Fresh Connections – The Parfitt Way Blog

Contributed by Christine St. Pierre

Conflict is woven through the fabrics of our lives, and as I’ve laid my head to rest in recent nights, thoughts swarm like mad hornets: What has the world come to? Is there no end in sight? What of the progress we had made as a human race? Was there ever progress?

Global news reflects back to us stories of our own undoing, like a mirror above the bathroom sink, revealing blemishes we wish to conceal—blemishes we wish were never there at all. Many of us have the privilege of hiding those blemishes as if they never existed, until the end of day, as we wash ourselves clean for a peaceful night’s sleep, and there they are: Syrian refugees, Putin cold war fears, struggling immigrants on U.S. soil, white-supremacist GOP trollers, Black Lives Matter opposition, ISIS terror, and the list goes on.

History repeats itself as we see heartbreaking images of young Syrian children sleeping on the streets or seeking refuge with their families, cold, wet, and with fear in their eyes and their hearts. As we, as a nation, struggled to realize and welcome Jewish refugees into our borders in the 1930s, we, again, have failed as members of the human race to once again set aside pointless political mechanisms for the sake of homeless and helpless men, women, and children, running for their lives.

Invisible borders dissolve to receive refugees in countries like Turkey and France—despite recent attacks by ISIS extremists who have been recently categorized together with all Muslims and all Syrian refugees by ill-informed refugee rejecters—while other borders, like our own in the United States, strengthen and materialize in order to keep refugees out. According to GOP candidate hopeful Mike Huckabee, the United States should “deal with” Syrian refugees the way Chipotle dealt with an E. coli outbreak: shut’m down.

Is this how we view each other? Like bad meat to be cast aside—a product on which we can or cannot, should or should not, capitalize? Or is this how many of our appointed authorities view other races—a question that runs like a red thread through the heart of our crises: Race and terror. The two go hand-in-hand, and show themselves in many forms.

Within our own borders, the Black Lives Matter campaign resurfaces in the media to reveal institutionalized forms of racism occurring, this time, on college campuses across the country. People of color recount experiences of systemic oppression, death threats, and manipulation that are seldom acknowledged, by media, by college boards, and by peers and community members. As mainstream media develops these stories, we are seeing action all the way to the roundtable—with University of Missouri president, chancellor, and head football coach resigning amidst student protests over cultures of racism.

On November 24th, in Bellingham, Washington, Western Washington University’s President Bruce Shepard suspended classes due to hate speech targeted at Western students of color. Dr. Shepard stated:

“We have mobilized to offer support and to provide protection to those specifically targeted by the hate speech.  With disturbing social media content continuing through early this morning, students of color have advised me of their very genuine, entirely understandable, and heightened fear of being on campus.

We need time to press the criminal investigation and to plan how, as a campus, we will come together to demonstrate our outrage, to listen to each other, and to support each other.  So, I have decided to cancel classes today in order to provide that time.”

On one hand, resignations and cancellation of class recognizes issues of systemic, institutionalized oppression of people of color, and, hopefully, seeks to overcome them; leftist-armchair-Internet-activism on behalf of Syrian refugees shows support for opening our borders by creating dialogic banter with opposing and supporting views; GoFundMe campaigns and volunteer opportunities are becoming available for individuals to contribute to the Syrian refugee crisis; “V for Vendetta”-esque political satire from political commentators like John Oliver help to breakdown the fear mongering tactics deployed by politicians.

On the other hand, these issues—on which no one seems to be able to agree—are still in moving throughout the sphere of social justice and political activism where things continue to circle in a whirlpool of indecision, with no end in sight. One can ask themselves, Where do we see our systems changing? The dialogue has begun, and progress, or the onward movement toward a destination, is underway, but what does our destination look like?

I urge you to take time with yourself to reflect and write. Take an hour with your significant other(s), family, friends, and talk. This is a call-to-self-reflection. Ask yourselves these two questions: What gives you pause? What gives you hope? And, from there, as Gandhi once said, aim to “be the change you wish to see in the world.”

Food scraps and decomposing plants from your spring and summer garden are fantastic compost material, but there’s something else–something better–that we’ve been missing all along: tree leaves. At least twice as rich in minerals than manure, the composted leaves of most trees can save you cash, not only on what you would spend on plant food and humus, but also on sanitation bills.

Some of you may be thinking, Well, I already save on bills by burning my leaves. But think of the carbon footprint you create when burning that organic material. Plants absorb carbon dioxide and release oxygen as they grow, storing the carbon dioxide in plant material that is rereleased as the plants burn. Even though composting also releases small amounts of carbon, much of it is contained in the decomposing plant matter. A major contributor to climate change and airborne pollutants, carbon dioxide is a greenhouse gas that contributes to the greenhouse effect, which adds “insulation” to the earth, making our planet warmer.

During extra hot summer months that often go unaccompanied by rain, your mineral-rich leaf compost will improve depleted and dry soil, helping your garden reach its full potential. Plant material from trees, ranging from leaves to pine needles, are high in mineral content such as calcium, magnesium, nitrogen, and phosphorus–many of which make up your average bag of garden compost or potting soil. This is because most trees are deep-rooted, absorbing minerals from deep within the earth that travel through the tree and into the leaves. The structure of these leaves as they decompose, known as humus, facilitates mineral filtration, soil consistency, and overall plant and soil health by aerating heavy soils, preventing sandy soils from drying, and balancing water levels in the soil.

In order to successfully compost leaves, one must do a bit more than rake them into a pile and check on the pile come springtime. Adding nitrogen—such as manure—to the pile will allow the compost to heat up and give the bacteria in the compost something to break down. Next, attempt to grind or shred your leaves. This will make handling the compost much easier, as the humus will be more broken-down. Turn the compost pile every three weeks and, come spring, use your new compost as mulch for a healthy garden and healthy harvest!

For more information on other things you can use for compost, check out this detailed composting chart that lists materials ranging from dog poo to algae.

Contributed by Christine St. Pierre

1. Halloween is the greatest day ever for kids.

All month, kids have been making Oreo spiders and chocolate mud with gummy worms, carving pumpkins and stretching bunches of cotton spider-webs across their front bushes. Night after night, children have been dreaming of their costumes and endless heaps of delicious, perfect, plentiful candy. So, if you’re going to participate in Halloween festivities this year, please, for the children, get into it! Make it your goal to create a Halloween as magical as yours were when you were young.

2. Choose a costume, not a culture.

There are thousands of Halloween costumes each year, which far exceed the “walking dead” theme that Halloween used to cater to when Pagans first celebrated the Holiday. Now, we dress as anything, from zombies to clowns to people in giant banana suits. Remember, though, that dressing up as another person’s race (associated with biology) or ethnicity (associated with culture) is not okay to do, as it trivializes the sacredness and importance of identity. Click here if you’re interested in learning more about this important issue.

3. Porch lights and decorations mean Trick-Or-Treaters!

If you don’t want little (or big) visitors, be sure to turn off your porch lights. It would also be kind to leave a large sign either on your door or fence that reads “Not Home!”

4. Bigger candy equals bigger success.

A lot of things have changed since we were kids, but one thing remains the same: giant candy bars are king. It’s no secret that after trick-or-treating, every kid runs home, dumps their candy, and sorts out the bogus from the major scores. Give these kids something to celebrate.

5. “Healthy” is not cool. Not tonight.

Sure, little packets of almond butter and tiny green apples are healthy and delicious ways to keep your community kids from earning more cavities this Halloween, but be sure to channel your inner child and keep the health food out of the equation—maybe the parents would love your nutritious snack while they’re out and about?

6. And neither are homemade treats.

Reason being: children have been injured by candy that was laced with drugs or had dangerous, sharp objects inserted into them. It feels unlikely that this could happen in our own community, but people are still creepy, and even though you’re not, it’s not worth the risk for parents to allow their little ones to eat homemade treats, so be sure to keep your treats individually wrapped and store-bought.

7. Halloween is a real life “The Purge” for teenage rebellion. Embrace it.

Pumpkins will be smashed. Candy will be catapulted through the sky, only to land with a splat across the sidewalk. By morning, toilet paper will adorn a few unlucky neighborhood trees, and your garden gnome will have somehow found its way to your neighbor’s door four houses down. Packs of teens, not unlike packs of unruly werewolves, will be prowling neighborhoods, acting crazy and having a great time. Have a talk with your teen about the consequences of vandalism, but give them the freedom to run around like, well, kids, and have a safe, fun time.

8. Kids still love—but hardly ever receive—Halloween riddles.

I’m not speaking from experience, because I never had to answer a riddle or a joke before receiving free candy as a child, but, apparently, a lot of lucky kids did! How fun is that? So ready yourself with an armada of jokes, riddles, and tongue-twisters, and ask your trick-or-treaters as they come to your door!

9. The ultimate challenge: “Take One” Bowls, and why they need to disappear.

Here’s the deal. If you don’t want to be “that neighbor” who doesn’t participate in Halloween, but also don’t want to put the effort in to answering the door, you need to find a better option than the infamous gigantic, tempting bowl brimming with candy with a small sign that says “Please Take ONE!” These kids are sugar-hungry, determined candy-collectors, and all it takes is one renegade to dump the whole thing in their bag and ruin the fun for others.

10. There’s a fine line between being fun scary and traumatizingly scary… walk it well.

On the other side of that coin, I do fully support a “Take One” bowl if the scenario is as follows: kids walk on porch, see a life-size mummy holding a bowl that reads “take one” and, as they reach to take one, the life-size mummy comes to life, letting out a low roar that gives the kids a gentle scare and some excitement. Sure, it’s scary, but it’s Halloween. What’s not okay is running toward kids from behind a door or bushes, or grabbing them in any way—let’s make this a FUN night to remember!

Contributed by Christine St. Pierre

Nora Harrington and her close friends are asking communities to rethink their medicine cabinets, bringing herbal remedies directly to your door. She and I shared a cup of virtual tea and chatted about her herbalism passion, entrepreneurial journey, and the love and intentions behind her recent endeavor, Medicine Chest Herbs. Pull up a chair and join us.

Christine St. Pierre: Starting a business on your own takes great planning, passion, and grit. What about herbalism moved you so deeply that you took it upon yourself to bring it to others?

Nora Harrington: Aw. Such a sweet question. Thanks for seeing that!

In my early twenties, I was pretty sick. I did my own research and found some great healers to help me, but a lot of the alternative modalities I wanted to try were just out of my budget (i.e. acupuncture and naturopathy). I had always been studying herbs and alternative health, but it wasn’t until a friend gave me a bottle of homemade bitters that I really got a taste of Western or Folk Herbalism. They cured me! Those bitters helped me so much. And I was astonished that I could go out and make my own batch after. I started cooking up a storm of herbal medicine and I felt deeply inspired by the accessibility and effectiveness of this medicine. Soon afterward, I enrolled in Herbalism School in Portland, and the rest is history.

When we were doing the first herb CSA, we got a lot of feedback from people that we were helping them learn about herbs, and I found that really inspiring, too. I started this business because I truly believe that the medicine we need is right outside our door, and that plant medicine belongs in our homes. It is an “accident” of the current culture that we do not automatically inherit a basic knowledge of how to heal ourselves with herbs and food. That’s why our little tagline is “Grandma Knows Best.”

St. Pierre: How did the seed for Medicine Chest Herbs become planted and grow into fruition?

Harrington: The idea for an herbal remedies CSA landed in my brain almost 4 years ago. My dear friend Heather Wolf and I were planning to attend herb school, but we needed to raise money. I had just started to make remedies at home and I had been giving them out to friends and family members, and I thought, “Why don’t I sign people up for this ahead of time?” So Heather and I started Remedies CSA called The Wheel Plant Medicine. We ran it for a year and had a wonderful time, holding some classes and herb walks, too. It helped us pay for school.

Then, after traveling to Europe two years ago, I decided I wanted to start the project again, but in a more financially viable way. (The Wheel had been all donation based.) I had the idea this time to partner with other small-scale herbalists; by finding other people to make the medicine, I could focus on curating the shares and creating the educational zine that comes with them. The zine is a great way for me to make art in the name of empowering people to heal themselves with herbs. It has been really rewarding.

Mirabai “The Magician” Troll is my business partner. Starting this project was overwhelming­–I had never had a real business before and there were so many things that my witchy artist brain could short circuit on. Mirabai came on initially as “Head of the Problems Department,” but pretty soon after that joined the Medicine Chest as a partner. She now edits and contributes to the zine, runs most of our marketing, and generally makes the magic happen when it is most needed.

St. Pierre: How did you gather knowledge on herbalism?

Harrington: The bulk of my formal education was carried out at the School of Traditional Western Herbalism in Portland, which I attended for a year. Before that, I did an internship with an addiction rehabilitation center in Peru, where they use and sell to the public about 50 different medicinal herbs. In addition to various additional jobs and conferences, I continue learn from our participating herbalists.

St. Pierre: Say I’m a potential customer (because I am). How does the Medicine Chest work?

Harrington: Essentially, you order a package of herbs, and then, at the beginning of the next season, we send you the package, which is pretty much a treasure trove I must admit. If you live on Bainbridge, we will deliver it to your home. If you live in Seattle, you can also chose to pick up your share at the SugarPill on Capitol Hill.

So, you go to the website (www.medicinechestherbs.com). There, you have some options:

1. You can get a Full Share, which is a package 6 remedies and one Zine per season. If you buy the full share for the whole year—as in, you pre-order all four shares for the whole year—you save a little money. But you could also just buy the full share for the upcoming season, which in this case is winter.

2. Another option would be to buy a Half Share. The half share contains 3 items and one zine per season. Same deal here. You could get the Half Share for the whole year­—all four half shares ordered at once—and you get a little discount. Or, you can get the half share for the upcoming season, which is around $39.

We also sell an Essentials Pack, which is a package of our most trusted remedies. It also comes with a little informational zine. Additionally, we sell a subscription to the zine only as well as individual products from the shares (all on the site). The zine is a place where I feel like I’m able to bring together a lot of different perspectives and tips on at-home herbalism.

St. Pierre: What are your intentions with the Medicine Chest?

Harrington: Our hope is for the Medicine Chest to continue on as a beacon of herbal education and outreach, maybe sprouting up localized branches or sister companies in other parts of the country. I think it would be best for there to be lots of small companies like the Medicine Chest. Our Medicine Makers wild craft most of their ingredients and make the medicine in small batches, which is ideal for serving the local community. The zines we are hoping to send out to bookstores across the region. We just landed them in Left Bank Books and Elliot Bay Books in Seattle.

We’d like to make this easier to navigate on the website.

St. Pierre: Who is Nora Harrington, the energy behind the Medicine Chest?

Harrington: I’m also a gardener for an amazing gardening company called Red Twig Fine Gardening, and for a huge vegetable garden for a local island family. I’m so grateful to be spending so much time in the dirt! Realistically, running a small business, a little home and a gardening job, takes most of my time, but when I’m free, you can also find me practicing with my band Boobface, planning Lady Church, doing Tarot Spreads for lost souls and making meals with my friends. Right now I’m drinking yarrow, elderflower and ginger tea because I’m warding off a cold.

The deadline for signing up for the winter share is November 23rd! It arrives December 14th, so it will be a great holiday thing if people are thinking ahead. Last year, we had a lot of people send the subscription as a gift to their friends and family members. (One lady seriously bought 8 of them.)

www.medicinechestherbs.com

Contributed by Christine St. Pierre

Environmentalists, dust off your resumes—you’ve got some updating to do. The news is better than anyone expected, but it’s what we were all putting our energy and voices toward: there will be no oil drilling—or spilling—in the Arctic!

Royal Dutch Shell has backed out of plans to drill for oil off of the Alaskan coast amidst intense scrutiny from millions of activists, environmentalists, and people with the power to have their voices heard by the powers that be, most recently Pope Francis and Leonardo DiCaprio. These big names are amongst the many that have recently spoken out against the unfathomable and inhumanity that drive colossal environmental devastation for the sake of capital gain and fossil fuel extraction. And today, after months of disappointing results from failed exploratory drilling, Shell announced that they will indefinitely suspend Arctic drilling, having wasted billions of dollars on the project.

That’s what Shell’s chalking it up to, at least. But—and this is just one activists opinion—there were far too many loud voices, communities, risks, kayak flotillas, and concerned citizens’ fingers waving in the face of this mega-corporation for drilling to ever occur. Just as we activists weren’t going to be stopped until the rig was far off in the Chukchi Sea, Shell wasn’t going to stop until they proved their point: the planet can be bought for a high price, and new ownership can do whatever it pleases, even if that means risk everything. Shell and countless other oil corporations have always known that there aren’t enough oil stores at 6,800 feet below the surface of frigid arctic sea. They say it’s about money, investors, and the looming financial devastation that an oil spill would cause—not the looming environmental devastation.

On one hand, we want to consider this a victory; on another hand, we’re all wondering what will tip the scale the next time, driving oil tycoons to gamble once again with the fate of our planet by extracting oil from the arctic. Will it be that oil prices have risen once again, making the gamble worth it? Or, will Exxon resolve the political disagreements with Russia that have kept them from drilling thus far? Maybe teams of scientists will discover yet another potential pocket of oil that could produce enough to pacify the growing demand—another 10 million barrels a day to meet growing demand between 2030 and 2040, according to some analysts. Until then, the prices of oil continue to drop while the push for cleaner energy sources becomes stronger and stronger.

If there’s one thing Shell wants us to believe, it’s that people power had nothing to do with their backing out of the arctic. Let’s show them what else we can accomplish when we come together as a planet. As Mahatma Gandhi said, “Earth provides enough to satisfy every man’s needs, but not every man’s greed.”

For nearly twenty years I walked beneath the indescribable orange, yellow, and red colors of deciduous trees in central Missouri as their leaves quaked and billowed to the ground during a most beloved time of year: autumn. I recall the scents and sounds of these dried, crunchy leaves flooding my nose as the wind whisked them along neighborhood streets.

Fall was hot apple cider, hand-picking apples and muddy pumpkins; decorating the front porch with dried corn and hay bales; caramel-covered apples and corn mazes; feeling the warmth of the sun through your thick wool sweater as you lay beneath a blue sky and breath in the crisp, dry air. Fall was, in a sense, my childhood. And while my opinion that fall is, in fact, the most wonderful time of year may be biased by these memories, I believe that fall is a special time for all of us. So, Bainbridge Island, let’s keep this fall enchantment alive within ourselves as well as the hearts of our little ones by rejoicing with Friends of the Farms this Sunday, September 27, from 11:00 AM to 5:00 PM.

Enjoy the annual Harvest Fair amongst the company of your community on the grounds of centrally-located Johnson Family Farm with a hot cup of fresh-pressed apple cider—hand picked from the trees all around you. With a focus on locally grown, harvested, and cooked foods, Friends of the Farms has arranged a seven-hour event aimed at celebrating farmers and their craft, providing a seminar on local foods as well as farm stands and delicious, local meals. Come with an empty bag—or three—to bring home the farmers’ final summer and fall crop and learn a few autumn recipes or gardening tips from face-to-face chats with local master gardeners.

There’s plenty more fun to be had aside from farm-to-table education. Big kids (aka adults) can enter a raffle to win wonderful prizes (like a locally grown turkey, who will be hanging out at the fair!), plop down on a hay bale with a tasty treat and a local adult beverage from the beer and wine garden, take in the sounds of local music, and watch the pie contest (enter by 11:30 AM) while the little ones enjoy pony rides, face painting, a land slide, hay jumping, and yummy snacks.

And yes, I did say “pie contest,” although I don’t mean the eating-copious-amounts-of-pie kind of contest. Rather, Annual Harvest Fair Pie Contest, with categories for both adult and youth, is an opportunity for Pacific Nothwesterners to strut their stuff and submit their famous pie recipes. Being the land of wild berries and apples, it’s no wonder the best pies come out of our ovens. The judging (by professional bakers, sorry everyone else) begins at 1 PM.

With shuttles available from the ferry terminal and Bethany Lutheran Church, there’s no reason to miss this family-oriented fall Harvest Festival. With a huge “thank you” to Friends of the Farms, their sponsors, and volunteers, I for one can not wait to taste, smell, and experience this Sunday’s event. We only have a few weeks of this wonderful season to relive our favorite childhood memories and help our children create their own, so clear your schedule for this Sunday, and we’ll see you there!

For more info, including an address, directions, and ferry/shuttle info, click here!

Contributed by Christine St. Pierre

One of the unique things about Bainbridge Island is that it still exhibits diverse pursuits within the community.

While you may have gotten to know Laura Swanson from her bartending and serving shifts here at the pub, you may not have known that she is a reigning World Kickboxing Association (WKA) National Champion. When she’s not working, she’s committed to a grueling two to three times a DAY training schedule at Bainbridge Boxing.

Bainbridge Boxing, currently undefeated and owned by Ben Little (who ironically is XL) opened back in 2010. Before then, Bainbridge hadn’t seen boxing since 1907.  Laura isn’t the only champ Ben has trained.

Josh Soliva, another fighter from Bainbridge Boxing, the current 145 lb. KOA super fight belt holder, is also the National Champion for his weight class. Both Josh and Laura traveled to Richmond, Virginia back in March to compete in the WKA National Championships. Both won spots on the 2015 United States national team for the WKA World Competition.

Laura’s first fight was for a Kitsap Humane Society fundraiser at Bainbridge Boxing in 2012.  Laura found a perfect fit in competing and decided to take her fighting career to the next level. She started being matched up for more fights and eventually made her way to Nationals to earn her current title as WKA National Champion.

Bainbridge Boxing could not have gone to Nationals without the generousity of friends and family. When Josh and Laura won, so did all of their supporters. Getting to the world championships is going to take the same outpouring of support.

Many may not know but the boxing club also serves as a home to at-risk youth on the island as well as kids and adults who haven’t found conventional team sports to be fulfilling. Coach Ben keeps the gym running mostly out of his own pocket. If students can’t afford to pay, he has them sweep or mop up after practice.

Now the champs humbly ask for your help to send the Bainbridge Boxing Fight Team to win a world championship. The five-day competition will be held in Spain and expenses for the two fighters and their two coaches will add up quickly. The gym needs to raise the money by September in order to pay airfare and other travel expenses for Laura and Josh to compete for world titles and bring the unique distinction of world champions back to the Bainbridge Island community.

Any amount you can donate will help the Bainbridge Boxing Fight Team get that much closer to their goal. If you want to help Laura and Josh represent Bainbridge Island in the WKA World Championships, please donate to their Go Fund Me campaign at:

www.gofundme.com/bainbridgeboxing

Contributed by Christine St.Pierre

This Labor Day, consider avoiding the wildfires and staying home to experience the Winery Alliance of Bainbridge Island’s Winery Tour Weekend, September 5–7, from noon to five o’clock PM. Seven wineries and one tasting room present wine procured from grapes grown within the island’s maritime climate as well as the east side of the Cascade mountains. These small and quaint wineries are earning big awards, and the vintners and viticulturists will be present during the tastings to welcome you and discuss all things vino. Take a loved one or two along for the ride, although avoid large groups as these tasting rooms are island-sized. After the clock strikes five, regroup with your friends and neighbors at one of the island’s restaurants to pour over your experiences from the day!

The Winery Alliance of Bainbridge Island (WABI), which began in 2003 at the hands of winemaking fanatics, consists of seven independent micro-wineries living right on our patch of rock. These wineries are run by their winemakers—individuals who are gifted with the ability and driven by the passion to create award-winning, vibrant handcrafted wine. Without relying on heavy machinery and thousand-barrel batches, these wineries operate through simply designed artisan systems, as well as uncomplicated, community-driven supply sources—like uber-local grapes—and neighborly distribution.

WABI consists of the following seven wineries that will be participating in the Winery Tour Weekend over Labor Day, as well as the Island Vintners tasting room:

Amelia Wynn Winery: This winery, founded in 2008, features Bordeaux, Rhone, and Northern Italian wines from grapes sourced from Eastern Washington’s aged vineyards.

Bainbridge Vineyards: With land stewardship dating back to 1928, this vineyard’s maritime bioregion—similar to that of France and Germany—works wonders for the seven acres of grape varietals grown on site at the Day Road Farm.

Eagle Harbor Winery: A commitment to honoring and furthering winemaking in Washington State has this winery producing new-age wine influenced by old world styles.

Eleven Winery: This off the cusp, sustainable (yes, green!) winery not only produces a variety of fantastic wine, but is run by wonderfully loving people who great things, like donate all after-tax profits to charity as well as sit-down food pairings with the winemaker.

Fletcher Bay Winery: Located in the happenin’ Coppertop Business Park, this winery features French Bordeaux-style wine that incorporates Italian Sangiovese and Spanish Tempranillo grapes.

Perennial Vintners: In 1997, Perennial Vintner’s (PV) winemaker began experimenting with winemaking, but it didn’t take him long to realize that most of winemaking truly happens in the vineyard, and so began the 2005 conception of (PV), producing estate-grown dry white wine from the underappreciated Melon de Bourgogne grape.

Rolling Bay Winery: After many years of playing and exploring within winemaking, a group of friends and wine enthusiasts settled in rocky Rolling Bay nearly a decade ago to handcraft fantastic wine as well as a stunningly beautiful tasting room, both of which have been considered one of the “Top 22 Tasting Rooms in Washington” by the Seattle Met.

Contributed by Christine St.Pierre

According to NASA, 2014 was the hottest year on record—crops died, land dried, rivers shriveled, and we began feeling the effects of a dry heat that many have never experienced before. But, as I write, I am gazing at a disheartening portion of Mt. Shuksan’s pristine, ice-blue glaciers that have receded into the dark hollows of the mountain’s rocky core, and, next to her, Mt. Kulshan’s (Baker) famed powder looking more like the slushy shoulder of a highway during a Chicago winter—murky from the soil and rock moving beneath the rapidly melting snow—and I wonder what NASA’s records will reveal about 2015’s state of emergency on both the land and sea.

Over the winter, I taught an English lesson on satire to the 2015 graduates of Nooksack Valley High School, located north of Bellingham. The lesson preceded the area’s 93-mile “Ski to Sea” multi-event relay race that traditionally begins with skiing down the slopes of Mt. Kulshan (Baker) and ends with sea-kayaking Bellingham Bay. This year was the first in the 100 year history of the event that was forced to eliminate the ski portion altogether due to an extreme lack of snow. The students resonated with the lesson on satire, creating satirical headlines about the Patriot’s shoddy Superbowl win (“The Deflate-riots”), a search for the new Pope (“The first black, female Pope, Poprah?”), and, with unfortunate poignancy and relevance to the lives of these snowbird seniors, headlines like “Surf Mount Baker!” and “Surf to Sea!” Witnessing these warning signs as early as February frightened me, but I had no idea what terrifying drought conditions would we face in Washington State, on the entire west coast, throughout much of the Midwest, and across the entire globe.

In May of this year, Gov. Jay Inslee declared a statewide drought for Washington for the first time since 2005, following the historic lows of the winter’s snowpack, dwindling river levels that threaten fish populations (not to mention increased temperatures in the shallower river water), and irrigation districts cutting off water to farmers in eastern Washington, an area greatly affected by the rain shadow of the Cascades. Declaring drought for Washington state must meet two criteria: the state must be experiencing or expected to experience a 75 percent reduction in water supply and consumers of this water will experience hardships due to this lack of water.

By May, Washington had already experienced an 82 percent reduction in water supply. The State Dept. of Agriculture predicts a $1.2 billion crop loss this year as a result of the drought, according to the Dept. of Ecology. The Olympic Peninsula is experiencing high-elevation wildfires and the bloom of glacier lilies, where, normally, there is seven feet of snow. “This drought is unlike any we’ve ever experienced,” said Washington Department of Ecology Director Maia Bellon on their website. “Rain amounts have been normal but snow has been scarce. And we’re watching what little snow we have quickly disappear.”

In August, state legislature approved the reallocation of $16 million dollars toward drought relief work, including the support of stream flows for fish, water supplies for farmers, and grant money for cities, counties, and tribes to develop alternate water sources and purchase or lease water rights for the 2015–17 biennium. This approval arrived just in time to address the seriously scary possibility that this year’s El Niño could be the most extreme in history, making for a difficult recovery over the next few years.

El Niño, associated with dry winter and spring conditions, is upon us. In order for this rare and complex climate event to take place, three things must occur simultaneously: eastern trade winds weaken, sea temperatures rise, and the southern oscillation index must be -7 or below (which it has been since 2014). To spare you a layman’s description of what scientists expect to be a “Godzilla” El Niño, I’ll sum it up briefly: trade winds across the Pacific Ocean weaken, releasing a pocket of warm water near Indonesia that travels eastward, then sinks along with the thermocline, which means less cold water is rising up from the deep ocean near South America, reducing rain much of southern hemisphere. For we on the west coast, rain tends to follow the warm pool of water—although, this year, scientists aren’t too sure it can end the drought. In addition, heavy rains after a drought can bring upon heavier mudslides and floods.

It’s a lot to accept all at once — Central California looks like the post-apocalyptic set of Mad Max, Oregon’s on fire, and Washington’s land and rivers are shriveling in the heat. We’ll see what the weather brings to us throughout the rest of the year, but we can’t regrow glaciers in our lifetime or turn back the clock. Things — “they are a changing.”