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What I learned from my own Salem blogging class

Tuesday, June 22nd, 2010

The drive to become better at what you do is an amazing thing.

Take the free blogging class I offered yesterday at Clockworks Cafe and Cultural Center. I went into it hoping that it wouldn’t fall completely flat and I left feeling the amazing power of being surrounded by people intent on focusing and developing their craft.

If you offer a free blogging class, chances are good that some already excellent bloggers are going to show up. Indeed, the room was filled to capacity (read: everyone got a chair) by people who have much to teach ME:

Jessica Ramey of Northwest Nest
Rob McGuire (once Salem’s top Tweeter until he closed his account, who knows enough about WordPress to identify my blog design by name)
Salem Man of Eatsalem and Salemites fame
Christy Hey (okay, not yet blogging, but she teaches music for tots!)
K. Williams Brown, the Statesman Journal’s oh-so-adorble entertainment columnist

We also had a great showing among people who are active on Twitter and Facebook but who have been looking for the right project to turn into a blog. Lots of would-be writers looking to make the leap towards self-publication in the blog form.

I think it went pretty well, but I’ll have to make it explicit that my class is a blog WRITING class and that we won’t be getting into the specifics of setting up a blog, making a post, etc., at least from the technical side of things. I’ll be giving the same class on July 12 at 6:00 p.m. at Clockworks.

Finally, I’ll leave you with an image: Me, getting hoodooed by a guy with a mini production studio who sets his stuff up right next to me and announces that he’ll be recording the free class for his website.

How can you say no don’t record me in a course focused on citizen journalism empowerment and new media creation? Sigh. Kind of impressed by the boldness of the enterprise, but it really does challange the intimacy of a setting…

Posted in Media, These are the people in my neighborhood | 14 Comments »

I Promise You a Rose Garden

Friday, June 4th, 2010

The woman who lived in our house before us loved roses and planted eight of them on our property. Every day when my husband comes home from work, he picks one and brings it to me.

Adam’s a plant guy, and he has spent the past two weeks potting succulents, the only plants our cat won’t eat. He’s not big on flowers and last night I found out why.

“Look at those poppies on the table,” he said, pointing to the orange poppies he recently picked from a ditch here in town. “They look so happy. They don’t even know that they are dying.”

I’ve always kind of felt that way about roses. They are so Miss Havisham.

Even growing up in Pennsylvania’s Red Rose City, I always knew that their beauty was lost on me.

But not here!

The roses in our neighborhood here in Salem are heavy with blossoms at this point – droopy heads bending over to reach the grass. But all across the micro-hood we call home, roses are doing their languid burlesque.

My neighbor has a red rose growing on her front wall, the Ingrid Bergman rose, that has blooms larger than my baby’s head. We have roses woven through the fence in our back patio that bloom and rebloom for several weeks each summer — sure puts those ideas about temporality to shame. And now I’ve discovered this rose, which reminds me of an 1980s dress one might wear while roller skating, at the Portland International Rose Test Garden.

Even if you don’t love roses. Even if you think that the scent of a rose reminds you of the toilette of an 115-year-old woman. Even if No rose has ever smelled as sweet. It is almost impossible not to be happy when you’re surrounded by these gently unfolding pink ladies.

Posted in These are the people in my neighborhood, Travel | 4 Comments »

Welcome to the Secret Society

Friday, May 21st, 2010

I had to giggle a bit a while back when I got lumped into Salem’s new creative class, but that got me thinking. An influx of new creative folks into Salem’s affordable, sometimes charming, often grubby Northeast city section? Is there any legitimacy to that?

There is!

I’ve always held that stuff happens in Salem — it’s just laughlingly under-the-radar. Well… something is definitely afoot in the Northeast Salem neighborhoods.

All it took was one party at my friend the poet’s house (also in NE Salem) to determine that there are a lot of us small-housers out here milking the city for its historic properties and living large on a tiny footprint. In addition to me, my sculptor of a husband and my baby Dash, a.k.a. The Next Alexander Calder, we have:

Michael Chasar, a Poet with an Penchant for Pop

Stephanie Lenox, editor of Blood Orange Review, a well-received online literary mag

William Bragg, photographer - or you might know him as a champion for the underpriveleged

Jonathan Bucci, multimedia artist, and his writer wife, Rachel Bucci

Any more you can think of? Whom have I forgotten? Whom haven’t I met yet?

As far as I know, all of the people listed here have been in Salem for five years or less. Yay for new blood — and for E.B. White quotes that can lend themselves to cities other than New York.

Posted in Art, Celebrities, Home, Salem Mysteries: SOLVED!, There's something about Salem, These are the people in my neighborhood | 19 Comments »

A Clockwork Awesome

Sunday, May 16th, 2010

You were probably among the hundreds who gathered at a retooled space on Commercial Street last Friday to celebrate the opening of Clockwork’s Cafe and Cultural Center, a project dreamed up by Ryan Rogers and his merry men (and women) of Culture Shock.

I wasn’t.

I was throwing together dinner while preparing Dash for his oh so early 7 p.m. bedtime. But I heard it was a great party and I knew I had to get down there soon to see what’s brewing.

For one, Stumptown! Perhaps the best development for us coffee-addicted snooty sippers, the cafe is serving the country’s best coffee. Stumptown doesn’t let just any old coffee place serve its roasts. From what I hear from Ryan, they interview you. Clockworks must have been deemed worthy because I’m sipping some Indonesian varietal at this very moment.

As you can tell from the pictures, Clockworks isn’t your garden variety cafe that’s been thrown together with no concept. Opening as it does, just as the Steampunk aesthetic is reaching the mainstream, it’s got a clock fixture and found art sensibility that hasn’t been done well (if at all) in Salem before.

Clockworks is a nonprofit, and as such, it will be offering a wide program of events. I’d be tempted to say something for everyone, but I kind of throw up a little in my mouth everytime I read that, so I’ll just say that I might even want to offer my own writing class in its rocking spaces.

Some things one might do at Clockworks:

Take a class (perhaps even by yours truly, more on that to come) at C4 Academy
Give a class (Salem creatives, contact Christy Seehey, 503-399-7076)
Learn how to dance
Rock out, slam towards, puppet over, laugh in on the Clockworks stage (seen above)
Make out in the huge barrel at the back of the main room
Let your kids play in the kids space in the mezzanine
Cut some digital audio once the sound room is finished
Find some space to clear your head in the little writing nook
Hang with friends in the (actually very cool) lounging area
Read a book in a pillow-laden bathtub (to come!)

Something for everyone? (Blech! Sorry…) Perhaps not. There’s definitely nothing for the Keep Salem Lame-r’s here, but they’ll just stay at home anyway.

Posted in Art, Coffee, There's something about Salem, These are the people in my neighborhood, Uncategorized | 6 Comments »

Almost Famous

Tuesday, April 27th, 2010

So a bunch of my readers have alerted me to my having been named the #82 most famous person in Salem by K. Williams Brown, the Statesman-Journal entertainment reporter.

First of all I’d like to say thank you.

Second of all, I’d like to protest that I don’t count. I have this idea in my head that people who are working in media, especially as reporters, don’t get to count as famous because they already possess the means to get their voices out there. Unfair — it is, it is! — to group me with the likes of Gerry Frank, Salem’s own Ace of Cakes, who ranked #1 on the list.

Third, notice my placement at #82. As adorably self-deprecating as Kelly’s column is, let us not forget that SHE IS MYLOCAL COLUMN-WRITING NEMESIS and wouldn’t dare rank me in the top 50.

What’s so great about Kelly’s column is the ridiculousness of there even being any Salem celebrities in the first place. Notice that she only actually names about a dozen people, assigning them almost random rankings (I kept expecting there to see a nod to Jon Heder, graduate of South Salem High School, and one-time tot-toting movie star of Napoleon Dynamite. Sigh, no dice).

I would also like to point out one more person who is as high profile as they come and didn’t warrant mention. That nice-looking crazy transvestite that roams the space between Savage Road, NE and the I-5 underpass on Market Street. Love that guy. Um, gal.

Finally, I would argue that the sexiest people in Salem are the ones that guard their anonymity fiercely, like Salem’s own J.D. Salinger, the writer of the Capital Taps Beer Blog, who has never once aired his name or his dirty laundry in public. There is a genuine attractiveness to hiding behind the work you put out — especially if it’s good stuff.

As for me, maybe I’ll hide my big head behind this increasingly gorgeous muffin face.

Posted in Beer: It's what's for dinner, There's something about Salem, These are the people in my neighborhood | 6 Comments »

New Growth Forest

Monday, April 5th, 2010

I rarely admit to loving television commercials, but I’ve got a soft spot for that Subaru short where the driver gets his Outback all sexy muddy and then waits for it to rain, calling it a Subaru carwash. Clearly, this is a spot that has reached its intended audience — lazy old me, who is only happy when it rains and who connects with her forest green Impreza on a level that some might call intimate.

So how happy was I when my husband pointed out that we had a small tuft of moss growing right behind my left front wheel. Am I a bad or neglectful car owner for wanting to watch this little patch GROW GROW GROW its way into the thick carpet that blankets my front walk?

It’s like a big fuzzy green Muppet eyebrow for my wheels!

Your attachment to most might depend on how long you have considered yourself an Oregonian. Most people I talk to hate the moss that creeps stealthily up to their roofs. Moss, like the lowly dandelion, is an unwelcome guest at many house parties.

But hey, we rent our house, so for now, we say bring it on, moss. Go ahead and build yourself up in accumulations that begin, ever so slightly but powerfully, to make me think I’m sharing a house with more than just a husband, a baby and two cats.

Posted in There's something about Salem, These are the people in my neighborhood | 1 Comment »

January Salem Monthly out

Wednesday, January 6th, 2010

I’ve often wished that everyone I know in Salem could meet my neighbors, Keith and Sarah Chilcote. They have introduced us to some of the secret sides of the city (he’s my pick-your-own pinot hookup) and have overwhelmed us with their generosity and good natures.

Well, now you can! Salem Monthly just did a little story on them and their business, American Antique Hardware.

Keith is one of the most loquacious people I have ever known. I am consistently amazed that he can manage a dozen properties, run a business and be father to three darling children when he can barely remove himself from a good conversation. Adam and I both have dad crushes on him.

Sarah is a fabulous mom who has found a way to work from home and raise her kids there — a goal I’m striving for myself. All new parents need role models, and we seem to be surrounded by them.

They have built this mini-Eden in the middle of Northeast Salem, a secret city alcove the is all but overflowing with pears and apples and blueberries and plums in the summer.

Oh, and they sell awesome antique hardware at decent prices. Eat it, Hippo Hardware!

By the way, if you are one of the 2.3 people out there who are wondering why there is no Desperately Seeking Salem column in the January issue of Salem Monthly, I’ll enlighten you.

I totally dropped the ball!

Well, kind of. I’m generally gestating these pieces until about the 23rd of the month, when I write them out in a spontaneous burst of literary activity that lasts about an hour. I was working on such a piece when I went into labor.

Thankfully my editor gave me a reprieve for January. Thanks, Eric!

So sorry to my readers: grandma, Jan and my cat De Kooning. I’ll be back in business next month.

Posted in Celebrities, Home, These are the people in my neighborhood | 2 Comments »

Skeletons in My Closet

Thursday, October 1st, 2009

LadiesSwap

So here’s the real epiphany to come out of the ladies’ clothing swap I hosted a few weeks ago at my house. I have a lot of horrendously boring clothing.

Laugh-out-loud boring.

Kill-you-with-kindness boring.

Stench of 1995 boring.

I mean, bags of it. Of black pants, and white shells and — gasp! — sweater vests and all sorts of things that I used to wear at my office job at the German Embassy but, which have been dying a slow death in my closet for the past four years.

Perhaps I am an awful friend for trying to lob these staid skeletons off on my friends, but that’s what I did. I wrote about the experience in this month’s Desperately Seeking Salem column over at Salem Monthly.

I invited women from different cubby holes of my Salem life — only two of them knew each other — to bring their own cast-offs and trade for new ones. Anything left at the end of the night I was taking to the Salvation Army.

Here’s what I learned about how to have a clothing swap:

1. Keep it smallish. Nine women in one room is just about the perfect number for a swap; anything more than that and you might as well be at the Goodwill Bins.

2. Invite the ladies — or dudes — to share a story about one of their cast-offs. Every garment has a story.

3. Like all charitable donations, clothing swap are equal parts altruism and greed. I felt good dropping off the bag of clothes at the Salvation Army, but I knew the real benefit for myself was in getting to know these ladies as a group, ridding myself of my boring former self, and achieving the catharsis of a good closet clean-out.

4. Don’t let your husband come. Mine had gone out to Noble’s Tavern, his new dive hangout, with a friend, but returned to find a pile of clothing the size of a three-year-old on our living room floor. He then went through every single item saying: “This is cute, this would look great on you, are you sure you don’t want this?” I am married to a champion rummager.

5. My new friends in Salem are awesome.

Posted in Shopping, There's something about Salem, These are the people in my neighborhood | 5 Comments »

Won't You Feed My Neighbor

Monday, August 10th, 2009

Microhood

We had our first-ever neighborhood jam in the microhood last weekend. Families from seven homes brought burgers, chips, cakes, cookies, beer, wine, and a whole lotta good will to hang out for five hours and listen to Adam rock out on the guitar.

microhood: n. 1). the handful of houses surrounding yours that don’t have perpetual garage sales on their lawns and whose inhabitants smile and wave when you see them. 2). a community of good neighbors

Since I was bringing guests, I felt like I had to step up and provide more than the requisite one dish to share.

So I brought along three summer season, locally-inspired dishes perfect for serving to the crowd.

1. Gazpacho. Or as the kids called it, a big bowl of salsa.

Gazpacho

This gazpacho included six tomatoes, one green pepper and two onions, one purple pepper from the Salem Saturday Market, and two yellow heirloom tomatoes from my garden. I served it with a stack of custard cups — it’s intended as a cold soup — but the group seemed more inclined to dip tortilla chips in it.

WARNING: Beware of double dippers when your chip vs. salsa ratio is so whack.

2. Fennel, mache and parmesan salad. I’ve been thumbing through blogger Molly Wizenberg’s new book A Homemade Life, which is based on her wildly popular food blog Orangette and have worked up a couple of versions of her favorite family recipes. This salad, made simply of fennel shards layered with parmesan flakes, salt, pepper, lemon juice, and olive oil, is a knockout.

Fennel
To make this, I used fennel from the Salem Saturday Market, beefed up a bit with mache from the bearded dude who sells the eggs there (La Terra Vita), parmesan from Trader Joe’s, and lemon from, well, I don’t know… California?

Adam’s been wanting a Meyer lemon tree, but he hasn’t picked one up yet.

3. Blueberry crumble.

Crumble
Blueberries hand-picked from Sunnyview Farms Blueberries, picked last Monday, peaches picked from my neighbor’s tree that morning (shake it!), and a streusel crumble on top. We served this with the amazing Umpqua 150th Anniversary of Oregon ice cream, which you can pick up at Roth’s.

The gold-label ice cream has flavors of roasted hazelnuts, clover honey, and huckleberry syrup.

Screw fences. Good food makes good neighbors.

Posted in Food, There's something about Salem, These are the people in my neighborhood | 12 Comments »

Desperately Tweeting Salem

Saturday, August 1st, 2009

cover

My husband came home last night to find, as he often does, something suspicious on my computer screen.

This time, it was my open TweetDeck, the tool that makes sending and viewing tweets on the micro-blogging site Twitter easier.

He scrolled through the recent tweets, he clicked on a couple of the “mentions” — the tweets that have come from conversations I have been having and from other tweeters mentioning me — and he had an epiphany.

“I don’t know any of these people you’re writing to!”

“I don’t know them either!” I said.

That’s been the beauty of Twitter. Except for a former college friend, who went on to write the world’s best book on competetive eating, I don’t really know the roughly 200 people who follow my tweets and the 200 people that I follow. Unlike my facebook friends, all of whom I have met in person, Twitter is my place to mingle in the madding crowd. And though I admit to being a reluctant Tweeter at the get-go, I have grown to see the massive opportunity it represents for me, my work and my life.

Here are a few examples:

1. Story ideas. If you’re a journalist, you can’t not be on Twitter, where many of the stories are happening. This month, you might want to read my Salem Monthly cover story on Salem’s Top Tweeps, my first-ever Twitter-based story. Tweep #1 himself is Rob McGuire, a local IT guru. I’d like to give special thanks to editor Eric Howald and his team, who were inspired to frame the story in the style of a 1970s-era Audobon Field Guide. Brilliant!

Sadly, the Salem Monthly site has not yet posted the rest of the feature, which includes nine other interesting people whom you have never in your life heard of (again, beauty of Twitter). But until it gets posted, you can always pick up a paper copy. Your best bet is the Coffeehouse Cafe downtown, but you can find them pretty much at all the independently-minded businesses and organizations, the Beanery, Kim Huong’s, the Public Library, etc).

If you don’t see one, it’s because our publisher actually bikes them around town all by himself. That can take time.

2. Troubleshooting. I have found my new WordPress Fairy through Twitter. I have a reader of this blog who is meeting with me next week to discuss ways I can develop this site. I’m kind of a mediocre techie, and while I can go so far with pics and print — my kind of stuff — playing around with the possibilities of WordPress is pretty daunting for me. Bibbity bobbity boo!

3. Self-promotion. I post all of the links to my blog posts on Twitter; and yes, people actually click on them. Amazing!

4. Shopping tips. When you’re in a new place and you can’t always call my friend Jan, Twitter is great for finding the goods. I recently posted a request for an art framery in Salem and my Tweeps responded in kind. This item goes along with:

5. The overall goodness of the world. Good people! Helping you out! Without agenda! If anything Twitter makes me feel like the world is a wonderful place. My Twitter stories are slowly replacing 30 years of customer service nightmares in my mind.

6. The power of individuals. If Twitter has shown me anything, it is that individuals can have voices to their own surprising audiences amid all of the media chatter. I’m not one of those media people who are scared by what happens when you give EVERYONE a voice. Actually, I really love it.

This post is dedicated to Iowa’s best new food writer and my former multimedia guru Nick Bergus who, like a little bird in my ear, convinced me I had to get on Twitter last March. Thanks, Nick!

Posted in Media, There's something about Salem, These are the people in my neighborhood | 9 Comments »

Desperately Seeking Salem