Psychiatrists aren't crazy about living in Wyoming

They story had me at the first line:

In many parts of Wyoming, it’s impossible to get mental health care.

Darn near impossible in rural areas. Nigh near impossible in settled areas. Close to possible in cities such as Cheyenne and Casper. 

Federal granting agencies consider Wyoming a pioneer state. The entire state, all 98,000 square miles. That means wise heads inside the beltway look out and see a square state filled with yokels in need. That's good news when it comes to getting grants. It's also bad news too, since state-based governmental entities or non-profit orgs or faith-based communities need to fill out the paperwork (or apply online). They often don't. The need is there but the people-power can be lacking. Who will write the grants? And who will manage the grants?

And who will clients turn to when they need a therapist?

The turnover rate for psychiatry in the state, and other providers, is very, very high.

That's PJ Treide being interviewed by Willow Belden on Wyoming Public Radio. PJ is with Health Link Now, a company that provides telepsych services in Wyoming. It lets patients connect with doctors who live elsewhere, using video conferencing.

Treide says Wyoming needs telepsych because it’s next to impossible to convince skilled psychiatrists to live here.

I'm not a psychiatrist, although I sometimes play one on TV. Health Link Now is providing psychiatrists for online sessions. The psychiatrist can be in Brazil, such as the one interviewed by Belden, and the patient can be in Bairoil, which is in Wyoming in case you didn't know.

Thing is, there are psychiatrists in Wyoming that are doing telepsych sessions. My shrink has a video screen the size of his entire wall. When he's not dealing with my psyche, he's delving into the psyches of clients in rural areas or even Rawlins, which has driven more than one doc back to his/her urban roots to get a decent cup of coffee and attend an occasional performance of Aida. This is a rural-urban issue. A recent story in Colorado's 5280 Magazine said that 80 percent of all of the state's mental health providers live in Denver and Colorado Springs. Hugo and Simla share the other 20 percent with La Junta and Craig and all the other less-teeming burgs.

If there's ever been a state made for telepsych, it's Wyoming. It's happening now. But few insurance carriers are on board, insisting that patients actually see someone in-person before they fork over the dough they've been deducting from your paycheck for several decades. I could see myself holding sessions via telepsych. There have been times in my bouts with depression that I've needed a real person in the room. "You gotta help me, doc. I see everything twice!" But not now, not when I'm cruising along on a pretty mellow mixture of psychoactive meds. "I'm OK, doc. I see everything once."

Read more about telepsych here.

Advice to gardeners: avoid mixing lettuce planting and geopolitics

Wyomingites know that spring is several different seasons in one. One day (Friday) can be 60 degrees with the scent of real or imagined wildflowers in the air. The next day (Saturday) can be 20-something with grey skies and sideways-blowing snow. The next morning (Sunday) can bring a car encased in ice and snow that takes ten minutes to scrape off and even longer to warm up for a very short trip to the Loaf 'n' Jug to get a newspaper.

Just a typical spring weekend in the Cowboy State. It will be warmer this afternoon but windy, of course.

Moisture is a good thing in this land of little rain. But it can be a dangerous time for calving and planting and driving. Snow-wise, we're not out of the woods until Memorial Day, which also is the magic date for planting your summer garden. I always cheat the calendar by a couple weeks. Most of us high-altitude gardeners have discovered methods to lengthen the growing season. Our friends just bought a house in east Cheyenne that came with a small greenhouse equipped with seeding beds, tools and a heater. It's what we all need. Greenhouses should be as ubiquitous as two-car garages.

While it's stressful to be a Wyoming gardener, we have many resources at our disposal. We have lots of trained master gardeners. Cheyenne has its wonderful Botanic Gardens, which will be under construction during the next year. A big new building is being added along with resources for us challenged gardeners.

And we all have stories to tell. "Summer of 2012 -- that one was a bummer, with back to back hailstorms following a spring drought. But last summer -- I had a bumper crop of tomatoes. You never know."

Now I know what farmers talk about at donut shops in Worland and Torrington. That and Obama the socialist.

I do not sprout my own seeds. I tried but have always had better luck when I buy seedlings from local purveyors and at the annual Master Gardeners Plant Sale and Kaffeeklatsch, usually held on a snowy/rainy/foggy Saturday in mid-May.  I also buy seedlings from local growers such as the woman on Snyder with the Xeriscaped front yard and backyard filled with greenhouses (can't remember her name off the top of my head). You can find others at the Master Gardeners sale and farmers' markets. I think that the Grant Farms store will still be in business on Lincolnway. The Wellington, Colo.-based Grant Farms declared bankruptcy last year but was purchased by another Colorado farmer -- so who knows? And, if you're not a localist and dig bargains, Lowes and Menards and King Soopers are stick seedlings at bargain prices. I buy my seeds in different places. It's best to buy seeds that can withstand the dry, cool climate. But green beans seem to be green beans and grow well here. Same with snow peas and lettuce and spinach. I use seeds for all of my leafy veggies. I haven't found any that won't grow here. I haven't had any luck with head lettuce, so I've quit trying. Besides, head lettuce is passe. The more exotic the leafy varieties you can grow the better it is for your hipster image (if you have one).

Hipster gardener: "I'm growing Crimson Crimean variety this year in solidarity with the Crimean farmers who don't want to be Russian."

Me: "I heard that they all want to be Russian. I'm growing the Ukrainian Yellow variety in solidarity with all the Ukrainians who survived Stalin and didn't ally with Hitler and are angry with Putin."

HG: "Good luck with that."

It's not easy mixing gardening and geopolitical tensions.

Best advice: Eat your leafy greens. It's all good when it comes from your own garden.

Habitat for Humanity holds "Thankful Thursday" fund-raiser

From those good folks at Habitat for Humanity of Laramie County:

Thankful Thursday

at the Redwood Lounge
2105 East Lincolnway
(East of the American Legion)

March 27
4:30 to 7:30 pm

Proceeds from this fundraiser
will go towards building our
2014 Habitat for Humanity home for the Holder family!

There will be a spirited live auction of an amazing array of gift baskets, 50/50 raffles and card games!

Come hungry. For a $5 donation, enjoy lasagna, breadsticks, Caesar salad, & dessert.

See you there!

   

Stop the cosmos, Wyoming wants to get off

March Madness.

A month that saw the return of "Cosmos" also brought us a maddeningly unscientific move by the State of Wyoming.

On March 14, the Casper Star-Trib explored the effects as Wyoming (through a footnote in a bill passed by the Republican-dominated legislature) became the first state to block national science standards:

One of lawmakers' big concerns with the Next Generation Science Standards is an expectation that students will understand humans have significantly altered the Earth's biosphere. In other words, the standards say global warming is real.

That's a problem for some Wyoming lawmakers.

"[The standards] handle global warming as settled science," said Rep. Matt Teeters, a Republican from Lingle who was one of the footnote's authors. "There's all kind of social implications involved in that that I don't think would be good for Wyoming."

Teeters said teaching global warming as fact would wreck Wyoming's economy, as the state is the nation's largest energy exporter, and cause other unwanted political ramifications.

Micheli, the state board of education chairman, agreed.
"I don't accept, personally, that [climate change] is a fact," Micheli said. "[The standards are] very prejudiced in my opinion against fossil-fuel development."

We staties realize that a chunk of our salaries comes from taxes on coal that is burned in rickety old power plants that produces greenhouse gases that are warming the planet. Many of us also have children or grandchildren who attend science classes in Wyoming public schools where teachers should be teaching science and not some hare-brained wingnut theorem based on how many Tea Party votes there are in Lingle. I also know that Wyoming doesn't exist in a vacuum, that every wacko move by our legislature has a way of zooming around the Internet for everyone to read. Thinking about moving your family to Wyoming? Interested in having your kids learn that coal is the breakfast of champions or that our ancestors rode around the prairie on dinosaurs? We have just the education system for you. And good luck getting into that tier-one university.

The above Casper Star-Trib article went viral this week, with coverage by the Washington Post and Education Week, among many mainstream news outlets, as well as progressive blogs such as Daily Kos and Think Progress.

One might speculate that pols such as Teeters and Evanston's Micheli (also a Repub) are purposefully going out of their way to portray Wyomingites as a bunch of bumpkins just so people won't flock here when floods, caused by nonexistent global warming, inundate the coasts. That attitude is in stark contrast to our governor's efforts to attract tech-savvy companies to Wyoming. For two years, I've heard him at the Wyoming Broadband Summit push for more tech companies to locate in Wyoming. I've also heard him lobby for increased connectivity, from Cheyenne to Jackson, from Lingle to Evanston. We all want greater connectivity. The danger, of course, if that communiques from Wingnuttia reach the wide wide world much quicker.

Wyoming Unites for Marriage launches campaign

The tall guy in the middle is yours truly. I'm flanked by Robin Van Ausdall, director of the Wyoming Democratic Party, and Rodger McDaniel, fellow prog-blogger and pastor of Highlands Presbyterian Church. We joined 100 or so others at the Wyoming State Capitol on Monday for the launch of the Wyoming Unites for Marriage campaign. Four Wyoming LGBT couples, joined by Wyoming Equality, filed a lawsuit earlier this month in an effort to help the state live up to its "Equality State" motto. Sign the Wyoming Unites pledge here.

Florida and Wyoming duke it out as retirement destinations

Headline in today's Casper Star-Tribune: Forget Florida, Wyoming is number one for retirees

It's funny for a lot of different reasons.Wyoming is not the first state that comes to mind when retirement is mentioned. Florida and Arizona are obvious codger destinations. Florida is warm most of the time and it is filled with nifty little retirement communities where you commute in golf carts and play golf all of the live-long day. Ditto Arizona, although it's a dry heat and it doesn't have as many bugs.

But Wyoming? A recent study ranked Wyoming high on the list of job opportunities for retirees, with its 4 percent unemployment rate. It also ranked high on economic security and the lack of state income tax. Weather was not ranked, nor was the scenery.

Fact is, retirement ain't what it used to be. When I was growing up in Florida in the '60s and '70s, the place was lousy with old people. They migrated south from Massachusetts and Michigan to warm their old bones and play shuffleboard out in the January sun. They clogged the roads, their little old grey heads popping up from behind their big Caddy or Lincoln steering wheels. You often got behind them in grocery store checkout lines as they counted out their pennies, nickels and dimes to make exact change. Here you were, young and in a hurry to be somewhere, while someone your grandma's age was counting out change and asking the clerk if she wanted to see photos of her grandchildren.

Now retirees my age are cruising the great rivers of Europe, climbing Macchu Picchu and surfing Costa Rica's bitchin' waves. It's enough to make you veg out on a recliner watching Charlie's Angels reruns. But your friends will make fun of you. What are you, some kind of 21-year-old slacker sitting in front of a screen all day? Get out and do something!

Wyoming offers 98,000 square miles of outdoors. The summers are so nice that I feel guilty when I'm indoors. You can ski or snowboard in winter if your 60-something knees are better than mine. Snowmobiling is a better alternative, as long as you don't get stuck in a snowbank or -- God forbid -- an avalanche. The sun shines on winter days, more often than not, but the wind blows a mean streak. More than one spindly senior citizen has been blown to Nebraska in near-hurricane-force March winds. I have much too much meat on my bones to go airborne during a chinook.

There's another factor at work for retirement destinations. If they have kids, retirees want to be close to them and their grandkids or other family members. Our son lives in Tucson and his sister is thinking about joining him there. My wife Chris and I grew up in Florida and all of our surviving siblings and their kids live there. We have good reasons for living in FL or AZ. Most of our friends are on the CO-WY Front Range. And there is so much to do in Colorado. Chris and I plan to be busy with the arts and volunteering and travel.

So which destination is it? AZ, CO, FL or WY?

Note to Laramie County Dems: Beware The Ides of March

My first Democratic Party county convention was 2004 -- a decade ago. I showed up as a Dennis Kucinich delegate primed for bear dove. I had had enough of senseless Bush/Cheney wars and wanted to end them. Kucinich was the peace candidate. Kerry was the candidate of destiny. At that county convention, held in the basement of the American Legion hall, I ended up as a Kucinich delegate to the state convention in May in Sheridan. There were a few of us peaceniks on hand, but we were trounced by the Kerry people. If Kerry had shown the same grit as his delegates showed at the convention, he might have beaten George Bush. But he wimped out. And we ended up with four more years of wars and giveaways to the rich and Dick Cheney's scary face.

What does a Dem delegate accomplish in an off-year election? A lot, if you're planning on running for the legislature. There's also a U.S. Senate election. That was going to be a circus when Liz Cheney entered the race last year against Mike Enzi. But Cheney dropped out and now Enzi is probably a shoo-in.

What about the Governor's race? Matt Mead is an incumbent so he probably will win, even with a lackluster record. The Dems, to date, do not have a gubernatorial candidate. We have some good people waiting in the wings, but everyone knows that Wyoming re-elects its Govs, be they D or R, because, well, it's more convenient that way.

This is my fourth Governor since moving to WYO and I have yet to see an incumbent lose. So the county convention is Saturday, March 15, at the Plains Hotel in downtown Cheyenne. Registration is from 8:30-10 a.m. Wonder what would happen if I breezed in and registered as a Kucinich delegate.

Me: "I'm a Kucinich delegate"
Registrar: "What's a Kucinich?"
Me: "He's the peace candidate for president."
Registrar: "It's not a presidential election year."
Me: "Isn't this 2004?"
Registrar: "It may seem like it -- this is Wyoming, after all -- but no, it's 2014." Me: "Then what am I doing here?"
Registrar: "You tell me."

I could be there to hear the Rev. Rodger McDaniel, who's the designated speaker for the day. He's always exciting and controversial. I could be there to visit with my Democratic friends. They are a great bunch, funny and argumentative. I could be there because I'm a registered Democrat and we keep showing up at these things because hope springs. Come join us. At the most recent Dem meeting I attended, there were new people there, some of whom used to be Republicans. I like that. I didn't used to be a Republican, although almost everyone is my family is a Republican and I briefly contemplated voting for Reagan in 1984.

See you Saturday.

And beware The Ides of March.

Irish or not?

What does it mean to be Irish in America?

That's topic enough for a book or two.

I'm Irish enough. My maternal grandfather left County Roscommon for the coal mines of England and then to to the U.S., Denver by way of New York and  Chicago. My paternal grandfather's grandfather was a Potato Famine escapee whose original name was O'Shea. My aunt, Patricia Lee Shay, tracked the immigration of our ancestors from Ireland to upstate New York to Iowa over the course of 20 years. Somewhere along the line, the family changed its surname to Shay. Our guess was that Shay is less Irish than O'Shea. Yet it's tough to hide your Irishness -- brogue, red hair, Catholicism, big family and all that.

My maternal grandmother was Agnes McDermott from what's now a suburb of Cincinnati. She motored West with some gal pals and her sister and discovered the wonders of the Rocky Mountains. When she and her sister returned home, they packed up and moved to Denver. A few years later, she met my grandfather at a Hibernian Club shindig, married, had kids and so on. As a baby, I lived in their Washington Park house with my parents. I don't remember much of that time, although it's undoubtedly locked away in my subconscious, waiting to be explored.

My paternal grandmother is the only non-Irish in the bunch. Her forebears come from England and have the surname of Green, settlers of Baltimore. Her mother was a Lee from Virginia, which makes me one of the millions of Southerners who claim they are related to Robert E. Lee, Light Horse Harry Lee and the rest of that warlike clan. I've never checked out the connection as the story itself is fun to relate and I'd hate to spoil it.

So I'm three-quarters Irish and a quarter English. Two sides at war with one another for five centuries. You could say that makes for divided loyalties but the Irish always wins out. My mother was raised on Irish stories from my grandfather's South Denver chums. Mischievous fairies and wailing banshees. Irish stories always seem to be a mixture of magic and terror, much like Irish history and Roman Catholicism. We loved it when our mother read to us but really were waiting for her banshee bedtime stories, which were more thrilling than soothing.

That's my Irish lineage. I've never been to Ireland, which seems an oversight. I've thought about going more than once but never carried through on the thought. I don't really care about looking up my Irish roots. God knows that Ireland must benefit from all of the Irish-Americans flocking in to explore their roots, looking up Great Uncle Sean and Great Aunt Molly. I'm more interested in the literature of Ireland. I'd love to be in Dublin for Bloomsday on June 16. As is the case with many English majors, I almost finished James Joyce's "Ulysses" several times. But I know the "day in the life of" story and have read enough of Joyce's penetrable works ("Dubliners," "Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man") to find the event fascinating.

Maybe next year.

I think that my need for storytelling can be traced to my Irish roots. Other cultures value stories but the Irish are almost pathological about it. Irish writers seem a cantankerous bunch. Joyce with his stream of consciousness and banned books. Sean O'Casey with his troublesome plays and Oscar Wilde with his witty plays and troublesome lifestyle. W.B. Yeats is misinterpreted as often as he is explained. Roddy Doyle has an exciting time telling stories of modern Ireland and re-examining its uprising and civil war. I don't even know most contemporary Irish writers. I hear that there's a revival in Gaelic writers. And then there are all of the U.S. and Canadian and Aussie writers with Irish roots.

It's good to be Irish. Even on St. Patrick's Day.

It may take Courage v. Wyoming to get our state to live up to its "Equality State" brand

Here at hummingbirdminds, we spell "clout" with a lower-case "c." But we want to throw our support to the lawsuit filed this week to force Wyoming to acknowledge gay marriage. The lawsuit couldn't have a better title -- Courage v. Wyoming. That's Courage as in Cora Courage, one of the plaintiffs from Evanston. She happens to be a major in the Army Reserve, an Iraq and Afghanistan veteran, clinical director at the Wyoming State Hospital and a lesbian. Since 2009, she's been married to Wyoma "Nonie" Proffit, a part-time librarian and sheepherder. The other couples in the lawsuit deserve to be named because they represent courage too: Carl Oleson and Rob Johnston, Casper; Anne Guzzo and Bonnie Robinson, Laramie; and Ivan Williams and Chuck Killion, Cheyenne.

Carl Oleson and Rob Johnston of Casper, Anne Guzzo and Bonnie Robinson of Laramie, and Ivan Williams and Chuck Killion of Cheyenne. - See more at: http://wyofile.com/wyofile-2/sex-couples-wyoming-equality-file-marriage-lawsuit/#sthash.r6BLdx6u.EEGaMMQz.dpuf

Carl Oleson and Rob Johnston of Casper, Anne Guzzo and Bonnie Robinson of Laramie, and Ivan Williams and Chuck Killion of Cheyenne. - See more at: http://wyofile.com/wyofile-2/sex-couples-wyoming-equality-file-marriage-lawsuit/#sthash.r6BLdx6u.EEGaMMQz.dpuf

Cora Courage and Wyoma “Nonie” Proffit of Evanston, Carl Oleson and Rob Johnston of Casper, Anne Guzzo and Bonnie Robinson of Laramie, and Ivan Williams and Chuck Killion of Cheyenne. - See more at: http://wyofile.com/wyofile-2/sex-couples-wyoming-equality-file-marriage-lawsuit/#sthash.r6BLdx6u.pv4Q1niY.dpuf

Wyoming Equality is also part of the lawsuit.

It's no surprise that this case arises at the tail end of the most recent legislative session. Marriage equality bills haven't fared well in the Legislature. Last year, the first marriage equality bill (this one on domestic partnerships) to ever make it out of committee was defeated in the House while gathering a surprising number of Republican votes. The debate, broadcast on radio, was very instructive. I wrote about it here.

This year, a bill sponsored by Rep. Cathy Connolly (D-Laramie) to include same-sex couples in the state’s definition of marriage failed to get enough votes to be introduced.

Clearly, it's time to turn to the courts. The courts have been ruling against discrimination of late, so it seems to be the right time for a lawsuit.

Said Jeran Artery, executive director of Wyoming Equality:

“Wyoming has a proud history of being the 'Equality State' and its refusal to allow same-sex couples to marry is contrary to the core values of our state. The couples in this case, and all same-sex couples in Wyoming, deserve to be treated with equal fairness and respect, including having the same freedom to marry that others enjoy.”

Well said, Jeran Artery, who grew up in rural Wyoming and knows the territory. 

See more on wyofile and Wy Pols and WY ACLU

Cora Courage and Nonie Proffit
Cora Courage and Nonie Proffit, of Evanston, have been together for over nine years and were married in Iowa in 2009. Cora is the Clinical Director at the state psychiatric hospital and a Major in the Army Reserve. Nonie is a part-time librarian and sheepherder for their family’s ranch.
Carl Oleson & Rob Johnston
Carl Oleson and Rob Johnston, of Casper, have been together for sixteen years and were married in Canada in July 2010. Carl manages a retail store and Rob is the program director for Project ReGain, which teaches skills to people who are recovering from addiction.
Anne Guzzo & Bonnie Robinson
Anne Guzzo and Bonnie Robinson have been together for four years and reside in Laramie. Anne is a professor of music composition and theory at the University of Wyoming in Laramie. Bonnie is a property manager. On February 27, 2014, they applied for a marriage license at the Laramie County Clerk’s Office in Cheyenne and were rejected because they are a same-sex couple.
Ivan Williams & Chuck Killion
Ivan Williams and Chuck Killion have been together for nearly two years and reside in Cheyenne. Ivan is an attorney. Chuck is a comptroller at a local construction and development company. On February 27, 2014, they applied for a marriage license at the Laramie County Clerk’s Office in Cheyenne and were rejected because they are a same-sex couple. The County Clerk later asked the First Judicial District Court in Cheyenne to determine whether she was obligated to reject the couples’ applications for marriage
- See more at: http://wyofile.com/wyofile-2/sex-couples-wyoming-equality-file-marriage-lawsuit/#sthash.r6BLdx6u.onzF4i89.dpuf

Cora Courage and Nonie Proffit
Cora Courage and Nonie Proffit, of Evanston, have been together for over nine years and were married in Iowa in 2009. Cora is the Clinical Director at the state psychiatric hospital and a Major in the Army Reserve. Nonie is a part-time librarian and sheepherder for their family’s ranch.
Carl Oleson & Rob Johnston
Carl Oleson and Rob Johnston, of Casper, have been together for sixteen years and were married in Canada in July 2010. Carl manages a retail store and Rob is the program director for Project ReGain, which teaches skills to people who are recovering from addiction.
Anne Guzzo & Bonnie Robinson
Anne Guzzo and Bonnie Robinson have been together for four years and reside in Laramie. Anne is a professor of music composition and theory at the University of Wyoming in Laramie. Bonnie is a property manager. On February 27, 2014, they applied for a marriage license at the Laramie County Clerk’s Office in Cheyenne and were rejected because they are a same-sex couple.
Ivan Williams & Chuck Killion
Ivan Williams and Chuck Killion have been together for nearly two years and reside in Cheyenne. Ivan is an attorney. Chuck is a comptroller at a local construction and development company. On February 27, 2014, they applied for a marriage license at the Laramie County Clerk’s Office in Cheyenne and were rejected because they are a same-sex couple. The County Clerk later asked the First Judicial District Court in Cheyenne to determine whether she was obligated to reject the couples’ applications for marriage
- See more at: http://wyofile.com/wyofile-2/sex-couples-wyoming-equality-file-marriage-lawsuit/#sthash.r6BLdx6u.onzF4i89.dpuf

Molina Speaks blends hip-hop and futurism and social justice

Adrian Molina at a performance in Denver.

Spoken word artist and Rawlins native Adrian Molina will conduct an interactive workshop that focuses on "the power of voice in the technological age" on Sunday, March 9, 2-3:30 p.m. at the Laramie County Library in Cheyenne. Geared for youth ages 16-25.

I've never seen a hip-hop TEDx talk. Molina (a.k.a. Molina Speaks) uses his skills as a rapper in this video to do this:

Building on his talk on futurism and hip-hop, Molina Speaks delivers a performance serving as a powerful demonstration of the values of the new hip-hop movement as it ties into a new vision of the future. 

Here’s a taste of Molina on stage last year at TedX Mile High in Denver: http://youtu.be/3ejY6bAqNM4

Molina's vision for the future is one where young people have unfettered access to the arts. He puts this philosophy into practice daily as a mentor to students in one of Denver poorest neighborhoods. He's performance director and a lead instructor at Youth On Record, an arts education organization started by the Flobots that recently launched a state-of-the-art Youth Media Studio on Denver’s west side. 

He teaches Chicano Studies, Hip-Hop Studies and Media Justice courses at the college level, including courses at his lama mater, the University of Wyoming. Molina is a member of the Café Cultura Artist collective. He has collaborated with Bioneers, Denver Spirituals Project, Su Teatro, Lighthouse Writers, Café Nuba, Slam Nuba, The Growhaus, Servicios de la Raza, and the Denver Public Library, among others.

Come on out to the Molina's presentation on Sunday. It's designed for our kids but we all can learn something from such an engaged and talented artist. 

Q: Where is God? A: God is everywhere!

From the Baltimore Cathechism:

Q: Where is God?

A: God is everywhere

That was an easy one to memorize. It also gave us kids food for thought.

Is God in me?

God is everywhere

Is God in a tree?

God is everywhere

Is God in that Muslim over there?

God is everywhere

And so on.  

Is God really everywhere?

How many times do I have to answer this? Yes and yes. It's just difficult to see his actions among some groups of people.

Such as in the Wyoming Legislature.

Bob Kisken of Glenrock wrote on the topic recently in a letter to the editor in the Casper Star-Trib. His conclusion:

I see where the Wyoming legislature has refused to raise the minimum wage and to extend Medicaid coverage.

I see no evidence of God in the Wyoming Legislature.

Pronouncements uttered by the more conservative legislators do make me wonder. Their lack of empathy for those in need is quite remarkable.

Hey, I'm no saint.  I cast aspersions. I covet and hate and envy.

But I don't publicly profess sainthood and then act otherwise.

Do hordes of Colorado burger wranglers commute to Chey-town?

It's about a half hour (34 miles) from downtown Cheyenne, Wyoming, to downtown Wellington, Colorado. I've passed it hundreds of times on my way to Fort Collins and Denver. I've stopped many times, too. I used to buy lottery tix at the convenience store -- never won a thing. I sometimes get off I-25 at Wellington to take the back way to the Fort, especially if I'm heading downtown. I once had a flat tire at the Wellington exit on a moonlit Fourth of July. There are worse times to change a flat than on a warm, brightly lit Colorado night. My family was asleep in the car. I took my time. I half expected a drunk to come barrelling into us. But traffic was light and impaired drivers bound for Wyoming were behaving themselves.

Wellington is a quick commute for those employed in Wyoming who prefer Colorado's rarefied atmosphere. You know, progressive politics, legalized marijuana, organic groceries, FoCo's Craft Beer Nirvana and a lively live music scene. Of course, you also have to pay state income tax. I am told that there are as many Wellington-based commuters heading north to Cheyenne each morning as there are heading south. And it's not just those employed at Laramie County's big Wal-Mart distribution center, Warren AFB, refinery, LCCC or state government. It's also those employed in the retail trade. Business people in Cheyenne keep telling me that they can't fill their fast-food jobs from Cheyenne folks and they have to reach out to Coloradans. Seems odd that people would commute 30 or 40 or 50 miles to wrangle burgers, but that's what I hear. Let me be clear -- I have no evidence for such a claim. Blogging is not an evidence-based practice. If I said that the sun revolves around the earth, you might take my word for it, especially if you were a fundie. You might dispute my claim, commenting that I am a nincompoop, a Know-Nothing prog-blogger, a waste of electrons.

So let's look at some real stats.

Wyoming's unemployment rate is 4.4%. Colorado's is 6.2%. But a recent story in the Denver Post says that those figures don't include some 250,000 Coloradans who have "disappeared" from the workforce. If those people were thrown into the stats, that state's unemployment rate might be more like 10%, according to a story in The Daily Caller. Read more about Colorado's unemployment picture here.

Maybe those disappeared are working part-time in Wyoming? They wouldn't be the first people to disappear into The Great Wide Open. Remember, we are the state of UFOs, cattle mutilations, unsolved murders and Cindy Hill. Mysteries abound!

Hand it to Wellington. It's looking at ways to restore its quaint downtown. The Downtown Revitalization and Main Street Project just finished a needs assessment survey of the town's businesses. The Wellington Area Chamber of Commerce is holding meetings on Feb. 24-25 to discuss all of this.

It appears that Wellington wants to be more than a bedroom community for Fort Collins and Cheyenne. Everyone is thinking locally these days, some places more than others.

Wellington has its own poem. It's not a great poem but I'm impressed that the town features poetry on its web site. Here it is:

As you wander toward the Rockies,
from the way of the rising sun, you come to the Boxelder Valley,
and the Town of Wellington.
We take pride in our little city, not a selfish motive shown.
For our harvest will be plenty, from seed that’s freely sown.
How that dear old town is growing.
Its streets are clear of dust. Where my heart is there I’m going,
It’s Wellington or bust!
And the moment that I spy it, not a boost will I deny it.
Every man there will stand by it. The watch word will be Trust.
Here’s to you old-timers, the backbone of the land.
Alone you’re sure to falter. Together we all stand.
And now in conclusion,
May we all be as one, and put forth our best efforts,
For a greater Wellington.

--W.O. Haberman, 1917

Halfway through painful legislative session

On this last Saturday in February, snow is falling and more is promised. On the plus side, the legislative session is half over. But that also means two more weeks of nuttiness from Republicans. I try unsuccessfully to keep up with the "Cheyennigans," the new term for legislative goings on. So I have to depend on the crusty commentary of others:

In today's post at Blowing in the Wyoming Wind (reprinted in the Wyoming Tribune-Eagle), Rodger McDaniel explores the influence of American Legislative Exchange Council (ALEC) bills in Wyoming. He concludes: "And Wyoming voters thought their representatives were dreaming up these crazy bills on their own!" Read some of my commentary on ALEC here and here. Here's the editorial cartoon the WTE ran above Rodger's column:

Veteran reporter Geoff O'Gara covers the legislature for Wyoming PBS. He wrote a column on Feb. 21 wondering if lawmaking in WYO hasn't become too complicated for the four- and eight-week sessions of the "citizen legislature." The Lege is proud of its part-time status. Yet is increasingly grapples with the world's complicated issues -- energy policy, education issues, healthcare, technology -- and a budget that now exceeds $3 billion. Despite conservatives' pipe dreams of returning to a golden era when men were men, women were in the kitchen, kids were in the one-room schoolhouse and the flocks were in the fields, Wyoming can't avoid the 21st century.

Kerry Drake was upset on wyofile on Feb. 18. He wrote about two Republican bills (one in the House and another in the Senate) that proposed turning every teacher in the state into a pistol-packin' mama or papa. Those bills mercifully died yesterday when they failed to get their first reading in their houses of origin. So much for gun-totin' in schools (until next year, anyway).

Wy Pols is a feisty new Facebook page that takes on the excesses of WYO Repubs. It features all sorts of snark and memes and gifs. Sen. Charlie Scott (R-Wacko County) is a favorite target of late. Not necessarily a bane to conservatives (who probably don't "Like" it) but it has been a delight to us Liberals. Here's a sample:

Wy Pols has been excerpting chapters from a 1980s book by new state legislator Troy Mader (R-Wingnuttia). Mader was named by Campbell County Commissioners to take the place of Rep. Sue Wallis, who died suddenly on Jan. 28. The commissioners may not have been aware of Mader's publishing efforts. In his 1987 book, "Death Sentence: AIDS," Mader blamed “homosexual terrorism” for the AIDS crisis and advocated for sexual and actual quarantine of people with HIV/AIDS. You can find Mader's complete list of must-read batshit-crazy books on the Wyoming Authors Wiki.

Mader's rise to prominence made its way to the pages of the Think Progress blog. Wyoming politics are quite popular on prog-blogs. It's too bad, really, since Wyoming is home to a thriving arts scene, good writers, a growing local food movement, some nifty creative placemaking ventures and award-winning craft beers. Not to mention bitchin' landscapes and wonderful people. But crackpots live amongst us, and their utterances are tempting fodder for bloggers such as yours truly. This is Republicans' Achilles Heel -- retro beliefs is an increasingly interconnected world. Their wacko POVs can fly around the world on the Internets. And, yes, we have the Internets in WYO. True, it's coal-powered and will remain so until I can get the high school kid down the street to patch me into the nuclear fusion reactor he built in his garage.

Upcoming weekend a busy one for Laramie County Democrats

This news from Laramie County Democrats:

On Friday, February 21 at Suite 1901 in downtown Cheyenne, 6-8 PM, is the Annual Democrats Legislative Reception. State legislators will be in attendance. There will be special drawings for some cool prizes too. The cost of the event is $15, proceeds go to the County Democratic Party.

Historically, the Laramie County Democrats Grassroots Coalition members have provided some of the food. For this year, please plan to bring desserts to Suite 1901 by 5:30 PM on the 21st. Your contribution to this event is greatly appreciated.

On Saturday, February 22, is the Annual Nellie Tayloe Ross Banquet. Keynote speaker is Faith Winter. FMI:  http://www.wyomingdemocrats.com

And coming up in March:

Mark your calendars for the Laramie County Democrats Convention on Saturday, March 15. In the evening, 7-11 PM, there will be Bingo at Suite 1901. It will be a fun-filled day and night.

Gun totin' in schools, El Rancho Avalancho and red state energy bound for blue state

Some things that irked and/or entertained me this past week:

The state legislature is in session. Opening day included the Gov's State of the State speech, a "legalize pot" march by Wyoming NORML and performances in the House chambers by WY Poet Laureate Echo Roy Klaproth and the UW Collegiate Chorale. The week was filled with debates over Medicaid expansion, gun-totin' in schools, minimum wage increases, early childhood education, more guns, Common Core, increases to hunting and fishing licenses, a decrease in coal taxes and, of course, more gun-totin'. Most bills were killed early so the Housers and Senators can get on to the issue at hand, the budget. Only three weeks left to do so. The big surprise is that Sen. Chris Rothfuss (D-Laramie) fashioned a bipartisan bill on Medicaid expansion that still is in the mix. Way to go, Sen. R! This is a miracle in this Obamacare-bashing state.

From the library shelves: "This Land was Made for You and Me (But Mostly Me)" by Bruce McCall and David Letterman. Yes, that's the same David Letterman as seen on late-night TV. And illustrator Bruce McCall was one of the Scots-Irish geniuses behind the rise of National Lampoon, the others being Michael O'Donoghue and P.J. O'Rourke. Letterman is a millionaire with a Rocky Mountain getaway in Montana. I'm not sure about McCall's portfolio, but it's intriguing that Dave and Bruce would turn their comedic sights on the super-rich and their favorite playgrounds in the West, places like Jackson Hole. This from the book's intro:

It all began a decade and a half ago or so in the far American West, in Montana and Wyoming and those other states that appropriated and misspelled the Native American words for "Big Empty Space" and "Much Bigger Empty Space"; there, a few daring pioneers from the pharaonically wealthy top crust embarked on a spree, powered by lust, inspired by a vision only they could see.

Because it takes more than money, privilege and cronies in high places to ransack nature's bounty for the private pleasure of a privileged few, in what poets might call acts of sublime idiocy (as if anyone would ask poets their opinion!), in other words, obliterating what always was, and making out of it what never existed before, then flanking it with armed guards and electric fences and Rottweilers.

The writer/illustrator duo go on to explore "the only Montana hunting lodge with its own indoor airport,"  El Rancho Avalancho in Idaho -- the world's first skiable mansion, and "the biggest goddamn bison in Wyoming." During the legislature's first week, it was good to once again laugh at the humor of wretched excess.

Speaking of wretched excess.... A Los Angeles Times story excerpted in my local paper today is about the largest wind ranch in creation, coming soon to Carbon County. Big enough to fit all of L.A. inside of it, the 500-sqare-mile ranch -- owned by gazillionaire Philip Anschutz -- will be home to 1,000 wind turbines and the starting point for a transmission line to carry all the energy to California. Cali needs clean energy and Wyoming breaks wind incessantly -- a match made in heaven. The irony in all of this is that the the most blue of blue states, with more enviros per square mile than anywhere else on earth, will be getting its energy from the most red of red states, a place that keeps its energy rates the lowest in the nation by burning coal, the dirtiest energy-creating substance there is.

California has until 2020 to ensure that one-third of its energy comes from renewable resources. Meanwhile, its cities are clouded in a haze that travels from pollution generated by coal-burning plants in China. Some of that coal comes from Wyoming's Powder River Basin. Wyoming currently is working with officials in Washington to build new ports to ship more coal to China.

The world is indeed an odd place.

Winter off-roading in Wyoming

A week ago today, I sat in my Ford staring out at the frozen tundra of Carbon County. I was about ten feet off of Hwy. 287, rear end facing the road. My tires had carved a trail as straight as an arrow from road to final resting place, a slight depression midway between asphalt and barbed wire. 

My mistake was going too fast through a slushy mix of snow and ice. You'd call it "hydroplaning" if the road was awash in rain water. The tires lose contact with the road and the car goes into a spin. Florida people hydroplane all the time. It's an official state sport.

But it rarely happens in Wyoming, where rain usually falls in a fine mist. Hail is a different kettle of fish. I once was caught in a hailstorm in I-25 near Buffalo. My car began to lose traction as hail swamped the road. Couldn't see either. So I slowly rolled to a stop on the shoulder, coming to rest five feet behind a truck hauling a horse trailer.

Last Saturday, I sat for a few minutes and then decided to take a look at my predicament. The wind blew about 50 mph but it was a warm wind, as these things go, not an Arctic blast but a downslope wind, a chinook or "snoweater" as Native peoples used to call it. It also blows freshly fallen powder snow in great quantities across roadways, leaving snow traps for the unwary.

My front wheel wells were clogged with wet snow. My running board rested on a snowbank. I guessed that I was high-ended, the term used when your car's mid-section rests on a mound of snow or sand or dirt and your wheels can't find traction. This usually means a tow, or getting pushed out of your predicament by a roving band of cowboys or collegians. When I was younger, I found pleasure in helping push people out of predicaments. My damaged heart won't let me do that any more.

A father and son in a small truck pulled over and asked if they could help. "Don't have anything to tow you out with," said the man. "Want us to call someone?"

I showed him my phone. "I'm going to call my insurance company."

He nodded and pulled away.

I extracted my gloves and ice scraper. I dug out around the front tires and poked the scraper beneath the car, trying to loosen the snow that kept me high-ended. I scraped the snow down to the prairie grass, hoping I could get a purchase on dry ground. Winded, I got back in the car and caught my breath. Bluegrass tunes played on the radio. At least I could get Wyoming Public Radio. 

I rocked the car -- reverse to forward and reverse again. The car moved a tad, but finally got stuck again. I shifted back into park and fished out my insurance company's 1-800 roadside assistance number. I called. Reached an electronic voice that transferred me to another e-voice and then I got a real person. She wanted to help me. I reconstruct our conversation from memory.

"Where are you located?" she asked.

"Off of a state highway about 10 miles north of Rawlins, Wyoming."

"Where?"

"Off of Interstate 80, north of Rawlins in Wyoming." I was tempted to add: "The big square state right in the middle of the map."  But didn't.

A few seconds passed. "I-80 -- found it," she said. "You said Rawlins?"

"Yes."

I heard her tapping on the keys in an office somewhere in Dallas or Indianapolis or Portland. "State highway, you said?"

"Can't remember the name. 287 I think."

More tapping. "Ah," she said. "Highway 287."

"Sounds right."

She asked me if I was stuck. I said I was. She asked if my car was damaged. I replied that it was OK. She asked if I was less than or more than 10 feet from the road. I thought it would sound better if I said less than ten feet so that was my answer. She asked if she could have permission to log into my phone's location finder. I told he that my smart phone was busted and that I had a dumb phone with me. That didn't seem to phase her. She said she was going to locate me, said I would get a call from the responder. We said our goodbyes and disengaged. Wind rocked the car. Old-timey banjo music played on the radio.

I looked to the south and saw two snowplows headed my way. You couldn't have been here a half hour ago? They stopped just short of me. Both drivers disembarked.

I got out of the car. 

"Need any help?" asked the first driver, who was surprisingly young. He looked at me and then at the car.

"I have a tow truck coming."

He nodded. "You sure?"

"I'm sure."

We parted ways. During this three-day trip, I had seen a dozen snow plows. It's winter in Wyoming and this winter is a doozy. The WYDOT plows get a lot of credit for keeping the roads open. But it was a closed interstate that brought me to this predicament. I-80 was closed between Rawlins and Laramie and it didn't appear it would open any time soon. And I needed to get home for my wife Chris's birthday party. So I was taking the long way around, going north around the snow, or so I thought.

My phone dinged. I answered an automated call. It went something like this: "Your roadside assistance vehicle is on its way. You can expect it in approximately six hours."

WTF? Six hours? I'll never get home. The call disconnected. I noted with alarm that I had only one bar of service showing on the phone face. How did I get so low? Now I was going to sit here for six hours with very little phone service, a heart patient trapped in a snow bank. Cars and trucks passed on the road. I thought about making a sign and standing out by the road. "Heart patient needs help." Or maybe "Help -- Wife will kill me if I don't get home for birthday."

As I contemplated my options, I noticed a surprising number of cars and trucks and SUVs passing me by. Would I stop if I saw a stranded motorist on the side of the road? Depends. It was the middle of the day and, if they were to get a good look at me, people could tell that I was somewhat harmless. What does a red Ford Fusion tell you about the person inside? Buys American cars. Wyoming license plate. Probably not a very good driver -- what kind of knucklehead slides off a road in the middle of a sunny February day?

Someone did stop. Dark blue pickup. Guy got out. I got out. Young Latino, maybe 30. Wore a light jacket and a ballcap. Asked if I needed help. I told him my story, said a tow truck was coming but not until dark. He walked over to the car and looked around.

"I think we can push it out." He spoke with a slight accent. "My girlfriend is in the truck -- she can drive."

I thought about it for a second. I really shouldn't be pushing out any cars, even my own. But he seemed very certain that we could do this. I nodded. He waved his girlfriend out of the car. She came out. Very pretty woman wrapped in a bulky coat. She walked over, the two spoke and she got behind the wheel. 

The man and I pushed. The girlfriend turned the wheels and the man said to keep the wheels straight. We pushed again, the car moved back a few inches and I fell on my face in the snow.

"You OK?" said the man.

I nodded. Deep breaths. Deep breaths. Don't be a weinie. Heart don't fail me now.

We pushed again. I slipped in the snow. The car moved back toward the road, slowly, and then it gained traction and reached asphalt. Two cars on the inside lane had stopped, giving us some room to back up. The girlfriend backed gently onto the road, and then pulled forward on the shoulder. I breathed heavily, my heart pounded. 

"Thank you so much," I said to the man and his girlfriend. She grinned. I never heard her speak a word. The two walked back to the car. I got into my Ford, looked in the rearview mirror and saw them get into their pickup. I waved. I put my car into drive and gently pulled away, hoping I hadn't sustained any front-end damage. The car purred. I drove. It was a good 20 miles before I caught my breath. From there, it was mostly smooth sailing.

Also see my post that day from the new Burger King in Rawlins, written while I waited (in vain) for I-80 to open. This new BK featured gaming PCs at several of its tables and AT&T wireless. The password: ILoveBacon. Read my blog from Rock Springs about the travails of Elk Mountain here.

Little Ag vs. Big Ag -- which one grows the most food?

From Wyoming Public Media:

In collaboration with the University of Wyoming, a local food advocacy group conducted a study to find out just how many vegetables a backyard garden in Wyoming can produce.  The project is called Team G.R.O.W., or Gardening Research of Wyoming.

Gayle Woodsum is the founder of Feeding Laramie Valley, the group sponsoring the research. She says the idea behind the study was simple. “So these were gardeners who said, yeah, we’d like to know, really, how much are we producing.  And what value does that have in terms of numbers.  But what they did is they weighed every pea, every bean, every leaf of lettuce that came out of that garden for the entire season.”

The 22 gardeners in the study raised 4,500 pounds of vegetables on a little over a quarter of land.  Woodsum says the results show the harvest was as good as those reported by large-scale factory farms.  The study was funded by a $5-million USDA grant.

Woodsum hopes the results will help the group with future efforts to show policy makers why community garden projects should be supported and encouraged the same way large-scale farms are.

BTW, I think that third paragraph was supposed to read "a quarter acre of land." A "quarter of land" doesn't make sense.

How much square footage is a quarter acre of land? 10,890. Divide that by 4,500 and you get 2.42 pounds of food per square foot. I guess that's possible. I've been able to grow a couple pounds worth of tomatoes from one plant. Then there's zucchini. Your average gardener (and I'm pretty average) can grow about 5,000 pounds of zucchini on one plant, give or take.

I guess the big question is this: How much funding in the recently passed Farm Bill goes to big ag and how much goes to gardeners?

Anyone?

Getting religion on I-80

Stuck inside of Rawlins

With those Cheyenne blues again.

Don't you just love winter driving in WYO?

Since I just came from a literary event in Rock Springs, it's only appropriate to revisit a poem by one of that city's fine poets. Here's a sequence from Barbara Smith's poem "Interstate 80:"

...even if you drive the same forty miles

morning and night to work

and know every pimple on the lady's ass

every curve or incline

you could drive it in your sleep or blind

like you do half of the time in January anyway

whiteout white knuckle terror

braced against the blast of triple trailers

whipping like rattlers in the ruts.

This road will give you religion, mister.

 

Amen, Barbara.

Elk Mountain -- that's all you need to know

One of the constants of winter driving in Wyoming: Elk Mountain.

That's all you have to say. Elk Mountain. 

When I arrived in Rock Springs from Cheyenne, I was asked about the driving conditions. 

"Elk Mountain -- you know."

"Yes, I know."

I crept across the flank of Elk Mountain yesterday in a light snow. It drifted across the interstate, flakes swirling in great gusts with the passing of each truck. Yes, trucks were passing me because I was tailing a semi doing 40. The swirling snow made it hard to see the road. To make it worse, the sun peeked through the low clouds, which added a glare to the white landscape. I did fine as long as I kept my eye on the dark-gray square of the semi's rear end. 

Once I cleared the mountain, the low sky lifted and I could see more than 100 feet. Then it was off to the races. It was snowing in Rawlins but the road was clear from there all the way to Rock Springs.

My last drive over Elk Mountain was at night in mid-October. The road has patches of slushy snow but it was smooth sailing, for the most part. October is early in the season. The road is still warmed by the sun and the snow is wet. This February is deeply cold and the snow is a light powder. Great for skiers but not so great for motorists.

That part of I-80 has many moods. A few Novembers ago, I visited the facilities at the Wagonhound Rest Area. Elk Mountain was a snowy beast rising out of the prairie. And there was only a whisper of a breeze. Usually a brisk wind is halting my progress to the restroom or threatens to send me sailing back to Cheyenne. I could see a stunned look on the faces of other Wyoming travelers, unacquainted with such calm beauty.

Why isn't the wind blowing?

I don't know. It's Elk Mountain.

Must be global warming.

Give it a few hours and we'll be back in the deep freeze.
 

Just think -- only four more months of winter.

Deadline for Wyoming Writers, Inc., writing contest set for March 15

From my friends over at Wyoming Writers, Inc.:

Wyoming Writers, Inc., is now accepting submissions for the 2014 writing contest in these categories: 

1) Adult fiction
2) Children’s/Juvenile Fiction
3) Nonfiction
4) Traditional poetry
5) Free Verse
6) “Short and Sweet” 

Deadline is March 15, 2014. 

Rules and entry information may be found here. 

Good company: Cheyenne, Billings and Loveland

Cheyenne is 15 years behind Billings.

It's playing catch-up with Loveland.

At least we're in good company.

On Wednesday evening, I attended a public meeting featuring staffers from Artspace in Minneapolis. Artspace describes itself as "America’s leader in artist-led community transformation."

At the meeting, Billings, Mont., was represented by Jack Nickels, the tall-drink-of-water cowboy who's point man on its city's nascent Artspace project. Loveland, Colo., was represented by Felicia Harmon. She's been working for more than three years on the Artspace project at the Loveland Feed and Grain building. It breaks ground Feb. 14, which is always a red-letter day in LOVE-land. This makes it the 36th Artspace project in the country, the first in Colorado, the first in the Rocky Mountain West.

Artspace's Wendy Holmes and Stacey Mickelson answered a call from Cheyenne to come on down. Issuing the call was a committee made up[ of reps from the Cheyenne DDA, Arts Cheyenne, LCCC, and a few others. Artspace held meetings with the mayor and city council, artists and arts groups and the general public. They toured three buildings with the potential for artistic live-work spaces: the Hynds, site of the "Lights On!" project, the former Z Furniture Building and the old power plant. They all hold promise as the site for live-work spaces for practicing artists, office space for arts orgs and retail space for arts businesses.

Everyone who spoke at the public meeting was very excited about the possibilities.

But hold your horses, said North Dakota native Mickelson who now works out of the Artspace D.C. office.

The Artspace staff visit is just the first step on a long trail. Artists and arts groups need to be surveyed. Local officials need to be brought on board.

"If elected officials and bureaucrats aren't interested, we can't do it," he said.

It was good sign that the mayor and six council members attended a meeting on Wednesday morning, Mickelson said. But luncheon meetings and agreeing to work together on a long-term project aren't the same thing.

The typical project takes around four years. The quickest turnaround was three years in Buffalo, N.Y. The longest was in Fort Lauderdale, Fla. -- 12 years. While the excitement level remains high in Billings, that project is on hold. The Artspace Billings Facebook page continues to grow and generate interest, according to Nickels. Some city administrators are holding up progress. The Billings downtown is home to a thriving arts scene, including the Alberta Bair Theatre, the Yellowstone Art Museum, the Writers Voice of the YMCA, an annual book festival and a new people-friendly, energy-efficient public library. Many of our northern Wyoming neighbors travel to arts events in Billings. Billings also featured in the new Alexander Payne film Nebraska (Wyoming, too, in one short scene). Get on over and like Artspace Billings on Facebook. Loveland Feed & Grain, too.

We're all in this together.

Sort of. Loveland's on its way. Billings is on hold and Cheyenne is just beginning. It's going to take a lot of people on the ground in Chey-town to make this project a reality. It will take some aye-sayers to get things down and to blunt the bleating of the nay-sayers. You know, the "Beware of Agenda 21" crowd. They'll be having their own meeting this week. Tea Party fave and Laramie County Commissioner M. Lee Hasenauer is hosting a town hall meeting at 3:30 p.m. on Saturday, Feb. 8, in the Cottonwood Room of the Laramie County Library. According to a flier promoting the event, the meeting will be held "to discuss the impacts of PlanCheyenne," the city and county's master plan. Hasenauer is leader of the local Tea Party, and last heard from celebrating in front of the Capitol when the Wyoming Supreme Court ruled in favor of Cindy Hill resuming her duties at the Department of Education. The Tea Party believes that every step in the name of progress is a commie plot. And you know about those commies. Russkis putting on Olympic games. Chinese buying up the Great Lakes. Viet Cong bringing their coffee to Wyoming.

What's next? Prairie hipster artists taking over Cheyenne''s old power plant and waking up downtown with a robust blend of art happenings and poetry slams and coffee shops and brewfests and all kinds of creative capitalist ventures?

You heard it here first.

Happy trails, Sue Wallis

This time last year, Rep. Sue Wallis (R-Recluse) was an ally in the cause to promote a domestic partnerships bill in the Wyoming House. I was at home, recovering from a heart attack, and I had plenty of time to listen in on the proceeding of the legislature. I blogged about it, too. Read the post here.

Now it's the last day of January, 2014. It's cold and gray outside. And Sue Wallis is dead, possibly due to a heart attack that killed her at 56 (the Gillette News-Record obit described it as "natural causes"). She was alone in a Gillette hotel room, spending the night in town to attend some legislative committee meetings on Tuesday. Later in the day, she was going to fly out to Elko and the National Cowboy Poetry Gathering, an event she helped run back in the 1990s.

That's just one of the scary things about heart attacks. You can be alone and then you can be dead. Or you can be alone and passed out of the floor, gasping for air. You could be calling 911 on your cell phone, if you're able, and then just hope that the EMTs arrive in time.

Wallis was a rancher, cowboy poet and Lynne Cheney supporter. She advocated for humane horse slaughter and food freedom for farmers. She didn't like Barack Obama or the EPA. She stood up for abortion rights and the LGBT community. A real Wyoming mix. The Campbell County Republican Party will try to find a replacement but she can't be replaced.

After I heard the news, I went to her blogs and read some of her poetry. It tells you a lot about her. Go there and see.

And get that heart checked.

Dear Students: It ain't easy to feed this fiction-writing habit, but you gotta do it

What secrets will I be sharing with student writers at Western Wyoming College on Feb. 7?

It's a secret. Don't want to ruin the suspense. What kind of fiction writer would do that?

I will begin by telling them a bit about myself. I was born a poor white child in suburbia. My father built homes for rocket ships. My mother was the Florence Nightingale of Denver. I spent my youth reading and taking care of my many siblings. Along the way I started to write and haven't stopped since.

Words of wisdom: The Nike ad said it best -- "Just do it!" If I had a nickel for everyone who told me, "I want to write a book," I would be as rich as Warren Buffet. If I had a nickel for everyone of those people who actually finished a book, I would have enough to buy a cup of coffee -- at Starbucks. If I had a nickel for everyone who finished a book and got it published, I would have enough for a cup of coffee -- at the Loaf 'n' Jug.

Last year, I read a quote by Florida Governor Rick Scott who said that Liberal Arts degrees were a waste of time. He may be right. If you measure an English degree on production values, it isn't very practical. Will it help it get you a job? Possibly. Let me make a list of the jobs I've had since graduating with an English degree from the University of Florida:

Correspondent for a construction industry trade journal
Book store clerk
Book warehouse order filler
Sports reporter
Telephone salesman
Junior high paper grader
Weekly newspaper managing editor
Weekly newspaper columnist
Business newspaper editor
Teaching assistant
Partner in an advertising/marketing firm
Free-lance writer
Free-lance editor
Newsletter editor
Literary magazine editor
Anthology editor
Corporate publications editorhttp://hummingbirdminds.blogspot.com/
Fiction writer
Essayist
Photographer
Free-lance writing teacher
Adjunct professor
Arts administrator
Event planner
Grants panelist
Grants writer
Arts magazine editor
Public Information Officer

Some of these jobs overlapped, especially the free-lance ones. Almost all of them had something to do with writing and editing. All of them fed my fiction writing habit.

Author and National Geographic Magazine roving correspondent Mark Jenkins of Laramie (who spoke at WWC last year) once told me that he majored in philosophy at UW and then retreated to the mountains for a year to think big thoughts. Eventually he had to come down from the mountain and decide how to make a living. And he did. He became an international adventurer and wrote about it. Wrote very well about it. He's won all of the fellowships you can win from the Wyoming Arts Council. We don't have any fellowships for philosophers. But we do for those people who want to spend the 10,000 hours it takes to become a good writer or artist or musician. And that's just for starters.

I can't wait to address those emerging writers coming to my workshop at WWC in Rock Springs on Feb. 7. By the end of my workshop, they will either be scared to death, ready to find a practical major such as agronomy or nursing, or they will be fired up and ready to go write and write and write some more.

I'm guessing it will be the latter.

From beach boy to beach cowboy

I'm not a Florida beach guy. Not anymore.

Salt water once ran in my veins. The sun freckled my skin on a daily basis. All summer long, I lived in my baggies and toughened my feet by walking barefoot on scalding asphalt on my way to the beach's hard-packed sand. My car wore surf racks and patches of rust. By the time I graduated from high school, it was almost ready for the scrap heap, although a neighbor forked over $100 so he could turn it into a dune buggy.

Nights and evenings, we worked so we could surf during the day. I was a busboy at a combination Kentucky Fried Chicken joint and a pancake house. We busboys spent a lot of time flirting with the waitresses, trying to get them into our cars for an after-work beachside rendezvous. When that didn't work, we'd drive down to the Daytona pier and see if any tourist girls were interested in canoodling with busboys. We lonely guys often ended up parked on the beach (you could drive on it back then) talking about our plans for the future.

I had plans. I didn't know what they were, but I had them. Life was waiting for me and I had no desire to remain a beach boy or, worse, a beach bum. The world was tough on me and I did return to the beach after being booted out of college. I surfed and worked, waited for the Army to pluck me from the waves and send me to Vietnam. But the call never came and I had to figure out the next steps. Traveled, returned to school, worked, returned to the beach again although spent less and less time actually on the beach. Guess I always thought it was something to grow out of.

My brother Dan found that the beach was something you could grow into. He surfed until he was almost 60, until leukemia claimed him late last year. His 50- and 60-something buddies all surfed. They formed a church called the Salty Church that is a block from the beach.

Meanwhile, I made my home in the Rocky Mountain West and only rarely looked back. Until recently. When retirement raised its head. Now I'm spending time at funerals and weddings of my loved ones in The Sunshine State. It's not the place I left in 1978. Scads more people, traffic, developments. I was surprised during my recent trip that you can still walk with your best girl on the beach -- and be the only two out there. It has to be windy and 45 degrees, but it can be done.

But as I said in a previous post, the beach is nice but I can't see basing a retirement on that one thing alone. I can't surf until I get my knees fixed and/or replaced. I don't fish, like some of the codgers I came across on my beach walks. My Celtic skin won't tolerate sunbathing. I don't own a boat.

The warm weather is nice. Lots of cultural offerings. My family members are there, as are old friends. I care deeply about my old Florida schools -- they shaped me.

Still...

Spend a few decades in a place and you change. I've lived in Wyoming since 1991, with two years off in the mid-90s to work in D.C. As it turns out, I still have salt water in my veins. That's because all humans have salt water in our veins, even those of us who live in the Land of the Ancient Seas. Millions of years ago, my little lot in Cheyenne was underwater. If I excavated my entire backyard instead of just my small garden plot, I would find fossils of sea creatures. When the wind blows from the south, I smell the salt air. It could be from the nearest saltwater patch in the Gulf of Mexico. More likely, it's the moisture by storms. Or it could be my imagination.

Most of the time, the wind brings the scent of the dry prairie or of snow from Gulf of Alaska storms. The landscape reveals no waves, unless I use my imagination and wonder what it would be like to surf a wave as high as the nearest sandstone bluff.

I have to admit that I am more of this place than of the place where I did my growing up. I am no longer a beach guy unless you count the fact that I have walked "the beaches of Cheyenne" that Garth Brooks sings about. No longer the beach boy but a beach cowboy.

Wyoming Writers, Inc., and Bearlodge Writers offer conference scholarship in Gaydell Collier's name

Not too early to contemplate summer arts events....

Wyoming Writers, Inc., holds its 40th anniversary conference June 6-8 in Sheridan. It's a terrific writers' conference, one I've been attending for more than 20 years.

How does a mostly volunteer-run organization persevere for four decades? The passion of its members -- writers and poets and memoirists and children's book authors and mystery writers and digital scribes and so on. Attendees get tons of good advice and have a great time in the bargain. Sheridan is home to an energetic group of writers and was the site of the first WWInc conference.

WWInc has traditionally offered conference scholarships. Now there's a new one. WWInc board member and Bearlodge Writers member Andi Hummel provides the details:

A founding member of both Wyoming Writers, Inc., and Bearlodge Writers (BLW), Gaydell Collier’s dedication to the craft of writing and her encouragement to writers of all ages buoyed many people for many years. 

Bearlodge Writers, with the gracious approval of the Collier family, is honored to remember Gaydell by offering a scholarship in her name for the upcoming WWInc conference. Keeping Gaydell’s generosity in mind, we hope this scholarship will prove an encouragement and help its winner to grow and become the best writer he, or she, can be.  

The Gaydell Collier Memorial Scholarship (GCMS) will be awarded for the first time at the 2014 WWInc conference to be held in Sheridan, Wyoming, June 6-8 at the Holiday Inn Convention Center. The GCMS is open to any writer wishing to apply (BLW members are not eligible) and will include a full conference fee, a one-year membership to WWInc, and a $200 stipend. BLW will pay the registration and membership fee directly to WWInc, and award the stipend to the recipient at the conference. The recipient’s name will be publicized.

To apply for this scholarship, applicants are expected to follow a few simple guidelines. In a maximum of 250 words, answer this question, “How will attending the Wyoming Writers, Inc., conference propel you forward as a writer?” The author’s response must be typed, double-spaced, with one-inch margins, in Times New Roman font, size 12, on one side of one sheet of 8.5” X 11” white paper. Name, address, email address, and phone number should appear at the top of the page. Submissions should be mailed to Bearlodge Writers, P. O. Box 204, Sundance, WY 82729-0204, and postmarked no later than March 1, 2014.

The GCMS recipient and one alternate — chosen should the initial recipient be unable to attend the conference — will be notified on or slightly before April 21.

Artspace comes to Cheyenne Jan. 29

Cheyenne's downtown needs help.

I'm not the first one to say that. The lead editorial in today's Wyoming Tribune-Eagle said it. So has our mayor, city council people and just plain folks such as you and that person standing next to you.

Artspace, by itself, doesn't have the only answer to a vital downtown. But it can help. And it's good to see action replace complaining.

This Minneapolis-based organization's mission "is to create, foster and preserve affordable space for artists and arts organizations." It has helped cities from Minot, ND, to Fort Lauderdale rehab old spaces into thriving live/work spaces for artists. On Valentine's Day in Loveland, CO, Artspace will be part of a ground-breaking for artist residences at the old Loveland Feed & Grain Building, part of new arts campus. Loveland once was known as Fort Collins' sleepy southern cousin. Then it carved out a niche as a hotbed for sculpture, and now it boasts a downtown focused on the arts.

The Cheyenne Downtown Development Authority and Arts Cheyenne propose to partner with Artspace to create downtown spaces for artists to live, work and collaborate. Plan to attend one of the meetings on Wednesday, Jan. 29, to share your ideas with Artspace, and to hear what the organization can do for our downtown.

Here are the public meetings:

11:45 a.m.: City Council and community leadership work session at the Historic Plains Hotel, 1600 Central Ave.

2 p.m.: Artists and arts organization focus group, Old West Museum, 4601 Carey Ave.

5:30 p.m.: Public meeting, Plains Hotel Ballroom.

The 2 and 5:30 p.m. meetings will include a summary of Artspace artist survey results, possible sites for Artspace in downtown Cheyenne, and PowerPoint loop presentation on arts organizations.

Not every Artspace visit leads to a project. As an Arts Council staffer, I attended an Artspace session in Casper that did not lead to a project. However, it started the ball rolling on the revitalization of the city's downtown and its adjacent Old Yellowstone Historic District. The Casper Artists' Guild has designs on an old downtown warehouse and is halfway to its fund-raising goal of a million dollars to purchase and rehab the structure which it will share with a business, possibly a brewpub. The Nicolaysen and the city and a private developer teamed up to replace a crime-ridden apartment complex with LEED-certified low-income housing units, a public plaza and a unique sculpture, with funding help from the National Endowment for the Arts.

I also attended the "Living Upstairs in Wyoming" conference in Sheridan which explored the city's thriving downtown and the trend toward transforming the upstairs units of those buildings into living spaces. Sheridan's downtown is also home to dozens of outdoor sculptures. Cheyenne could learn a lot from its northern neighbors.

Southern neighbors, too: Loveland, Fort Collins, Greeley. Yes, I know that Wyomingites are intensely proud of the state and profess a dislike for its neighbors, "The Greenies." But it's self-defeating to not use all the ideas we can find to reinvent our downtown.

Mike the lawn ornament

Walked outside barefoot this morning just to see what 35 degrees feels like on coastal Florida.

It was cold.

Freeze warnings were in effect. A wind chill warning.

I spied no frost on my rental car's windshield. I did last week during the previous cold front.

Do I walk outside barefoot in Wyoming in January?

In a word, no.

It's much colder, for one thing. For another, my front yard is filled with pine cones and pine needles which are tough on tender feet. And often there is snow, also tough on bare feet. We had 20 below at the tail end of 2013 with wind chills down to 40 below. Flesh freezes quickly at 40 below. I may have stuck to the ground, might still be there if not for our usual January thaw. Mike the lawn ornament.

"Love your new lawn ornament, Mrs. Shay," said the postman

"That's my husband," Chris said. "He went outside barefoot. Thought he was in Florida."

"He'll be right as rain by May," said the postman.

"I'll miss him," she replied.

Yesterday I walked on the beach after the rain and before the cold front charged in. The ocean was calm, waves tiny. Wind blew in clouds from the west. I came across some quaint fisherfolk on the beach. Guy with New York accent reeled in his line. I greeted him. He said that he was having no luck today. His pals were up on the sand building a fire. "Smoking your fish?" I asked.

"No fish to smoke," he said.

He reeled. I walked, wished him good luck.

A half hour later, I walked by the fisherfolk again. Guy said, "Caught two big ones."

"Great!" I said.

He shook his head. "Just kidding."

"Maybe later."

"Maybe."

That's fishing for you. As I walked, I followed a set of smaller footprints, a women's shoe size, I guessed. Saw someone way ahead, on her way south. Came across a middle-aged woman playing fetch with her German Shepherd. As I got close, she hooked the big beast to a leash. Dogs aren't officially allowed on the beach. Wouldn't do to have a tourist from Wyoming mauled by this big fella. As she walked her dog back up the approach, the hound tugged on the leash toward me.  Probably wanted to come over and say hello. I'm a dog guy. Dogs can tell that. I'm not a cat guy. Cats can tell that and swarm all over me, bathing me in dander until I sneeze.

Today, I take my last walk on the beach for awhile. I may even remove my shoes if it warms up. Leave my footprints for the surf to wash away.

Mike was here -- for a short while.

Whale of a tale

We ran into the whale watchers at the beach today. An elderly couple about my age, already retired, on the beat to record the right whales lurking off Ormond Beach. Chris and I were sitting at the beach approach, decompressing after a long walk in the sand. Actually, Chris took a long walk as I tried to coax my knees into overdrive without much success.

The couple is on the lookout for whales every Thursday, 8 a.m.-noon. They hit five stations during that time, recording any right whales they happen to spy. The Atlantic is home to some 500 of these whales, not many when you look out and ponder the size of the ocean. The man in the duo said that he's seen three humpback whales off of this coast. I replied that I didn't know that humpback whales came to this part of the world. He said that humpbacks are easier to see that others because they have a dorsal fin and white marking that help them stand out against the blue-green waters. They also move fast. Right Whales are slow movers. Humpbacks are more like linebackers while the right whales are no-neck linemen. I have football on the mind.

I took it all in, wondering about the different whales and why some are endangered and others are not. We must have had whales in Wyoming when our state was drenched by the inland seas. Forty million years ago, give or take. My property and that of my neighbors was under tons of water, home to prowling plesiosaurs, but not sure about whales. But it's pretty clear that the demise of the dinosaurs opened the door for all of the mammals, including whales. About 55 million years ago, 10 million years after a giant asteroid and/or a swarm of erupting megavolcanoes put an end to the dinosaurs, even-toed ungulates started branching off from pigs and deer to become the whales glimpsed off the coast of Florida. Cool -- whales are related to barnyard pigs in Arkansas and foraging mule deer in Wyoming. I also have science on my mind.

I liked the fact that these two retirees were scouting the sea for whales even on their volunteer day off. They must be very dedicated to the cause. During this trip to Florida, I've been reading a lot about the shifting sands of tourism, about the fact that tourists are not just coming to Florida for the beaches but for trips along inland waterways, bird-watching tours, wildlife watching and explorations of Florida's many cultures. We plan a side trip to St. Augustine to explore its 500 years of settlement by Europeans preceded by many generations of Indian settlement. We won't be going to the beach, although St. Augustine has a fine one. I like beaches. I like warmth. But many people have left the freezing north for the warmth and the beaches and have found heartache instead. They leave friends and family and the life they know for slick online ads or glossy brochures It's warm here! Friendly, too! Come on down to paradise!

It's never that simple. When my dying father in Ormond Beach was being attended by Hospice personnel, I talked to them. One nurse said that it was a nice thing that my father had many visitors and that we all seemed to care so much. I replied that this must be the case with many of her charges. She shook her head. Sadly, no, she said. Most of her patients died alone. The spouse had already passed and the children and grandchildren and friends all lived in Michigan or New York or even Wyoming. There was an occasional visit from a new acquaintance or a pastor, but a lonely departure was the rule rather than the exception. Made me think. Why are so many retirees willing to give it up for life in paradise? I know what it's like to be cold and old. I know what it's like to be braced against a 20-below wind chill imagining a warm walk on a beach.

But a beach is not enough. I could imagine living here. I can imagine whale-watching. We would go to many events and explore the historic sites and museums. We have passions and pastimes to keep us involved and alert.

But I think this mantra will be on my mind: The beach is not enough. Repeat after me: The beach is not enough.

Or, as a cynical, bleary-eyed bartender in Key Largo once said to me and my new bride on a brilliant May evening in 1982, the setting sun coloring the sky, "Just another day in paradise."