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Darwin Oordt doordt@harrisburgmagazine.com

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Darcy Oordt darcy@harrisburgmagazine.com

GENERAL MANAGER / DIRECTOR OF SALES Chris Aloia caloia@harrisburgmagazine.com

DIRECTOR OF DIGITAL MARKETING

Jennifer George jgeorge@harrisburgmagazine.com

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Jo Ann Shover jshover@harrisburgmagazine.com

MANAGING EDITOR Randy Gross rgross@harrisburgmagazine.com

ARTS & ENTERTAINMENT EDITOR

Christina Heintzelman cheintzelman@harrisburgmagazine.com

GRAPHIC DESIGNER

Shane Carino scarino@harrisburgmagazine.com

DISTRIBUTION MANAGER Richard Eppinger reppinger@harrisburgmagazine.com

CONTRIBUTING WRITERS

Nathaniel Gadsden

Ed Robinson Bill Roddey

CONTRIBUTING ILLUSTRATORS

Brad Maurer

Kyle McHenry

CONTRIBUTING PHOTOGRAPHERS Will Masters Paul Vasiliades

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“It is not enough that yearly, down this hill, April Comes like an idiot, babbling and strewing flowers.”

-Edna St. Vincent Millay

It’s always good to move swiftly past April 1st, stepping gingerly over the sprouting flowers while evading all the idiots who may plot to make you look foolish. So, it’s definitely a plus that the majority of you won’t be reading these words until it’s well after April Fool’s Day.

Appropriately, we begin things this month with an excerpt from Edna St. Vincent Millay’s “Spring.” It is National Poetry Month, after all, so we are excited to present a special profile of someone who needs no introduction within the local writing community:

Rick Kearns (pictured above), the longest-serving Poet Laurate of Harrisburg, whose home – or more specifically, The Kitchen – has been an improvisational Friday night hot spot for music, poetry (and more) for more than three decades. As a bonus, our featured poet for April, Rev. Dr. Nathaniel Gadsden, also needs no introduction, for he is both a former Harrisburg Poet Laureate, and has been mentoring young writers in his Writers Wordshop since 1977.

April also delivers another annual “rite”: the start of voting for our next “Simply the Best” campaign! Starting April 15th, you can view the many nominees at our website (www.harrisburgmagazine.com) and then vote for all your favorites! Good luck to everyone!

Winter took it easy on Central PA, so let’s hope that April showers will bring a bumper crop of flowers, fruits, and vegetables for local gardeners. In an informative piece by Christina Heintzelman, the Master Gardeners at Penn State provide some helpful garden-planning tips.

For those who recently awakened from a long hibernation – and have the bedhead to prove it! – Christina’s Artful Inspirations invites you to “Walk With

Scissors.” Or, actually, learn what it takes to be the person who trims and shapes all those bedheads at Walk With Scissors, A Nathan Walk Cosmetology Academy in Middletown.

If music puts some “spring in your step,” then don’t miss our profile of Linda Tedford, founder, artistic director, and conductor of Susquehanna Chorale, a forty-voice choir that has performed throughout the east coast plus Great Britain, Switzerland, Austria, Germany, and Ireland (and, next month, at various venues in the greater Harrisburg area).

In this month’s Food & Fun Section, start your morning with our Compliments to the Chef profile of Nadia De La Cruz, who cooks up honest food from scratch at Your Kitchen restaurant in Enola.

In need of a few laughs? Our short story this month, by Ed Robinson, paints a picture of one man’s love-hate relationship with … well, painting; Brad Maurer’s The Cercus cartoon takes a bug’s eye view of climate change; and published poet & playwright Bill Roddey continues to jab and poke at modern conventions with more Off the Cuff one-liners.

Don’t forget our columns! Film & TV historian Kevyn Knox lists films to look forward to in 2023 in Cinematic Ramblings; Andrea Reed details how to stress less by eating better in Nourishing Bites; Kristen Zellner celebrates National Dog Appreciation Month by appreciating her own dogs in For the Love of Pets; Michelle Haring’s By the Book highlights the wealth of appearances by bestselling authors at local book stores and libraries; Bryson Roof provides tips on planning an inheritance in an inflationary environment in The Finance Hound; Barbara Trainin Blank previews spring musicals (and more) in Theatre Thoughts; and HACC’s Robert Stakem points out the dangers of texting while driving in Tailboard Talk.

Be sure to suffer no fools this month!

The Cercus reserves all reproduction rights, including the right to claim statutory copyright, in the above published Work . The Work may not be photographed, sketched, painted, or reproduced in any manner whatsoever without the express, written consent of The Cercus