Care, a total family medical care office, is now offering medical marijuana cards to those that qualify. Walk-in OK, no appointment needed. $100 fee. We are at 29423 HWY 160. More info at Durangofhc.com Lowest Prices on Storage!

Inside/outside storage near Durango and Bayfield. 10-x-20, $130. Outside spots: $65, with discounts available. RJ Mini Storage.

970-259-3494

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A heart June 4, 2020 n 19

20 n June 4, 2020

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