PAGE 8
REDSTONE • REVIEW
JANUARY 20 / FEBRUARY 17, 2021
OPPORTUNITY Looking at the sights and hearing the sounds around me as we enter the new year By Phil Aumiller Redstone Review LYONS – I know I don’t see everything. Besides the obvious reasons – dust, darkness, glasses, my oblivious (or is it focused?) disposition – there’s the fact that some things are just hard to see. I can hear a family of deer every morning by the creek. I know they can hear me as I split wood, but that doesn’t constitute a threat and they choose to keep grazing on the fallen leaves and the longer grass down there that the horses seem hesitant to eat. They seem to welcome the shelter of the numerous willow trunks propped up in
awkward arches after their rotting bases finally failed in the snow and wind of the past couple of years. The cottonwood near the house is still resisting its demise. The roots that lifted the walkway, providing a den for a bull snake the length of my outstretched arms and directing runoff down the stairs into the laundry room, still send shoots through the fragmented asphalt driveway. The rest of the tree has been reduced to wood chips in the peacock enclosure and fireplace-length logs that can never be split, their interlocking fibers determinedly hanging on to each other against the assault of my axe. The cat who lives in the barn wasn’t placed there by us. He stays for the dry food we give him – and for the mice. Evidence of his first two years in the barn was circumstantial – feathers, a headless rabbit, a grey blur darting up the ladder to the loft. For about a month last winter, one of his hind legs couldn’t hold any weight. For a few days we thought he might not make it, and still he never let us near him. This morning when I fed the horses, he rubbed up against my leg.
2021 LCF Advisory Board and staff member. Left to right, top to bottom: Jeanne Moore, Chair; Pam Freeman; Gail Frankfurt; Claudia Kean; Josie Wratten; Ravi Gandh; Kate Schnepel; Tanya Daty, Communications and Marketing Associate; Dr. David Mencin; Ella Levy. Marji Dainty is not pictured
Our perception of the fires started in our noses. Then it became a stinging pain in our watering eyes. The sunsets were orange. Then the daylight was orange and the ash fell like a light snow – a dark snow with visible fragments of pine needles scorched black. Plumes of grey smoke rose from the north and from the south, stretching east when they weren’t directed overhead. We saw flames from our property once, the evening after we packed our go-bags, practiced loading up the horses, established a plan for the birds (open their coops and let them go), and hauled the travel trailer a few miles east, staged for a hasty exit if needed. Thankfully it wasn’t needed. For the first time in recent memory we are ending the year with more chickens than we started with. This happens when we forget to collect the eggs for a few days and the hens get broody. That instinct carries on after the hatch, as the babies stay under the wing of their mama at night and always within her sight during the day. Her fierce protection endures into maturity. The kitchen has been my office since March. The living room has been Wendi’s
LCF looks forward with gratitude and hope By Jeanne Moore Redstone Review LYONS – In this uncertain time of health and economic crisis and political strife, the Lyons Community Foundation wants you to know there is a small advisory board of caring and dedicated volunteers, and a staff member, who work hard to raise money to support diverse non-profit groups whose intent is to improve the quality of life and encourage positive change in the greater Lyons area. We do it because we care. We care about the economic stability of our local restaurants, shops and art galleries, hair salons, auto repair shops, and health care services – as well as many others who make up our business community. We care about our residents who need food and assistance in time of need. We care about our musicians and artists and service workers whose ability to make a living has been greatly diminished during this pandemic. We care about the groups who want to beautify our community, who choose to teach us about the pioneers who began and grew this town, and those who want to encourage us to use plants and methods to support our native ecology, and those who wish to enhance the education of our young people. We care because we appreciate the essential services, the outstanding entertainment, and the community connection these people provide for us. We care because these people are our neighbors and friends. We are immensely grateful for the many generous residents who appreciate what we do and who helped us come very close to reaching our goal of $30,000 through their monthly and end-of-year giving. You are our angels, and we need all of you so that we can do our work of improving the quality of life, and encouraging positive change in the greater Lyons area. We approach this new year with hope that the health and economic crisis will end, and our community will connect in kindness, compassion and joy! Happy new year to all. Please meet our amazing 2021 advisory board and our staff member: Jeanne Moore Chair, Pam Freeman, Gail Frankfurt, Claudia Kean, Josie Wratten, Ravi Gandh, Kate Schnepel, Marji Dainty, Tanya Daty – Communications and Marketing Associate. And introducing our two newest board members: Dr. David Mencin is the Director of Data Services at UNAVCO (www.unavco.org) and a Research Scientist at the Cooperative Institute for Research in Environmental Sciences at the University of Colorado Boulder (https: // cires. colorado. edu). UNAVCO is a National Science Foundation funded university-governed non-profit that facilitates geoscience research and education using geodesy. He was born in Cleveland, Ohio and discovered his interest in Geophysics and Geology early in life reading National Geographic magazines at his grandparents’ Continue LCF on Page 13
office since October. Dogs and cats, peacocks and donkey – all have participated in virtual meetings. The roof has been reinforced and re-covered, as have the outside walls. The inside still needs some work. I wish I could see everything, because everything has something to teach: when to protect, when to trust, when to prepare, when to hold on, when to let go, when to create, always to be thankful. Phil Aumiller lives with his wife Wendi and their animals just west of Lyons.
Lyons Library presents An Evening with Sarah Adleman LYONS – Join in an online conversation with awardwinning Colorado author, Sarah Adleman on January 14 at 7 p.m. In her memoir, The Lampblack Blue of Memory: My Mother Echoes, Adleman, a 2020 finalist for the Colorado Book Award for Creative Nonfiction, utilizes a unique mix of literary techniques to dig to the heart of tragedy and explore the concept of forgiveness. Limited copies of the book are available now at the library. Call 303-823-5165 to place a hold on a copy. Adleman was a Peace Corps Volunteer in Bangladesh, studied yoga in India, and taught English in China. She earned her MFA from the University of Texas at El Paso and works as a Certified Yoga Therapist specializing in traumatic brain injury survivors. She lives in Denver with her husband, two-year old son, and their 13-year old dog. Sarah Adleman’s work has been published or acknowledged by Kindred Magazine, Terrene, Glimmer Train, and America Writers Review. The Lampblack Blue of Memory won a Nautilus Book Award in Lyric Prose / Hybrid Works, an IPPY Award in Essay, was a finalist for the NIEA in Death and Dying, and a winner for the Eric Hoffer/da Vinci Eye Award. Visit the library website at https: // lyons.colibraries. org / to register.
Trivia Night Fundraiser is back It’s Trivia Night with all the fun, but online this time. It will be Thursday, February 11 from 7 to 8:30 p.m. Start now to round up your friends and stay tuned for details of how to register as a team. Those who don’t have a team are welcome and will be matched up. Teammates will get to privately discuss answers online then return to the whole group to share responses and hear the correct answers. Prizes of gift cards to local business will be awarded for winning teams. Suggested donation is $10/person. Donations will be made via PayPal and all proceeds will go to support library needs and services. While we miss out on the in-person fun and socializing of playing trivia at Pizza Bar 66, this online version will make for an entertaining, maybe even educational, evening.