a look back

Sometimes, looking at pieces I wrote in the past makes me cringe, both because my writing seems creaky and my perspective has changed since publication. And while I'm not exactly cringing over this piece, published in the fall of 2007 for Oregon Humanities magazine, I know I'd write a drastically different version today.

Even the housing crash of 2008 seems like ancient history compared with recent tax credits for first-time home buyers and landlord incentives for commercial and residential renters.

Then there's my personal story: I'm finally hunting for a house. I'm in the trenches with other first-time buyers, battling for low-priced fixers that are selling with 24 hours of hitting the market here in Portland.

Maybe I need to write "A Home of One's Own, Part Deux"?

no room for cream

Lately I've been fighting off the end-of-winter blahs by drinking an inordinate amount of coffee. I paid attention, too, trying to discern the hints, the overtones and the smack-you-in-the-face flavors that tickled my palate. For example, someone at Stumptown IDed a lemon hard candy (as opposed to lemon rind, peel, zest, candied balm or blossom) in an Ethiopian Mordecofe Sidamo.

Of course I like these games...playing with words, coaxing new levels of perception from an overstimulated mind/body. In order to really go there with coffee, I've slowly weaned myself from cream, which I liked to add to French press brew, my favorite method of delivery. Now a splash of cream seems like a decadent dessert, one that coats my mouth with richness but masks any little spikes of acidity or earthiness. So, cream sometimes.

I've been a big fan of Stumptown ever since I moved to Portland, and won't soon forget my first cup of coffee at the Belmont location. I couldn't believe I was having the experience for a mere $1 (prices have gone up since then). Therefore, I was delighted to interview owner Duane Sorenson for a piece in the March issue of Best Life magazine. He's hit the big time this year with a new location in NYC, which I plan to visit when I'm in the city next month.

sausage making

I first met nutrition advocate Nancy Becker at a round table of dietitians, nutrition advocates and politicians rallying for a new, statewide menu labeling bill. They talked about calorie counts at Subway and praised Multnomah County's new food labeling law. What struck me about the meeting had less to do with the actual debate (opponents call menu labeling intrusive big government while proponents take the access-to-information route) than the mechanics of law making.

Since moving to Oregon, I've had few chances to report on the state's legislative process, but writing about Nancy Becker for the spring issue of Edible Portland magazine launched me back into the world of policy making. Becker's story reminded me just how long it can take to turn an idea into a law: decades, at times. Still, there's room for all of us in the process. But don't get involved without taking some of my mother's advice: Patience is a virtue.

true colors

On a day when I'm feeling extraordinarily proud to be an American, I couldn't help but think about the many times I've shown strangers my navy blue passport, which through its color alone, reveals my nationality. At airports and border crossings, I find myself trying to catch a glimpse the colors of everyone else's passport covers while I tuck mine inside pockets and plane tickets. (Some mysteries should be preserved, at least for a few moments.)

How appropriate that today my husband applied for a new passport, which should arrive within two weeks. Applying for a passport is a patriotic act, a statement that you appreciate the homeland enough to leave it. And come back. That said, I wouldn't mind having more than one (there's nothing wrong with having an extra quiver), but no matter how much I think back, I can't seem to remember growing up in a foreign country.

no excuses

It's winter, but I'm pushing the line that there are few excuses for choosing to hop in a warm car instead of onto a bicycle. Check out my piece about commuting by bike during these dark days in the current Women's Adventure magazine. Ignore my reference to rising gas prices. At deadline time, the idea of a gallon of gas for less than $2 seemed insane, yet here we are.

it's election day somewhere

moving mud

Having trouble getting the debate to stream live on this computer in...where am I right now?...seriously, I can not remember. Mendez to Limon. I am in Limon, tiny mellow jungle town with an internet cafe packed with teenagers on a...what day is it?..Tuesday night.

I am in a non touristy part of the jungle right now, which means few hotels, zero pizza and plenty of attention for the gringa. Sometimes when I start talking to people (slowly, carefully and clearly), they just stare at me in seeming disbelief that I can talk and that I am talking to them. The men like to ask each other if I am their wife..ha ha. They find it hilarious when I enter that conversation.

Today I must have seen 800 huge trucks and tractors. The whole southern Oriente seems to be crawling with them as they push huge boulders and piles of mud into more piles that promise a future of better roads and bridges. There is nothing delicate about their work. Today my bus broke down in the mud just a few minutes before we had to stop for an hour to watch said trucks grunt and crawl across the hillside. Adding hours to all transit plans for the next few days.

At this point, I am quite accustomed to seeing pigs in bus stations, chickens in town squares, people boarding buses with machetes and toddlers wearing rubber boots. My own rubber boots have been nicely broken in, worth every penny of the 7 dollars I spent in Coca.