News you can use
News you can use
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"In my next life, I want to be a tree." "A tree? Why, Mom, would you want to be a tree?" "Because they are more intelligent and kinder than humans." "A sycamore, Mom. Be a sycamore. I don't even know what one looks like but that tree popped into my mind." We each went to our computers and landed on the same site. Though we are 2,500 miles separated geographically, we are otherwise quite close. "Holy guacamole, these trees are beautiful." "Ooooh, I want to be a sycamore." I...
It may be that Stubby is gone for good. In the summer of 2022, I started writing about my mother’s new pet, a red squirrel who she reluctantly began to care for. My parents live on 20 acres in the woods up north in a house my father designed when he retired 35 years ago. The house looks over the lake and, for most of the winter, my parents have few neighbors, except for the birds at their feeder and the deer making their way through the deep snow and, of course, red s...
If you want to see a flying whale, go to the Natural History Museum in London. Well, the whale isn’t technically flying. That’s because it’s dead. Even live whales don’t fly, unless there’s something David Attenborough hasn’t told me. Right when you enter the museum, you see that enormous skeleton suspended from the ceiling: a whole blue whale, or what’s left of it. Gazing at this miracle of creation, you forget your dull, everyday concerns. It doesn’t matter where you’re going to have lunch, or what day of the week it is, o...
With the completion of the poll of the Legislature on whether to override the governor’s veto of Senate Bill 442, I want to explain my consistent opposition to the bill, including voting against overriding the veto. The bill would have incorporated $ 16 million in annual expenditures for county roads into the existing allocations of marijuana tax revenue with corresponding reductions to the general fund. When the voters legalized recreational marijuana in 2020 through initiative (I-190), the ballot language read: “I-190 leg...
Editor, Montana’s veterans deserve to live with dignity and independence. The Department of Public Health and Human Services is conducting an important survey to understand and improve the living conditions for our veterans. We at the Veterans Navigation Network encourage every veteran, caregiver, and family member in Montana to participate. This survey will help the state understand what veterans need to live well in their communities. It looks at healthcare access, financial stability, and opportunities to connect with o...
Like Alice, now and then I take a dive down a rabbit hole, purely for entertainment. Oh, well, and so I can feel superior, yes, smug in my own knowledge. I’m not on Facebook, but when I check weather on my computer, I get a sidebar of widgets, (love that word), that is every bit as good as FB for misinformation, from what I’m told. So, there I am, trawling along through non-news, political rants, hundreds of chocolate-chip cookie recipes and other trivia, when I spy a hou...
Our cat, Felix, has a new home. We adopted Felix in Mexico while we were staying there. The woman who fostered him, Marcela, thought he was a kitten because he was so small — except for his tail, which appears to be intended for a much larger cat. But when I took him to the vet, they said he was two years old. I worried he was going through a lot of changes rather quickly for a two-year-old. He lived on the streets until he was picked up by Marcela, then he came to live with u...
The two of us are from different political parties, don’t always agree on legislation and actually ran a spirited campaign against one another several years ago. Having said that, we are not enemies. In fact, it’s just the opposite. We are friends that actually get along and work together as much as possible for the betterment of the Hi-Line and those who live and work here. One legislative proposal we both were pleased to enthusiastically support, along with 86% of our House and Senate colleagues, was Senate Bill 442, spo...
The other morning, I visited with a long-time friend who lives in California. We don’t visit frequently, but when we do, it’s always good. Ideas fly and grow and develop and land in our deep hearts. My friend Anne belongs to a small church with an aim to make a difference in their community, to really matter to those they serve. With all the best intentions in the world, they formed a committee to put together gift bags for people in their area with no fixed abode. “Ho...
More than 100 years ago, my grandparents made a life for our family on a homesteaded plot of land outside of Big Sandy that we still farm to this day. I’ve been blessed to call Montana home my entire life and to always have a place to rest my head after a hard day’s work. Unfortunately, finding an affordable place to live has become a challenge for far too many Montanans. As I travel across Montana, I hear about how housing challenges are hurting working families. From Missoula to Kalispell to Bozeman, all the way to sma...
I ordered the sofa cover as soon as we adopted our new cat, Felix. The sofa in the little apartment my husband, Peter, and I rent in Mexico has seen better days, but we didn’t want to be responsible for ushering it into an early retirement due to cat scratches. So I bought a beautiful turquoise handloomed bedspread from a woman across the street to use as a throw. And the job would have been done right then and there if I’d kept my mouth shut. Instead, I asked the woman if...
April is Strengthening Families Month, a time to promote the safety and well-being of Montana’s kids. If you’ve been wondering what the blue pinwheels are around town, these are the symbols of this month and drawing attention to the issue of child abuse. Communities around the state and country put them up in April. CASA of Hill County is also hosting a Kids Carnival on April 27th to wrap up Strengthening Families month and celebrate happy childhoods. We will have free games with prizes, free lunch, and door prizes from 11...
That may not be how the song is sung but that is how we sing it in Etzatlan this summer. We juggle the procession of seasons, winter flips into a few days of spring, which gets dropped on the floor and immediately flames into summer, temps in high 90s up to 100 this week. Dry and dusty. What little breeze we get brings cane ash and field dirt, right into my casa where I can enjoy it at leisure. I yearn for what I now think of as normal times, when the rains come in June, bring...
To our readers, Today will be my last day as a reporter for the Havre Daily News, and I want to bid the paper and the community it serves a fond farewell. I want to. I want for my final thoughts to be about the people I’ve met, the community I did my best to serve, the memories I’ve made and how thankful I am for them, and every word of the parting letter I want to write would be true. However, I’m afraid my final thoughts cannot be about those things, at least not entirely, because a recent change announced at the paper...
Dear Havre residents: The Havre Public Schools Board of Trustees seeks your support for the Elementary District General fund Mill Levy on the May 7, 2024, ballot. Approval of this levy will allocate an extra $138,615.45 to bolster educational initiatives for K-8 students in Havre. Passage of this proposal will result in a tax increase of approximately $7.40 per year for a home valued at $100,000, $22.19 per year for a home valued at $300,000, and $44.39 on a home valued at $600,000. HPS has diligently pursued grant funds to...
The fact is, I am spoiled. I never get sick. I’ve never spent a night in a hospital since I was born (and then, my mother stayed with me). I’ve never broken a bone. I’ve never had a major operation. I am absurdly healthy, and I can take no credit for any of this. So, naturally, when I get sick, I am insufferable. It always starts in the same way. I get a sore throat. First, I ignore it. I have found this is the best way to deal with imminent disasters. When I used to drive...
Because of the unique qualifications of contenders Joseph Biden and Donald Trump, the Havre Daily is able to provide readers this exclusive early 2024 presidential election wrap up. While some details will have to wait for November, one election shocker is here now: a majority of Americans are still mad, and mildly depressed by the outcome. In the aftermath of the hard fought unpopularity contest, election analysts point out that both Trump and Biden maintained their respective deficits to the finish line. Former President...
I’ve never made a big deal of my birthdays. In childhood, my birthday presents were always books, which was exactly what I wanted. Coming from family raised during the Great Depression, a gift was a Big Deal. I’m pretty sure my dad never had a birthday present. For decades, beginning in my forties, I began skipping the “9” years. Instead of forty-nine, I became “almost fifty.” I did not see 49 as a positive gain. Almost sixty. Almost seventy. This year, a “9” year, I turned...
Primary candidate for clerk of the Montana Supreme Court Jason Ellsworth doesn’t understand or respect separation of powers — a core tenant of our American democracy that protects us all. Demonstrated by his newly created “Judicial Oversight Committee” and now the subpoena he recently issued to the Montana secretary of state, Ellsworth continues to show, in addition to his personal criminal and civil records, that he doesn’t think the law applies to him. Worse yet, his actions undermine governmental accountability, judicial...
My husband, Peter, and I spend the winters in San Miguel de Allende, Mexico. The center of the town is a designated World Heritage Site, which means the facades of the buildings must remain as they were in the mid-1700s. The streets are made of round and sometimes slippery cobblestones. The doors are stout and covered with hundreds of coats of paint, and on the top of every building is a rooftop terrace where people can watch the fireworks that go off for no reason that anyone has ever been able to figure out. It is...
I just finished “Democracy in America,” which is a book by a Frenchman named Alexis de Tocqueville on… well, it’s in the title. To write this book, Tocqueville and his friend Gustave de Beaumont, who was the Dr. Watson of the duo, only without a mustache, sailed to the United States to check out its capital attractions. Not McDonald’s. Prisons. These two splendid gents got the French government to sponsor their jaunt across the Atlantic by promising they’d bring back loads of stuff on prisons. Wouldn’t you know, the plo...
During my second tour to Iraq as a U.S. Marine, my unit was tasked to help secure the Syrian border. We had received intel that Iran was sending weapons into Syria to smuggle across the border for use against American troops. At the same time, refugees from all over the country were flooding the border to escape the war. We successfully accomplished the mission of securing the border that deployment. It is an absolute shame the Biden administration will not do the same and is allowing an unsecure southern border in our very...
Sometimes when life gives you lemons, well, you can’t make lemonade when life drops the whole tree on your head, can you? The entire last month has been terrible for my friends, Ana and Michelle. First one of the cats got strange. Cats can be strange, so what! However, when something is wrong, something is wrong. After several visits to the nearest small animal vet in Tala (Havre to Loma), Blue was diagnosed with diabetes and Cushing’s disease. Blue is on medication, blood jab...
We are a house divided against ourselves. The evidence is everywhere. Neighbors are angry with neighbors. Republicans and Democrats accuse each other of treason and stupidity. Our government, churches, colleges and universities, scientific community, corporations and other institutions are subject to abuse and skepticism. People are even asking, “Shall we trade our democracy for authoritarianism?” There is plenty to be angry about. In that sense, the anger is understandable. There are so many problems that we could solve if w...
It’s been over a decade since Colorado and Washington became the first two states to legalize marijuana for adults. With the benefit of hindsight, it’s fair to ask: Has this policy been successful? Absolutely. A policy of legalization, regulation, and education is preferable to a policy of criminalization, stigmatization and incarceration. Let’s be clear. Legalization didn’t create or normalize the marijuana market in the United States. The market was already here. But under a policy of prohibition, this market flourished und...
