In 2009, a full six years after the release of Gillian Welch’s critically acclaimed Soul Journey, Welch’s partner David Rawlings was asked when their next album would come out. “On the happiest day of my life,” he replied.
Articles by Tessa Stuart
How To Grow Community
“Aren’t these beauuutiful?” Rachel Cohen asks, brandishing three bright purple, glistening “Bull’s Blood” beets, each about the size of a fist, with thick leafy stalks that look like chard (and can be used like so in recipes). Cohen supervises the Homeless Garden Project’s Natural Bridges Farm, and the beets she’s just pulled from the ground are part of a cornucopia—carrots, strawberries, dandelion greens, a micro greens mix, leaf lettuce, sage, chard and flowers, and that’s just this week—available at the farm’s new U-Pick CSA.
Cyclist’s Death Underscores Grim Statistics
Seven bicycles, 10 bouquets of flowers, a couple of opened bottles of beer and about 15 visitors were gathered at Empire Grade Road near Heller Drive last Thursday afternoon for a memorial honoring Zachary Parke. Early the morning before, on June 8, the body of the 25-year-old climber, cyclist and courier was found 20 feet from his wrecked bicycle. Pieces of a car headlight were found near Parker’s body; according to the California Highway Patrol, Parke was struck and killed by a driver who fled the scene.
Roughing It On Skyline-to-The-Sea
We’re hoofing it through a shady oak grove when suddenly—I see it as if in slow motion—my friend whips around, his face stricken like he’s just tripped the wire on an IED. “RUN!” he yells, but I can’t, because he has already practically lifted me off my feet and is pushing me back up the trail like a linebacker driving a tackling dummy across the field. We’re 50 feet away before I hear him say, “I saw it raise its tail!” Mystery solved. Matt has just seen a skunk. (With slide show.)
Happy Trails At State Parks
Greg Snyder is hauling brush to the side of a trail he’s just helped clear at Wilder Ranch State Park. The new Twin Oaks single-track cuts across the slope of a hill before disappearing into a sweeping view of the Pacific Ocean. Not bad for a job that promises “hard work, low pay, miserable conditions and more.”
Students of The Country Classics
If Hotbox Harry were a disc jockey, his classic country show would feature the likes of Buck Owens, Loretta Lynn and Hank Williams and be piped into your living room via a staticky AM signal. Hotbox Harry is not a DJ, though—he’s a roly-poly train-hopping hobo Mike Scutari met perched on a barstool in Arcadia years ago.
Sanctuary Center Gets Its Crowning Glory
It’s been a busy few weeks at the corner of Front and Beach streets, where a steel structure has sprouted out of the wedge-shaped lot across from the Santa Cruz Wharf, kitty-corner to the Dream Inn and a hop, skip and a jump from the Beach Boardwalk. It’s the perfect location, really, for an ocean-themed visitors’ center with fun for the kids—precisely what the NOAA Monterey Bay National Marine Sanctuary Exploration Center promises to be.
Durbin Day Slideshow
Need more Vitamin Durbin? Here are a few shots from Saturday’s hoopla, courtesy Santa Cruz Weekly staff writer Tessa Stuart.
California Screenin’
John Steinbeck famously opened his 1945 novel Cannery Row with the observation, “California is a poem, a stink, a grating noise, a quality of light, a tone, a habit, a nostalgia, a dream.” OK, so it actually starts “Cannery Row in Monterey in California is a poem, a stink, a grating noise…” but the street is a microcosm of a larger and even more complex and stirring composite. In May 2010, local filmmaker, blogger and director of the Santa Cruz Institute of Contemporary Arts Kirby Scudder set out on a yearlong project with filmmaker Mark Halfmoon to ascertain whether, in spite of her current problems, the Golden State still has the ability to inspire her inhabitants.
The Alfresco Almanac
Nothing says “I’m not at work right now” like eating outside. Lunch on the patio, dinner under the stars—it’s like an instant transport system to summer vacation on the Mediterranean or a tropical island getaway, where the tables are set out on the sidewalks and decks as a matter of course and where the night air is balmy enough for tank tops.
