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And the peals of empty bottles sound almost like laughter…
Cascadia Magazine is proud to publish an original essay from poets Meghan McClure and Michael Schmeltzer, “And the peals of empty bottles sound almost like laughter.” It’s a postscript, a sort of literary “hangover” to their amazing hybrid memoir/essay A Single Throat Opens, a collaborative project exploring the pain and attraction of addiction.
The essay is a back-and-forth meditation on memory, forgetting and love. “The angel’s share. Somewhere an angel wrestles with our evaporated memories. Somewhere an angel wants to know why we can’t hold on to these things. At least Scotch keeps the angels warm, gives them spicy breath, helps them forget.”
In addition, you can read an extended interview with Michael and Meghan (both of whom have roots in Seattle) about the unique collaborative process that went into making A Single Throat Opens. “Writing collaboratively with Meghan is probably the most painless writing I’ve done, to be honest. It feels akin to an intimate conversation as well as a confessional at time, a place where I can just lay down whatever is on my mind with no fear; I know whatever I write will be reflected on, reflected back, in surprising, elegant ways.”
Read the essay and interview online at Cascadia Magazine.
A few modest proposals for International Women’s Day
In the wake of the #MeToo movement, the female staff members at the Portland Mercury have a few suggestions about how men can correct the mess they’ve made for women: “There are a lot of things that would help—keeping guns out of the hands of domestic abusers, equal representation in Congress, a president who isn’t a serial sexual assaulter, the ability to get the health care we need when we need it, and the freedom to walk home alone without fear.”
Will BC follow Washington in banning Atlantic salmon farms?
Now that WA state has voted to phase out Atlantic net-pen salmon farms in the Salish Sea by 2020, the debate has moved to British Columbia, where environmental organizations and a Green Party MLA are calling for a ban. Meanwhile, a new study finds that salmon with multiple infections respond poorly to vaccines (most pen salmon require antibiotics in the crowded unsanitary conditions they’re raised in).
Getting facts straight about proportional representation in BC
The Tyee examines the upcoming vote this year on whether British Columbia should adopt mixed member proportional representation (MMP) over the current “first past the post” system: “Remember the 2001 BC election? The BC Liberals got 51 per cent of the vote and 97 per cent of the seats. The NDP got 21 per cent of the vote and two per cent of the seats. The Greens got 12 per cent of the vote and no seats. That’s not an insignificant or minor difficulty; it’s a big problem.”
Elder Oregon couple share their death with dignity experience
The Oregonian reports on how a Portland couple married for 66 years and who were both terminally ill, decided to end their lives together according to the state’s Death with Dignity law, which is has been in place for 20 years. The couple agreed to have their experience filmed, and it has become a 45-minute documentary Living and Dying: A Love Story.
Looking for a new Sherman Alexie is asking the wrong question
Theodore C. Van Alst, Jr., writing for Electric Literature, notes that the white literary establishment shouldn’t go looking for another “Indian du jour” to replace Seattle writer Sherman Alexie after multiple allegations of sexual harassment have surfaced. “…maybe ask yourselves why you have no backup plan for your selection, your one text, book, writer, in what you do, what you teach.”
“The Intimacy of Brushing Teeth” by Jennifer Fliss
The banal intimacy of marriage is the subject of Seattle writer Jennifer Fliss’s short work of fiction, “The Intimacy of Brushing Teeth,” online at Lost Balloon. “He will brush his teeth with his mouth wide open, seafoam dripping, great big white horse teeth open and wide and abstract art-like sprays of toothpaste mar the mirror and the wall and the faucet.”
Happy International Women’s Day from a drizzly day at Cascadia Daily headquarters. –Andrew Engelson
Photo credit chinook salmon by Wikimedia Commons user Zureks CC BY-SA 3.0