







Wednesday, February 13, 2019
Last week, I expressed my ambivalence toward Valentine’s Day. To recap: People who want to make a big deal of it and break out the flowers and bust out the candy—I don’t really get it, but I’m cool with it. As for people who abhor Valentine’s Day, everything it stands for and everyone who celebrates it—I don’t get that either, but live and let live.
In other words, when it comes to Valentine’s Day, you do you, boo.
However, something I can get behind is an unorthodox…
Wednesday, February 13, 2019
I was in her father’s Lummi Island basement crouched awkwardly behind a chest freezer knocking cobwebs into the hose nozzle of an overmatched Shop-Vac when the Lady of the House swooped in to remind me that—contingent to our regular midwinter cabin-cleaning chores—we were still on the hook to rescue a rowboat.
“It’s an hour and a half before sunset,” she said. “If we’re going to haul the SS Sculpin off the beach we need to start sooner rather than later.”
“I’m…
Wednesday, February 13, 2019
In a way that only comfort food can, a bowl of cacio e pepe—a pasta dish supposedly created by shepherds tending their flocks—saved me when I was a writing student in Rome.
My classes took place in an ancient building in the Campo de Fiori, which means “field of flowers,” but belies that a man was burned at the stake there for heresy against the Catholic Inquisition. I was that muddled student who got lost, couldn’t hear instructions and penned the worst poetry ever written…
Wednesday, February 13, 2019
This month offers a fine opportunity to see and compare the work of two outstanding artists—Anita Lehmann at Perry and Carlson Gallery in Mount Vernon, and Margy Lavelle at i.e. gallery in Edison. Each creates “abstractions,” but their approaches are very different.
Lehmann’s works in the “Westbound” exhibit arise from her “westbound journey” to Seattle 35 years ago, and evoke the excitement and passion she feels for the divine landscape of the Pacific Northwest.
A…
Wednesday, February 13, 2019
Local writers who have long dreamed of seeing their work in print in a newspaper—or in the pages of a book, or inside of a city bus, or even on a placard outside of the Bellingham Public Library—have numerous opportunities in the near future to make that fantasy a reality.
At the Cascadia Weekly, we’ve been accepting submissions for the past month for our revived Fiction 101 Contest—something our staff hasn’t attempted since we all had a lot less gray hair and the paper…
Wednesday, February 13, 2019
Last February, Anneka Deacon felt the love from the approximately 1,000 humans who showed up at the Bellingham Circus Guild’s Cirque Lab to witness the heart-stopping magic of “My Circus Valentine.”
But the cofounder of the Circus Guild and the producer of the Valentine’s Day hootenanny wants it known the affection she was the recipient of wasn’t just limited to the audiences who flocked to the high-ceilinged venue in Fairhaven to watch local artists and dazzling special guests share…
Wednesday, February 13, 2019
A continued polar storm front has scrambled resources to provide severe weather housing for the unsheltered.
Mayor Kelli Linville signed a proclamation on Monday that an emergency exists throughout the City of Bellingham and authorized the city to provide emergency assistance to the victims of this current winter storm and take other actions to protect life and property.
The mayor’s order gives the city the ability to enter into emergency contracts with other service providers and…
What makes a great neighborhood? Well, one that is walkable, with tree-lined streets and ample parks, nearby services and entertainment. One that allows people to work from or near their homes. Many artists have moved to Sunnyland for exactly that reason, so they can run a studio out of their home—and that has produced a flourishing local arts community. Sunnyland is a nucleus for many of the favorite haunts and hangouts cited in this year’s reader survey.
That dynamism has a downside, too, and Sunnyland is experiencing some growing pains from its tangy mix of industrial and commercial uses in proximity to family homes. Friends, an outdoor beer garden is a heartbreaking thing to quarrel about! I predict they’ll soon solve those problems, and continue to claim their crown as Bellingham’s favorite neighborhood.
Info: http://www.sunnylandneighborhood.com