I was driving home a couple days ago, when I saw a pick up truck at a pull out with a "Gwen Lachelt Recall Petition" sign and an old gal with a clip board in hand. Driving by I started thinking about why she was doing it, so I turned around and drove back to ask. She had the basic boilerplate complaints. Gwen went to Washington D.C. to raise a stink about oil company Fracking and Methane leak regulations. What's wrong with that, I ask? She was fulfilling promises that helped get her elected by citizens like myself, there was nothing secret or inappropriate about it.
There was no answer forthcoming, instead she continued to the next point of contention, the awful Draft Land Use Code. Well, okay, but is that really a justification for starting a recall petition, which is normally reserved for extreme misconduct and dereliction of duty, not for differences of opinions. Why is only one of three commissions who shared blame for the Draft Land Code disaster being attacked? Incidentally, what about the reality that the Draft is being reworked and already much improved, thanks to the normal run of our democratic process. Again, not much of a response, instead we moved on to her trump card.
(This time I get personal and finish this post with pictures of my current renovation project.
Yup, you guessed it, making excuses for my sporadic posting record.)
She let me know, what I already knew, she came from multi-generational ranching royalty with a rich local history. She remembers the way it was, and has had enough of the changes, always more laws and more taxes, and more crowding, and more people telling them their business, they've had it and simply want to be left alone.
Tough to argue with that. Even though my own local memory only goes back some 30 years, it was certainly nicer and freer than today. I can only image how much nicer it was in the decades before my arrival and I too fear for future generations around here. But what's Gwen got to do with those demographic realities? Perhaps if we'd have taken the threats of population explosion more seriously in the 70s, 80s, 90s we wouldn't be in this bind we find ourselves trapped in. But, that's a different argument.
Then I pulled my trump card and asked her how she felt being a pawn for the Koch Brothers and whether she was aware of the connections between "SaveLaPlataCounty dot Com" and "American's for Prosperity" the Koch propaganda and recruiting front group - she took offense at the suggestion. She was absolutely sure that her movement had nothing to do with being orchestrated by outside forces who have their own agenda, which has nothing to do with our local interests or needs.
I left her with a flier that included the information, it would have been interesting to be a fly on the wall and watch her as she read through it, or did she toss it out unread? How to communicate with self-certain people who seem to have no interest in challenging their assumptions? That my friends is the challenge of our age.
A work project has again torn me away from my wannabe writer tasks. I find it frustrating because there's so much to catch up on. On top of everything else now we have the Cambridge Analytica story with its important repercussion for everyone interested in saving what democracy we still have left, but so it is. We deal with the world we inhabit, not in our wannabes. In any event, to assuage my frustrations this time, I'm going to share some pictures of my most recent project, funky but fun, in its own way. Guess I figure, this is also a sort of character reference.
; - )
Before,
hmmm, I was told it was just sheetrock,
Now homeowners get a clear view and need to weight options and get engineers okay,
Beefing up bearing points down to the ground,
view from above,
collar ties in, next removal of ceiling joints,
proceed with caution,
It's not the job you are doing that's most important,
It's how well you are doing, the job you're doing, that's most important.
Cheers.
No comments:
Post a Comment