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Help in your time of need Holiday hug Al-Anon offers strength and hope for families and friends of problem drinkers by COLLEEN SMITH ARMSTRONG Editor/Associate Publisher
Living with an alcoholic can be like walking a tightrope – one wrong move and you come crashing down. Al-Anon meetings provide a venue for friends and family members of problem drinkers to share their stories and learn steps to move forward. “I think everyone in that room has a tape recorder playing in their head of conversations and memories,” said Orcas Islander Diane, who wished to keep her last name private. “There are ways to get over that … Al-Anon is not something you go to for a few times and everything is fixed. It’s a lot of work.”
What is Al-Anon
Colleen Smith Armstrong/Staff Photo
Above: A grateful friend of Santa and Mrs. Claus at the Orcas Island Chamber’s tree-lighting in the Village Green on Dec. 3.
Often confused with Alcoholics Anonymous, Al-Anon is for friends and family of alcoholics. It is for those who are living with or who have lived with a person who has an addiction. Those who attend meetings learn that they are not alone in the problems they face, and that they have choices that lead to greater peace of mind, whether the drinker continues to consume alcohol or not. There is
some crossover attendance from “I am so happy I have a place Alcoholics Anonymous, but only to come to where people have the when an addicted person has been same kind of problems,” Diane in recovery for a sustained period said. of time and his/her sponsor feels Another anonymous source that Al-Anon would be beneficial. said Al-Anon helps her forge betAl-Anon’s program of recovery ter relationships and communiis based on the “Twelve Steps” and cate her needs. “Twelve Traditions” of Alcoholics “The group helps me be more Anonymous. The steps are a responsible towards my actions foundation for and learn how to be personal recov“I am so happy I have an adult and react ery and the to situations in a a place to come to traditions help measured way,” she groups sustain where people have said. “Growing up their unity and in a family of genthe same kind of fellowship. erations of alcoholDiane, who ics, there weren’t problems.” grew up with many role models — Diane, Al-Anon member that resonated with alcoholic parents, has been me. And I always attending Al-Anon sessions for put other people ahead of my around four decades. Whatever own needs. I never knew what I town she’s lived in, she has sought needed. Al-Anon has helped me out the support group. She has put myself in the equation … I’ve been involved with Orcas Al-Anon learned how to take responsibilfor 10 years and was a group leader ity for my own feelings – no one for six years. can make me feel a certain way “It has helped me with every ... Al-Anon provides a good road day living,” she said. “I do the map for finding some semblance daily readings and try to work the of joy and happiness instead of 12 steps.” drama and fear.” Some of the important lessons Al-Anon meets on Mondays at she has learned are to stop, think, 7 p.m. and Thursdays at 5:30 p.m. and reply thoughtfully in difficult at Emmanuel Church. Sometimes situations and see the good, not SEE AL-ANON, PAGE 6 the bad, throughout her life.
The ‘Big One’: impacts of earthquake or tsunami by MEREDITH M. GRIFFITH Staff reporter
The tsunami devastated the coast of Japan, washing away homes and killing 1,000 people on a winter’s night It was the year 1700. Japanese history calls it “The Orphan Tsunami” because it seemed to birth itself; they felt no warning earthquake. The Pacific Coast has no such comprehensive written history, and for a long time quake experts believed that the closest fault, the Cascadia subduction zone, was safely aseismic. That was until they found mysteriously sunken Northwest forests that appeared to have been killed by salt intrusion – in the year 1700. And before scientists doing horizontal geodetic modeling discovered that the Olympics are creeping languidly toward Tiger Mountain. It turns out that the eastward-moving Juan de Fuca tectonic plate is not sliding smoothly
beneath the westward-moving North American plate; instead, it’s bunching up, building up tremendous pressure that scientists believe will eventually let loose in the space of a few minutes. If the fault’s five segments all “go off ” at once, a 9.0-plus magnitude megaquake could launch twin killer tsunamis, one toward the Pacific Coast and one toward Japan. Seismologists now believe that’s what caused The Orphan Tsunami in 1700. When the plates finally slipped free, the pent-up Pacific Coast dropped by about five feet, submerging forests. Within 35 minutes, tsunami waves had hit the outer West Coast, depositing sand layers that can be identified today. The westwardmoving tsunami took about nine hours to reach Honshu. State DNR Chief Hazards Geologist Tim Walsh held 80 Orcas Islanders spellbound with earth-shaking tales as he shared about earth-
quake potential in the Pacific Northwest at a Nov. 17 event hosted by the San Juan County Department of Emergency Management. Predictions as to when the plates will roar again vary, but Walsh said six past events affecting Washington have occurred 500 to 550 years apart. In 2011, we’re at 311 years and counting. Canadian and U.S. experts have offered probabilities of 14 to 29 percent that the event could occur during the next 50 years. How could a Cascadia subduction zone megaquake and tsunami affect the islands? The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Association (NOAA) Center for Tsunami Research has been creating tsunami modeling to help Washington state communities prepare. They’re focusing on high populations first, but plan to model for the San Juans next year. NOAA is modeling this particular size of quake based on the probability of such an event
SEE EARTHQUAKE, PAGE 6
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