Editorial

August is usually a broiling time of year, but as I write this it’s gray and kind of drizzly outside; a welcome relief for all of us concerned with fires and drought. Fires and drought: It sounds like some biblical warning of imminent disaster. In truth, our world does seem to feel more and more like we’re living in perilous times. The likelihood of those natural disasters happening to us in any given year has grown to be an accepted reality, living here in all this splendor.

After a smoky and dry summer and a year of pandemic shutdowns, we are (mostly) sending our kids back to school. But we’re not exactly sure what we are teaching them. We have mixed lessons about wearing a facial mask. Maybe they help limit the spread of coronavirus droplets, but do mandated masks violate our personal freedoms? At the same time, there’s an ironclad prohibition that no student may walk into a school barefooted. What’s the lesson here? Is it that risking the spread of a deadly virus is less serious than exposing one’s toes?

100 years ago – August 11, 1921

There’s no use putting this off any longer; now is as good a time as any to tackle one of the most controversial topics of all. No, we’re not talking about capital punishment or global climate change; we’re talking about pie making.

The following snippets of history are drawn from the pages of the Healdsburg Tribune, the Healdsburg Enterprise and the Sotoyome Scimitar, and are prepared by the volunteers at the Healdsburg Museum & Historical Society. Admission is always free at the museum, open Wednesday through Sunday, 11 a.m. to 4 p.m.

Return our fire services tax dollars to Fitch Mountain

The 32nd annual Summer Olympics have come to a close in Tokyo, Japan. There were moments of lifetime achievements, world records, tears and raw emotions, a few lessons about mental health and stress, transgender milestones and, overall, a surprisingly successful collection of games, competition and camaraderie — all under a cloud of a global coronavirus pandemic.

The following snippets of history are drawn from the pages of the Healdsburg Tribune, the Healdsburg Enterprise and the Sotoyome Scimitar, and are prepared by the volunteers at the Healdsburg Museum & Historical Society. Admission is always free at the museum, open Wednesday through Sunday, 11 a.m. to 4 p.m.

Facts matter, but only when enough people accept and believe them. Reader comments to last week’s editorial in this space offered much disheartening proof to this. Our “disturbing picture” satire that proffered that the 2020 Presidential Election was fraudulent and Biden’s victory was illegitimate was celebrated by some as bold fact telling, mistaking mockery for concession.

It’s been a couple of decades since we started hearing about how climate change would impact the planet and hence, the creatures living on it. Ice would melt, seas would rise and extreme weather would get more extreme: hotter, colder, windier, wetter, dryer.