What Happened To The Orthodox Church?

 I am starting to wonder whatever happened to the Orthodox Church I love.

I hear sermons filled with admonitions to keep the fast as strictly as possible.  To watch out for those who are trying to destroy the Church from outside, through the influence of secularism in the world.

I have always felt that was hogwash. Secularism is no threat to the Church. Neither is humanism, or paganism, or homosexuality.  The only threat to the Church comes from within. The threats to the Church have *always* come from within. That’s what the Ecumenical Councils were all about.  Some elements of the Church didn’t believe in things that are essential to the faith, things like Christ’s Godhood, Christ’s humanity, the use of icons in our worship, and so on, and so the Ecumenical Councils were held to put a stop to such things.

There has never been an Ecumenical Council bent on trying to change things outside the Church. There has never been an Ecumenical Council making statements about other religions and other forms of belief.  It has always been that “we know where God’s Grace is, and we cannot say where it isn’t.”

There is a lot of noise about the “last days” right now, and about how the whole world is messed up because we are in the last times.

What do the apostles say?

 “But realize this, that in the last days difficult times will come. For people will be lovers of self, lovers of money, boastful, arrogant, slanderers, disobedient to parents, ungrateful, unholy, unloving, irreconcilable, malicious gossips, without self-control, brutal, haters of good, treacherous, reckless, conceited, lovers of pleasure rather than lovers of God, holding to a form of godliness although they have denied its power; avoid such people as these. For among them are those who slip into households and captivate weak women weighed down with sins, led on by various impulses, always learning and never able to come to the knowledge of the truth. [snip]

Now you followed my teaching, conduct, purpose, faith, patience, love, perseverance, persecutions, and sufferings, such as happened to me at Antioch, at Iconium, and at Lystra; what persecutions I endured, and out of them all the Lord rescued me! Indeed, all who want to live in a godly way in Christ Jesus will be persecuted. But evil people and impostors will proceed from bad to worse, deceiving and being deceived. You, however, continue in the things you have learned and become convinced of, knowing from whom you have learned them,  and that from childhood you have known the sacred writings which are able to give you the wisdom that leads to salvation through faith which is in Christ Jesus. All Scripture is inspired by God and beneficial for teaching, for rebuke, for correction, for training in righteousness; so that the man or woman of God may be fully capable, equipped for every good work.”

2 Timothy 3: 1-17

Note the interesting list of sins that characterizes the last days:  “lovers of self, lovers of money, boastful, arrogant, slanderers, disobedient to parents, ungrateful, unholy, unloving, irreconcilable, malicious gossips, without self-control, brutal, haters of good, treacherous, reckless, conceited, lovers of pleasure rather than lovers of God”

Nowhere do I see paganism, or drug abuse, or homosexuality listed as key sins to watch out for in the last days.

Why are there so many sermons these days about how bad things are “out in the world” instead of how bad things are in the hearts and minds of the faithful?

I will bring up the late Archipriest Vadim.  It seems that everywhere I go among the local Orthodox they speak very highly of Father Vadim. It could be said that he had his hand in starting every parish in the local area excluding those of the Greek and Antiochian Diocese. Father Vadim was the priest who brought me into the Orthodox Church. He was my pastor and father confessor for at least the first 15 years that I was Orthodox. Not only can I say that I knew him well, but I knew his sermons, his teaching style, and I knew the man behind the scenes since he trained me to be a reader and I served as a reader and altar server for many years at his parish.

I can assure you, Father Vadim would be rolling over in his grave if he were to hear the Orthodox teaching prevalent in the local area today.  I can say that in all those years that I served with Father Vadim and participated as a member of his parish, I did not once hear a single sermon on keeping the fasts, or how strictly to keep the fast, during Lent.  Lenten sermons were always about forgiveness, not judging others, pulling the twig out of your own eye instead of trying to pull the sprinter out of everyone else’s eye.  He used to give (every Lent) a sermon on how eating a simple baloney sandwich was a better way to keep the fast than going out for lobster. He used to remind us that to fast from foods but not idle words and thoughts was nonsense.  And to fast without doing good deeds just as bad.  This sort of sermon is rare today.  I hear people loving to name-drop their acquaintance with Father Vadim, but none are brave enough to follow in his legacy.

He had a favorite word he liked to bring out every Great Lent:  Prelest.  Prelest is defined as “spiritual delusion” or “spiritual deception” and in the context of Orthodox piety refers to a specific sort of thing.  To quote Wikipedia (who quotes St. Ignati Brianchaninov) “In a broad interpretation, everyone is considered to be in prelest, that is, everyone has some wrong thoughts and views, does not fully understand the meaning of life and the degree of own sinfulness etc.

“When used in a narrow sense meaning that some particular person is in the state of prelest, it usually means that this person, initially being on the path of pious Christian life, became possessed with the strongest pride and self-conceit right up to the thought about personal sanctity.“

And (again from Wikpedia) Ignatius Brianchaninov defines prelest as "a wounding of human nature by falsehood".[2]

“A modern reader can find the most thorough explanation of prelest in the writings of St. Ignatius (Brianchaninov) where he relentlessly keeps the traditions of Holy Fathers. Some of these writings were incorporated into a book, On prelest. The book is dedicated solely to different forms of delusion (wrong way of prayer, trust to dreams, excessive zeal, false humility etc.), which St. Ignatius explains on the basis of the words from Holy Fathers of the first centuries and provides information about different recent cases of delusion.” (Wikipedia)

Father Vadim taught by his sermons and his life that kindness and compassion to others were superior to keeping a strict fast, and that the great danger in keeping a strict fast was prelest - where an adherent strives so hard to keep such a strict fast that they look down upon others and completely lose site of the goal of the fast, to become more Christ-like. And we know that God is love and Christ is the ultimate expression of love, compassion and forgiveness.

Christ did not judge the adulterous woman. He allowed her to enter his home and wash his feet with her tears and dry them with her hair.  I could go on with a hundred similar stories.

I have heard it said that certain priests in the Orthodox Church today have lowered their standards, because they let all sorts of sinners participate in the life of the Church. I have heard it said that certain priests today are even “apostate” for having this lower standard.   The modern movement afoot within the Orthodox Church today, to protect the Church from all sorts of perceived evil wherein certain priests make a lower standard for the faithful is nothing but prelest.

“Judge not, lest you be judged.”

In my opinion, if the Orthodox Church has any risk of being destroyed, that risk is a risk of being destroyed from within by a radicalized element who wants to see absolute strict adherence to the letter of the law enforced by Orthodox Clergy.  Secularism, Paganism, Homosexuality: their only threat to the Orthodox Church is this same prelest.  That Orthodox Christians will grow to see themselves as morally superior to others and shut others out, denying them access to the gifts and beauty and love of God.

The legacy of the Orthodox Church I believe in, that is the legacy of turning a blind eye to my neighbors' indiscretions.  My neighbor’s life is in God’s hand, not my hand. I do not need to have any opinion about it. And if I start to have an opinion about it, well, that is a slippery slope to prelest.

I try to live by the commands of Christ to love my neighbor, and not think much about any of his beliefs or opinions I might not agree with. We pray daily, many times “forgive us our trespasses as we forgive those who trespass against us.” And yet do we even stop to consider those words?  God does not forgive the trespasses of those who do not forgive others.  In the end it won’t matter how well you kept the fast, but how well you loved your brothers.

They Are Not Like Us - A Quest For Diversity

They say some of us develop more slowly. For instance you've probably heard that girls develop much more rapidly than boys. Well, I was definitely one of those boys who developed more slowly. I don't think it was for any lack of mental intelligence so much as a lack of emotional intelligence and being raised in cultural isolation.

Let's be honest: most of us are raised in relative cultural isolation. What is normal to you and your family growing up: well, I have news for you: it isn't normal to everyone. People tend to hang out with those who seem familiar to them by lifestyle and interests, and this ends up being cultural isolation. I will be the first one to admit "white privilege" and the lack of knowledge of cultures of color, but I've got news for you if you aren't white: you don't know anything about white culture either, and the things your family taught you about us white folk, well, they are just as mythological as what us white folks were taught about people of color.

But before I piss everyone off, let me get back on topic: I developed slowly, and I honestly didn't learn to embrace other cultures until I was half way through my life.

I remember as a kid "going for a drive" with my parents. That's what our little sub-culture of white america did: we went for drives. Always a day trip, and rarely an overnight thing: drives in the country, drives through unknown neighborhoods, drives following around the Goodyear blimp late at night. I would have to say it was one of my dad's favorite hobbies when I was younger.

On this particular occasion we were driving through Arizona, on the back highway between Flagstaff and Sedona, through the beautiful country called Oak Creek Canyon. I was probably about 15 at the time.

My parents were talking about the beautiful scenery when we came to an area of highway congestion. Scores of people were parking and getting out of their cars in swim suits and with inflatable water things. I gazed out the window in amazement at people who were playing in the water of Oak Creek. It was a sweltering hot day so it made sense. But it was the first time in my life that I actually remember thinking: "Wow! Who are these people? They are not like us. They do things that we don't do. In fact, they do really cool and interesting things that we don't do."

I heard my mom rambling in the front seat about how dangerous it was for all those stupid people playing in the rushing waters of the creek. As I pressed my face against the car window while we drove by I didn't think it looked dangerous. I thought it looked fun! But it wasn't what we did.

Later that same day my dad drove on a dirt backroad that went through the rushing waters of another creek bed. So, we can leave the discussion about what is dangerous for later.

It still didn't occur to me that there was a whole other world out there that I knew nothing about from inside my tiny culturally isolated shell.

There were times before that, when I was younger, that I realized "we were different." For instance every time I was with my grandparents and they started speaking to one another in Portuguese. Or when we went to some of our Portuguese family's homes to visit and got another huge dose of that culture. I didn't realize at the time that just how isolated everyone was in their respective cultures. We saw each other in our native cultures but we didn't participate in them. I suspect the Portuguese family knew even less about us that we knew about them.

And then there were those who, for lack of a better expression: they were different. My "cousin Larry" was one such young man. My parents visited my mom's aunt and uncle every once in a while, but on this particular trip they warned me not to get too friendly with their son Larry. He was "going through a hard time" they told me.

Well, we sat around in the living room with my Portuguese great aunt and great uncle. Very boring for a kid my age, roughly 10 or 11 at the time.

Then I heard my great uncle say: "maybe your son would like to go see Larry's room?" About this time Larry came out to see who these guests were. I'm not sure what Larry's age was at the time. He was maybe 5 to 10 years older than me. But it wasn't his age that made me realize he was different, it was how he was dressed. Wild colors, bead necklaces, a huge afro,

Larry invited me into his room and my parents weren't objecting so I followed. His walls were covered with wild colored tapestries and posters. The lights were dim and he had a black light on illuminating some of the black felt posters. Of course, I didn't know what a black light was at the time, nor a black felt poster. He had a record player and he pulled out a record and started playing it. It was some crazy stuff I'd never heard before. (Probably the Beatles.) I was slightly afraid and slightly excited in a way I'd never been. Larry wasn't like us. No, he definitely wasn't like us.

Let me jump ahead. I'm now in my early 20's and beginning to sense that I've been culturally deprived my whole life. I go to church with people who are a little bit like me, but even they "weren't raised the way I was." They are white - we have that in common - but one of them is Scandinavian, and another Irish, and a few of them (oh my!) drink beer.

This was about the time of my life where I decided I'd had it. I wasn't going to be culturally deprived any more. I was going to reach out, stretch, grow, learn new things, experience new cultures.

I did two very different things: I got involved in a Christian Ministry with street kids, and I visited the Russian-American Friendship Pavilion at the Seattle Goodwill Games.

Yes, you can imagine how different both of the cultures I experienced in these two activities were. I believe they formed the foundations of my quest for cultural diversity.

Among the street kids I learned a lot. Not just the slang of street lingo, and all about the lifestyle of prostitutes and pimps, drug dealers and drug users, but even experienced quite a bit of the culture of those who live in the projects, and the culture of Samoan youth and their gangs. I did everything from let a prostitute stay at my house for a while, to inadvertently becoming the getaway car in what I later suspected was an armed robbery. The gang of Samoans loved me so much they invited me to the barbecues their families put on. That was something I really enjoyed. And I became the poster child for "how not to be" at all the orientations and trainings this Christian ministry put on for many years to come.

They are not like us.

And among the Russians I went down another rabbit hole. While among the Samoans I merely learned a few phrases to speak in Samoan (Fafeia mai oi, uso? how's it going, brother?) among the Russians I actually started to learn the whole language. That was a gargantuan task. One I have not completed yet, although I tell people I could hop on a plane to Moscow and not need to take a phrase book with me.

But a culture is more than a language. With the Russian culture I went sort of crazy. I met a whole bunch of Russians who were stuck in Seattle, because they had left the Soviet Union on a cultural travel expedition sponsored by their government, and while they were away their government had collapsed and didn't exist any more. Picture Tom Hanks in The Terminal, only this was on a ship in Elliot Bay. Their ship was moored there for a couple of years, and their people were stuck here for months and months without any way to get home.

Fast forward a couple years and I'm actually visiting Russia at the invitation of one of the friends I had made from that ship. It's not just about eating piroshki or getting drunk by the dacha campfire and barfing all over my hosts vegetable garden. There were elements of visiting ancient buildings and museums, attending my very first Orthodox church service, and following those shafts of light I saw beaming down in the Holy Trinity cathedral all the way back home to where, months later, I decided to embrace the Orthodox church and become an Orthodox Christian.

They are not like us.

I'm a late bloomer. I've mentioned this before. But up until this point I was still primarily politically and socially very conservative. Over the years of being an Orthodox Christian, I followed the ethic of what they call "Orthodox Spirituality" further and further until I became what you now might call a "flaming liberal." How can that be, you wonder. Isn't Orthodox Christianity the most conservative sort of Christianity that exists?

No, not really. It is theologically very conservative and very traditional. In fact, defining traditional. The Catholic Church by contrast hasn't got more than its small toe rooted in history. But the Orthodox Church is socially more aware of the world around it, embracing the diversity of other cultures, and there is one key theological component that provides the mandate for living your life: we are all human and no one of us can say that they are better than others. It is categorically forbidden to judge others, and we are reminded of this throughout the history of Orthodox teaching, in the liturgical works that are recited at services, and in the sermons. You will never hear a sermon in an Orthodox Church disrespecting the LGBTQ community or people of color (actually there are millions of black Orthodox Christians since the Orthodox church spread south through Africa many centuries before protestants and whites came there.) I admit that I've had some gay friends that did not do well in the Orthodox Church, and I've had others who thrived there for a time, but ultimately left. But I still find the Orthodox Church, at least in America, on the "accepting" side of the spectrum.

I spent a long time down that rabbit hole. But it is not the only culture I embrace.

There are those who know me now that are surprised to hear I still consider myself an Orthodox Christian. And there are those among the Orthodox who wonder why I never come to Church.  (Actually, just attending Orthodox feast days gets you to Church more times a year than most protestants go to Church... so there's that...)  I'm not going to answer that here, except to say that there is so much more out there in the world.

I have discovered and embraced several more cultures beyond this.

What about the Wino Culture? I define wino here as someone who really loves tasting wines, learning all about them, how they are made, knowing your grapes, learning your wine regions, and so on. Right now this is one of my favorite cultures. I "wasn't raised to embrace such things" but I've slowly worked toward my family's acceptance of my embracing this culture. A couple years ago I even got my tee-totaling (nearly) brother to drive me on a wine tasting trip of the Applegate Valley in southern Oregon. Yes, progress in diversity.

Beyond this there is the booze culture in general. Those who have attended parties at my house over the past 5 years or so have discovered that I now have a knack for home bartending, both mixing and creating interesting drinks.

Let me not forget the Con Culture - another one of my favorites. I love dressing up in costumes and going to conventions. I have friends who are deep into cosplay, including those who LARP (Live Action Role Play). This is where you go to some place in the wood for a weekend and make it into an imaginary medieval village (often using elaborate props). Everyone is given a role and you have to stay IN the role the entire weekend. It is a little bit more "hard core" than simple Convention Culture, where you just pretend to vaguely be a wizard for a few hours, but get to stay in a comfortable hotel, and "get out of costume" any time you like.  Often at conventions, I wear a completely different costume each day. Mostly a wizard, but sometimes a pirate and sometimes Kris Kringle (one of my Wizard-Fairy characters from my novels.) I have friends who again are more "hard core" with cosplay. Some who have huge online and convention followings due to all the costumes they make and model in.

There is a lot of diversity out there!  So many people not like us.

Over the course of the pandemic I've gone further down the rabbit hole of cultural diversity. Two and a half years ago I planned "my first trip" to Italy. A trip to Venice, that magnificent city!  I started learning Italian, and now am pretty good at it. I've made online friends who are all over Italy.

Of course, I've always loved Italian food. Most American's are raised on the American versions of spaghetti and pizza.  But, of course, I've embraced much more beyond this in terms of Italian recipes for foods and cocktails. I've been nearly an expert in Italian wines (some of my friends - even in Italy - consider me an expert) and I've dabbled in a host of classic Italian cocktails. I've become a lover of various Italian cheeses and meats. I've studied Italian history, especially the history of the Venetian Republic, and read Italian literature, some of it going back and forth between the original Italian and a translation. I've been on virtual tours all over Italy, and probably know more about Italy than just about anyone else on the planet who hasn't yet been there. 

I've had much the same experience with Italian things as I had with Russian things years ago. Except that I haven't been there yet.

But the pandemic has gone on and on.  So I made friends online with people in other countries too.

Somehow I became online friends with quite a number of Indonesians, most of whom are Muslim.  I started learning the language, and decided to put Indonesia on my bucket list. I've learned a lot about their culture and history, but not nearly as much as I've leaned about Italy. I've also learned a lot about the biodiversity of their 12,000+ islands.  Did you know, for instance, that portions of the rainforest in Sumatra are the only place on the planet where Tigers, Elephants, Orangutans, and Hippos live together?

And a close second to Indonesia is Thailand.  Thailand has always been on my bucket list, and now I've made online friends there, AND I've started learning the Thai language (very hard, let me tell you...) After months of studying Thai, I'm still struggling to learn the alphabet and can only say about a dozen phrases - but can't write more than about two of those, because I don't know all the letters in them yet.  Most professional teachers of the Thai language tell you to just skip trying to read and write Thai and only learn to memorize phrases and say them properly.  But, not me. I jumped right down the rabbit hole of the Thai Alphabet.

They are not like us.

As you might imagine. While both countries are nearby. They have similar climates and vegetation. Both have elephants and tigers roaming the wilds. But Thailand (which is 90% + Buddhist ) and Indonesia (which is 90% + Muslim) have very, very different cultures.

There are some very cool and interesting things about Thailand, aside from beautiful Buddhist temples, and very friendly people.  For one, did you know that Pad Thai - the national dish of Thailand and the favorite for most Americans at all of our Thai Restaurants, was invented by the Chinese, brought to Thailand, and then adopted by the Thai as their "national dish" - wow, huh?

And another of your favorite Chinese things: Sriracha sauce, actually is originally from Thailand, where today the most famous brands are made in the city of Sriracha, in the province of Sriracha (ซอสศรีราชา), not too  far from Bangkok. (I have tried in vain to find any Thai brands of Sriracha available in the united states, although I have found and purchased some of Indonesian's popular "ABC Sauce" here.)

Beautiful and interesting people, in beautiful and interesting places.

They are not like us.

Probably the next place on my list of interesting places I've learned about and interesting people I have met is the Philippines - although I haven't learned much, and can only think of one or two words I know in the main Filipino language, Tagalog - which has some remarkable similarities to Indonesian, including what I would call some "crossover words" which mean similar but slightly different things. I can't say I know much about Filipino culture, although I was eating Chicken Adobo for lunch at a Filipino restaurant in the Pike Place market at least once a week for the 10 or so years that I worked in downtown Seattle.

In all, in the seclusion of my home, using my computers and/or phone, with a variety of different social networking applications, I have made friends and acquaintances in all of the following countries: Italy, France, Germany, Netherlands, Spain, Portugal, UK, various parts of USA, Colombia, Venezuela, Brazil, Argentina, Japan, China, Philippines, South Korea, Vietnam, Indonesia, Malaysia, Thailand, Myanmar, India. I have taken time to study the following languages: Italian, Spanish, Portuguese, Indonesian, Thai. (I had to give up Spanish and Portuguese for a while because they interfered with my Italian, but I hope to return to them once I'm pretty stable in Italian.) I have read about the culture, the people, the history, the geography, the flora and fauna (and visited all of these places in Google Earth or Street view - many of them in 3D with my Oculus) of pretty much all of the countries listed above. When I meet someone new and become friendly with them, I like to see the city and country they live in. I like to think about maybe visiting that place someday.

My bucket list of places to visit someday started out with Italy (because I was mesmerized by it), the Azores (because my Portuguese ancestors came from there, and Thailand (because it was so cool.)  Because of the people I have met, I have added several more places: Indonesia, various different trips to different regions in Italy, possibly Malaysia and/or Singapore (because they are both so close to Indonesia and Thailand, it might be a shame to go down all that way and not see all three four countries in one trip.) And my bucket list of places I would like to visit continues to grow and expand the more people I meet in interesting places.

You may have noticed I don't include Russian in that list. I have known so many Russians and been immersed in Russian culture so much, that it doesn't interest me so much any more. But I always have in the back of my head to perhaps someday make a return visit, and possibly include Ukraine and Belarus, to possibly meet up with the kids my wife and I had hosted from those countries, or try to look up my old friends in Moscow.

The world is an interesting and diverse place. People everywhere have the idea that they are all that there is.  This is not unique to us in the USA, no matter how common it might seem here. But my hope is that with the blossoming of global social networking there has come about a global social awareness that may in the future help people of all cultures to transcend their differences.

But, sadly, I have found that there are prejudices against people of other cultures no matter where you go on the planet. No culture seems to be immune to this.

Perhaps if we all consider: They are not like us. Yes. But we also are not like them.  We are all on this planet together. We have weathered and continue to weather a horrific storm, with this global pandemic. But we will get through this, and hopefully come out shining brighter on the other side.  

Explore the world! Learn about other nations and cultures. Everyone has a history, a uniqueness. If you are a Christian or one the many other religions that believes in the Christian God, then you know that we are also all equal in God's eyes.

Our many cultures have influenced one another for many centuries. Sometimes for the better, and sometimes for the worse. Let us hope that in the many years to come it is always for the better.

Peace. Shalom. Salam.

The Journey

 The Journey is not about the destination. It is not about any of the destinations. It is about The Journey. It is about savoring all you learn and experience along the way. A destination is just another micro-journey. One where you will continue to wander and grow and learn.

The "Bucket List" isn't about showing the world your accomplishments, as if to say "Look what I did before I died." No, it is all about cataloging the things you wish to learn, and then things you learned. It is all about having experiences, embracing them and bring them into the fabric of your own being, and then sharing them to some degree with others.

This reminds me of my first bucket list. As a creative personality I am always scribbling things down. My desks are usually littered with hundreds of little post-it-notes or things scribbled hastily on torn-out pages of small notebooks. Ideas, and dreams. Characters and inventions. Places of the imagination. Coordinates in a game. Lists of spells and incantations both literary and in games. Things I dream up and things I collect from others. Places I want to go, things I want to create. Languages I want to learn. Favorite poets. Favorite colors. Colors in other languages where they have a certain glow that they seem to lack in English. Ideas for recipes. Recipes for ideas. Lists of things needed to brew beer or make wine or make a cake.

Once upon a time I grew frustrated with the clutter of these tiny notes on my desk and had a thought: "I will collect all of these and throw them into a bucket. Then any time I am searching for an idea about anything, I will scrounge around in the bucket a little."

I collected my notes, my ideas and dreams for a couple of years in my bucket. This was my first bucket list. It wasn't a list of things I wanted to do before I kicked the bucket, it was a bucket of lists.  A bucket of things in nearly every category you could imagine.

Then one day someone who shouldn't have been cleaning my office dumped my whole bucket into the trash.  I didn't discover it for several days and  it was already too late. The trash had already gone out to the street corner and been picked up by the Waste Management people.

I was upset of course, but I didn't take out my anger on anyone, because when I looked at that bucket, it really did look pretty foul and I could see how someone might have thought it was just a rubbish bin. I decided to repurpose that bucket, perhaps even use it as a waste bin. And to keep my ideas and dreams someplace else.

Don't throw your ideas and dreams into a waste bucket, or something that looks like a waste bucket.

So much to say, this is the real bucket list. It is a collection of your dreams.

I always thought the idea of a bucket list was stupid. People should be able to do what they want all the time and not waste time with such things.  But a few years back I realized that I had aspirations for a few things that would take some time in planning and saving to bring to pass. So, I started my first official bucket list, that I called a bucket list, and thought of as a bucket list. It generally centered around places I wanted to go before I died.

I didn't want to go to these places simply so I could say I had gone to these places. I wanted to go there because they were things that invoked in me the deep hallows of my dreams. I always found the city of Venice enchantingly beautiful. La Serenissima, floating on the water like a dream. I had always been mystically drawn to the Azore Islands, because that's where my ancestors came from. I put these places as the first places on my bucket list.

I would have to say that is when The Journey began. I have always put a great deal of forethought and planning into every major thing I have done, whether it is writing a novel, creating a song, making a movie or even a short video, I study and I research and I learn everything I can about anything that can possibly be related to my dream.

My family members, and those who have stayed my my family, over the years would recognize that I have always planned the most elaborate vacations. We have traveled to every stretch of the coast of Washington, Oregon, and Northern California, and with every trip we have always seen and done a host of new things.

I did something similar years ago when I travelled to Russia. The host family who sponsored me was amazed that I already knew the whole layout of Moscow, and where all the famous authors and poets had been born, lived, died and been buried. I also had a pretty good grasp of the Russian language before I traveled. The travel book that I studied as I planned was written entirely in Russian.

As I began to plan my trip to Venice I did something similar, and this part of the journey has grown and grown into something more than I originally imagined. I started with a Rick Steves travel guide to Venice. Then I got his Rick Steve's Italian phrase book. After getting a pretty good grasp of his Italian phrases I deiced that I actually wanted to really learn Italian and not just memorize a bunch of phrases, that I didn't really understand the mechanics of.

That blossomed. Eventually I downloaded about 5 different phone apps for learning Italian (I'm down to just 4 now), and that grew into "wanting to find some Italians I could chat with and try and learn more."

It helped that we were having a pandemic and I was at home all of the time.

My initial search for a way to talk with Italians was pretty fruitless, but eventually I found the livestream chats on Youtube, where I could chat with and learn from Italians in a chat textbox, and then I found Bigo Live where I could chat with Italians while they livestreamed, and even face to face. The journey was spreading.  On both of these apps right away I started meeting people in a lot of other countries too.  After a year and a half of chatting on youtube, and a year of chatting and watching broadcasts on Bigo Live a lot has changed.  A lot.

Right away I started picking up a lot of Spanish and a lot of Portuguese. That hadn't been a part of my plan, but Spanish is always nice to know in the USA (my next door neighbors are Mexicans) and Portuguese would always be nice to know when I visit the Azores someday.

I forgot to mention Thailand.  Thailand was the first place that I put on my bucket list because of two things: beautiful architecture and temples, and elephants!

Fast forward and after a year and a half of becoming friends with foreigners, all of the following has changed:

* I've made pretty good friends in Venice, and in other parts of Northern Italy (Milano and Torino) who I hope to visit with when I get there.

* I've also made friends in Rome, Naples, Sicily, Sardegna, Liguria, Umbria, Calabria, Puglia and Basilicata. Yes, did you know they had a region named after ME! :D 

* I've also made friends in the upper Rhone Valley in France, in the Galicia and Andalusia regions of Spain.

* Made quite a bunch of friends in Brazil and most of my Portuguese experience comes with chatting and talking with them. I actually spent one of my new years eves at a virtual "beach party" near Rio di Janeiro (online) Nobody in Portugal yet, although Galicia is close.  

* For some reason most of the Spanish speaking friends I have made are in Colombia, but a couple are in Venezuela and Mexico too.

* I've made friends in Thailand, Malaysia, and a whole bunch of friends in Indonesia (now also on my bucket list). A few in the Philippians, and a few scattered other places across Europe. 

* I now know quite a number of people in all of those places. I follow their lives and they follow mine. Quite a number of places have been added to my bucket list, in varying degrees, but I certainly hope to take to trip to Thailand, Malaysia and Indonesia someday and another to South America. This is in addition to my Rhone Valley France trip and my southern Italy trip.

* for a while I studied Spanish and Portuguese with my Italian studies but this was too difficult. They have so many similarities that I would keep getting things mixed up in Italian, and since Italy is the first place I plan to visit, I didn't want to mess up my potential with Italian, so I set aside the others (limiting myself just to the basic greetings). Instead I added Indonesian to my language studies, and there is the bonus that Malay is nearly identical to bahasa Indonesia. In fact Wikipedia says Indonesian is a Malay dialect.

Making friends with people on social media can have a sad aspect. Sometimes someone will vanish without a trace and you never hear from them again. In one case, one friend who vanished like that, we (our collective online group) were able to figure out that he died. But fortunately many of my new online friends I have now on more than one social media account. So if they delete their accounts one place there is always the chance I can find them and follow up with their lives in another place.

This is The Journey. But this is not all. In addition to making new friends and learning languages I am also reading about the history, culture, art and religion of many new places. I've picked up and read quite a few new poets and playwrights, listened to some interesting new music in a vast number of genres, and read about the strangest episodes of history.  Marco Polo is a favorite example. I picked him up and started reading him as part of my Italian studies until he got to Sumatra (the largest island in the North West portion of Indonesia which has  more than 20,000 islands). I lost interest here, but that was before Indonesia was  a part of my life. I plan to circle back to Marco Polo and resume with him on Sumatra.

As a connoisseur of many things, everyone wants to share their food and drink with me. So, I've learned a lot of new cocktails from my friends in northern Italy, and even video-blogged about some of them. I've learned that Thai people DO use chopsticks but only on noodles - it is too hard with rice. I now feel much better about all the years I asked for chopsticks at Thai restaurants. Oh, and by the way did you know that Phad Thai was invented by the Chinese but later became so popular in Thailand that it became their national dish? Also, that bottle of Siracha you have may be made in San Francisco, but Siracha actually comes from the city of Siracha in Thailand.

Lastly, we were all taught somewhere (perhaps by the zookeepers at our local zoos) that there are two kinds of Elephants, African and Indian. But actually, there are seven distinct kinds of Elephants, and the "Asian Elephant (which you find in Thailand and the Maylay peninsula is distinct from the Indian Elephant. Three of the distinct varieties are those living on the island of Sri Lanka, those living on the Island of Sumatra (part of Indonesia) and those living on Borneo (an island shared by the countries of Brunei, Malaysia and Indonesia).

Did you know that you can go onto google street view in Thailand and see elephants crossing the road?

All a part of the journey folks, and it makes sense that I got here from Venice, when you consider that Marco Polo brought the Venetian empire to the south pacific, and Sumatra specifically before Columbus had discovered America.

Another fun fact: it is widely recognized that the numbers of elephants in Sumatra are declining, due to loss of habitat. But if you check with any organization that actually counts elephants, the estimated elephant population of Sumatra has actually been climbing! Why is that? How can that be?  It is because much of the Island of Sumatra is still completely unexplored. Can you imagine that?  A place on our own planet, not at the bottom of the ocean, that nobody has yet explored! Sadly, it is only becoming explored as the agricultural industries for coffee and palm oil (mostly palm oil) expand their deforestation of Sumatra. In Sumatra the problem they have with poaching of elephants is not for their tusks, it is largely farmers trying to protect their crops.

And yet, one of Marco Polo's first places to explore was Sumatra where he stayed for nearly a year and a half while his ships were being repaired.

This is the journey.

(To follow Basil's Journey, subscribe to the facebook page: https://www.facebook.com/basilexplorer - Cheers!)

Try Before you Die

Here is a short piece of fiction I wrote about one of the characters in one of my novels. It was written nearly 10 months ago but never published. I just re-read it and it seems publishable to me, so here you go. It is short. It ends abruptly. It may someday be part of a larger work. Enjoy!

"Try Before you Die"
by Basil Sprig

Smitty had an insatiable appetite for life.

He loved every sort of food, and really could never understand people who didn't like a certain food.

He loved every sort of music, and could never wrap his brain around people who shunned a certain genre.

And art? He loved everything from the realists to the abstract expressionists, and the millions of nuances in between.

Movies and theater: great stuff. He wished he had more time to watch every movie, every television show, and see every theatrical production.

Musicals? No problem. He loved them too.

And booze?

Some of his friends through he was an alcoholic because he drank so much. But as things stood, he wanted to try every new and interesting cocktail. He wanted to try all the different and various and nuanced wines. He was on a quest to study every wine region in Europe, what grapes they grew, and what wines they produced. He was even getting to where he could actually do a blind taste test and come up with a pretty close guess as to what wine he was drinking.

Smitty's ancestors had been pioneers, and unfortunately abolitionists. Somehow the notions that all alcoholic beverages were evil was passed down through the generations. So he never really quite fit in with his biological family.

Over time, society's acceptance of "a glass of wine with dinner" became more widespread. Smitty took advantage of this to  crack open a bottle of wine every time he visited his parents.  At first he kept this bottle hidden, only pouring himself a glass once dinner was on the table. In later visits with his parents he started keeping the bottle of wine in the kitchen where everyone could see it. It wasn't long before he was having several glasses of wine per day at his parents house.

Occasionally his mom would snap at him: "Your aunt Jeraldine is coming over. You make sure you hid that stuff. She doesn't tolerate people drinking!"

He had complied and hidden the wine, only to find aunt Jeraldine was getting more liberal too, and had actually brought a bottle with her to dinner.

"I heard you drank wine, Nephew," she said.

Smitty just smiled and gave his aunt a big hug.

He noticed his mom was looking the other direction with a perturbed expression on her face.

It wasn't easy being an aesthete and epicurean in a family of austere abolitionists.

Friday the 13th at a Cabin in The Woods

Friday the 13^th at a Cabin in The Woods

by Basil Sprig

I planned my vacation down the coast not-quite-camping. I didn’t want to haul around camping gear and sleep in tents, so I rented yurts all down the Oregon Coast. But when I got to Northern California I could find no available yurts. Not wanting to pay for hotel rates on the coast, and not wanting to stay in a dive, I thought hard… hmmm… what about cabins?

I found a web site. The pictures showed cozy little beige and green cabins nestled in the redwood forest. The interior of the cabins reminded me of 1960s hotels rooms, but with wooden panel walls. That should work, I thought.

I arrived at my cabin destination on Friday the 13^th – it was easy to find along Highway 101 with the giant Bigfoot cutout standing in front of a flashing sign that said, “Cabins, Restaurant and Country Market.”

The cabins looked about like I saw on-line, except that they were a little more run down. What they didn’t show you on-line was that there were a whole bunch of dilapidated cabins overgrown with blackberries and other shrubs, dotted here and there all over the woods.  Hopefully mine isn’t one of those!

I stopped at the store, as it was the only habitable building visible right off the parking lot. An unusual sounding gong was triggered by an electronic eye as I entered. I couldn’t imagine why, as you could see from one end of the store to the other just standing right there. Inside there was a single row of miscellaneous goods – the kind you find a store when it is the only store within 50 miles either direction. After that there was a row of picnic tables they had somehow got inside. On one side of the picnic tables was a long counter with a window open into the kitchen on the other side. A guy was grilling up foods in the kitchen, and two women were sitting at the picnic tables staring at me like I was crazy for stopping here. They didn’t have any food in front of them. I could somehow tell by the looks on their faces that they worked here. Must have just gotten off. Or maybe they’d gotten off hours ago and there was no place else in the vicinity to sit down.

The kitchen felt like it had grease dripping from the walls. I’ve been in places where I was a little afraid to eat. Here I was a little afraid to stand too long breathing.

I asked the guy in the kitchen if this was the right place to stop and check-in to the cabins. He said, just a minute – it will be right over there at the front desk. He pointed to the cash register by the front door. After a few moments he pulled off his apron and walked over to the front counter. Probably didn’t want me to see how muck-encrusted the apron was.

“Name?” he said.

“Miller.”

He turned around and began pulling slips of paper out of wooden cubbies on the wall behind him, to read what was on them. Old school.

Finally, he found mine, and handed me the key to my room.

I pulled out my phone and asked what the phone number for the front desk was, so I’d have it in case of emergency. Noticed that there was no cell signal here but didn’t want him to know I had no signal.

“Won’t do you any good to have the phone number,” he said. “Nobody will be here after 6 o’clock.”

“That’s OK, can I just get the number anyway?”

“Won’t do you no good. What do you need the number for?”

“Well, who knows. What if there’s some emergency or something and I I need to talk with someone.”

“Oh, then you’d want to knock on the door of the Groundskeepers Quarters and talk with him.”

The groundskeeper?

“OK, where’s that?”

“Well, you’re in number 1? That would be right next door.”

“OK,” I said.

I’d figure it out when I got there.

I decided to ask if they had WiFi. Couldn’t hurt to ask, right?

“Only works right here at the store,” he said. “Won’t reach all the way over to the cabins.”

Why was I not surprised?

On my way back to my car I noticed there was an old-style phone booth out in front, next to the Bigfoot cutout. I heaved a sigh of relief and went to examine it. Completely gutted. No phone.

The directions for driving up to my cabin were convoluted. I drove up a tiny paved path, no wider than my car, between rundown and falling down buildings. Several times I nearly took a wrong turn but decided I didn’t want to do that and get lost back there in the woods. I noticed a nice custom plastic sleeve covering up a car like a body-bag. Wondered if there was someone who had once checked in but never checked out.

None of the small buildings were marked, so far as I could tell. He said “1” was the first cabin past the Groundskeeper’s quarters, so I pulled in behind the first cabin after the first habitable looking building.

At first I couldn’t be sure it was my cabin. Do I just try the key and see if it works? Then at last I noticed a "1" that had been painted over the same color as the building, just beside the door.

My cabin was a lot smaller than I had imagined. The roof was so covered with leaves and pine needles that I hoped it didn’t rain while I was here, because it probably leaked.

There were several broken boards on the front porch that I had to step over.

There was a welcome sign when you opened the door with a mama bear and two cubs. There was a different welcome sign over the bed with another mama bear and two cubs. Apparently bears were very welcome here.

Inside the creaky floor was sloped a couple of different directions. I tripped and nearly fell several times while bringing in my luggage.

Got all my gear in and decided to use the bathroom. I was thankful that I had my own bathroom after staying in yurts for a week and having to walk half-way across a campground to use one.

The bathroom was so tiny you had to sit on the toilet sideways because there was no room for your feet in front of the toilet. And unless you really twisted sideways almost to a 90-degree angle, you couldn’t close the bathroom door while you sat on the toilet.

While I finished unloading my gear, the Groundskeeper appeared out in front of his cabin – or really, more in front of mine – smoking a long, curved pipe. His pipe reminded me of a small saxophone, and the Groundskeeper himself reminded me of Santa Clause with his long white hair and long white beard. He was playing with a frisky Doberman – throwing it sticks, which it chewed on.

“Make sure you don’t leave any food in your car,” he said. “Bears will rip the metal doors right off if they smell food in there.”

I hadn’t been planning on moving my ice chest and all my food into the cabin, but I went ahead and did that too.

After dinner, mostly from my ice chest, I sat on the porch and opened a bottle of wine.

The website said the cabins had a view. They did: a view of about 15 feet of dead lawn that looked to be mostly rocks, a row of shrubs, and then US 101 with cars speeding by at 60 mph. All day and all night, it turned out.

I was surprised the groundskeeper let his dog run around and play with only a narrow band of shrubs separating the front “lawn” from the highway.

The groundskeeper was a jolly fellow. He regaled me with bear tales and conspiracy theories for hours while I sat there sipping my wine.

He seemed like a really nice guy, but then again, so did Norman Bates.

“I’m not really a groundskeeper,” he told me at one point. “More of a warden. Me and Magni keep away the bears. The idea is to keep the bears happy – away from humans, and to keep the guest happy – free from bear encounters.”

His dog, Magni, he told me, was named after Thor’s son. I realized that the old man looked just like Odin, but was too afraid to tell him that.

He told me more bear stories – and about his protecting them from poachers, and about the black market in bear gall-bladders sold to the Chinese in San Francisco, and how the local natives considered him somewhat of an honorary member of their tribe because of his work protecting the bears.

He told me about how the California Black Bear was the largest black bear on the west coast. Just smaller the grizzly.

A full moon began to creep up over the treetops and silhouette of abandoned cabins to the east.

Before the last of the daylight faded, he said he had business to attend to, and retired quickly with Magni to his cabin next door.

I decided it was also a good time for me to go inside also. I hoped I didn’t have to come back outside until it was bright morning.

I locked the door, then the dead bolt. Then stuck my suitcase in front of the door. There was no telling who might have a key to this place, and since I was a light sleeper. I’d definitely hear someone breaking in if they had to knock my suitcase over.

The interior of the cabin was a strange mix of the new and the old. A sticker on the door warned: No Smoking! Including vaping. There was electricity. I was able to charge my phone at least, even if I couldn’t use it.  There was a mini fridge, a microwave, a coffee pot, and a TV. Next to the coffee pot there was a nice basket with a large packet of coffee, a couple teabags and various creamers and sweeteners.

The bathroom had a small shower stall. In the morning I would discover there was no room to bend down and pick up your soap if you dropped it. But the nice white clean towels were just like any hotel room had.

The bathroom sink filled up with water and drained very slowly. But at least it eventually drained. And the toilet flushed.

There were marks on the windowsill that looked like a bear claw had scratched the paint off, and something laying next to the window that looked like a bear claw that had ripped off. On the inside of the window! The screen seemed to be in good shape, so I ignored this, but filed it away in the back of my mind.

I continued to stumble over the crooked floor every once in a while as I checked out my accommodations.

I didn’t really feel like watching TV but decided to try out the TV just out of curiosity. I turned it on, and message spread across the screen saying that there was something blocking the satellite dish, and we should have it serviced.

I decided to lay on the bed for a while reading until I was too tired to keep my eyes open. Nothing scary tonight.

I slept fairly well that night, in spite of being really creeped out about this place. But I discovered quickly that for some reasons every other car that came around the corner in front of the cabins hit the turtles in the middle of the road and made a nice thump-thump-thump-thump sound. Every couple of minutes.

In the morning, I woke up excited to brew myself a pot of coffee. For nearly the past week, I hadn’t been able to just get up and drink coffee – my normal routine. It would be nice to get back to that routine.

I pulled the pot out to fill it with water and discovered that the bottom of the glass was shattered. I rubbed my finger along it to see if it was still usable, and tiny bits of glass flaked off. Damn!

I sat down on the end of the bed and thought about my predicament.  Could I just make coffee and brew it right into the coffee mugs? Then I noticed that they had two very large ceramic bowls with handles. I wasn’t really sure what for? Did they sell clam chowder up at the store? Or maybe they dreamed of selling clam chowder?

I was able to rig up a make-shift coffee brewing station and brewed it right into each of the two large ceramic bowls. At least I had my coffee!

After coffee I packed up my things. The bears had thankfully left my car alone.

The “restaurant” at the store didn’t open until 9 am, so I waited until then to go get breakfast. That greasy café didn’t really seem appetizing, but I might as well make this adventure complete. You couldn’t ruin a couple strips of bacon could you?

I walked down the hill to there about 9:15 and went inside. There was a different guy on-duty and he was standing up at the front counter talking on the phone. Nobody else in the whole place. When he got off the phone, I asked him if I could see the breakfast menu.

“Oh, breakfast? Well, it will be a while before they start cooking breakfast – at least 15, 20 minutes. The cook is out back pulling pork for today’s pulled pork sandwiches, and I don’t know how to use the grill.”

I decided that was about enough of my adventure, turned in my key, and headed out on the road.

I was still alive, and that was all that mattered.

On my narrowly averting scurvy! Arrr!

Arrrr!

It seems I have narrowly averted catching scurvy!

Yes, you heard me right. Scurvy! Just like a pirate! Let me tell you about it.

When I first started the Keto diet I learned that one of the negative side-affects of being in ketosis is very bad breath. Because of this I started brushing my teeth a lot more.  At first maybe 4 times a day instead of the usual 2.  I started having a lot more problems with food getting caught between my teeth, bleeding gums and so on. Yep, I had gingivitis. I started brushing and flossing even more often. I started gargling with Listerine: first twice a day, and got all the way up to 4 times a day before I figured out what was going on.

I researched and researched, read every thing I could find on the Keto diet, on the biological state of ketosis, on ketogenisis in general: NOWHERE could I find any evidence that ketosis caused gingivitis. Was it because I was suddenly brushing a lot more? What was causing my gingivitis?  I kept brushing even more, but it kept getting worse. It got to where it hurt to chew, my gums were bleeding every time I brushed or flossed, and so on. It was a royal pain. But no information whatsoever that keto was causing this. But I was certain it all started a few weeks into the keto diet.

Then, about 4 days ago on a fluke I looked at it from the other perspective. I reversed my research. If the keto people don't know anything about gingivitis, maybe the dental people know about ketogenisis?  So, I started reading articles on gingivitis.  WHAM! It hit me like a board across the forehead. Maybe I should say "face-palm" but no, it was more like a board across the forehead. Gingivitis can be caused by a severe lack of vitamin C!  Who knew!  Wow. This was amazing news. Because I definitely had not had ANY vitamin C for two months at about this time.

Before the keto diet, I probably had orange juice, lime juice and/or lemon juice, straight, with sugar, or in cocktails about 6 to 8 times a week. Being fond of the Margarita, and Tequila Sunrise, and other such delicacies in the evening, and a decent glass of OJ in the morning, I rarely needed to take vitamin C.  I only took vitamin C supplements if I felt I was coming down with a cold or flu.

Once I read this, I immediately started taking vitamin C supplements morning, noon and night. You know what?  I immediately noticed a difference in my gingivitis. Now, after 4 days of regularly taking vitamin C my gums no longer hurt at all. I can chew food without problem.  When I brush there's only a tiny amount of bleeding. Who knew?  Vitamin C!  The things you take for granted.

Of course, now that I realize this, there are several other vitamins I can't get in my diet that I'm going to start taking supplements regularly for: mostly in the B family. And if I hadn't discovered this, I could have gotten worse and worse until I had scurvy. Yes, you heard that: scurvy!  Scurvy isn't a disease that you catch, it is simply the affects of severe vitamin C deprivation on your body. Gingivitis is one of the first symptoms of it.  Who knew!  I certainly didn't.  

Feel like I've got some pirating experience now!

And let me tell you, take your vitamin C - one way or another. You need it!

Arrrr

A Bit of history: First Woman to Hike the Pacific Crest through Oregon

This article is reprinted from Morning Oregonian,  Portland, September 26, 1910, page 13

WOMAN TRAVERSES CASCADES' CREST
Mrs. W. E. Herring, of Portland, with Husband Is First to Make Journey.
COUPLE SLEEPS IN OPEN
Government Engineer Completes Journey--
Valuable Water Power Found in Mountains May Be Harnessed.

    MEDFORD, Or., Sept. 25.--(Special.)--Mr. and Mrs. W. E. Herring, of Portland, have arrived in Medford after a 600-mile tramp along the summit of the Cascades. Mrs. Herring is the first woman ever to make this trip. Mr. Herring is District Government Engineer. In his tramp he examined all the lakes and streams as to their adaptability to power and irrigation uses.
    The journey was begun in the Cascades east of Portland in the middle of July and was completed in Medford yesterday.
    Mrs. Herring made this trip almost entirely on foot. She and her husband went for miles across country where no trails existed.

Candles Not Needed.

    The two months that Mr. and Mrs. Herring were in the mountains they never lighted a candle but went to bed with the sun. They carried no tent, but slept beneath the open sky.
    The engineer and his wife traveled through two snow fields at the altitudes of 7100 and 7500, respectively. The latter snow field was near Crater Lake. At Diamond Lake they found ice on August 16.
    They saw numerous deer and bear, but as Mr. Herring carried no gun he killed no game. His compass and aneroid barometer occupied his attentions. When crossing trout streams they would stop a few minutes to catch a mess.
    The order of day was to break camp at sunrise and walk until evening, covering 18 to 20 miles per day. Mr. Herring made numerous side trips, aggregating 400 miles.

Forest Fires Observed.

    As they came south, the couple passed four forest fires. They arrived at Prospect in time to see the fire which raged across the Rogue River. This was the most destructive fire in Southern Oregon.
    For two weeks Mr. and Mrs. Herring stayed in this fire district. Mr. Herring aided in the efforts of the firefighters.
    Speaking of the trip, Mr. Herring stated: "We found an immense amount of horsepower stored in the rivers, but were somewhat disappointed in regard to the possibilities of the lakes as storage reservoirs. Most of the outlets are too wide to make damming practicable. The outlets, however, of several of the large lakes are narrow and will make good storage reservoirs. The storage of water is very necessary both to power and irrigation projects. If enough water can be stored to keep a plant running to full capacity during the dry season, which in this country last 100 days, a great saving can be effected.

Storage Is Necessary.

    "The value of storing water for irrigation is apparent. The reservoir sites are so high up in the mountains that the only feasible way would be to let the stored water run down the natural channels during the dry months.
    "The possibilities of power development along the Cascades have not been touched upon. There can, of course, be no development of power plants until there is a market for the power. In Southern Oregon a small portion of the power could be put to good use pumping water for irrigation. In the San Joaquin Valley 430 motors are used to pump water from the river and its branches for irrigation purposes."

Other Trip Contemplated.

    Next Tuesday Mr. and Mrs. Herring leave for another journey through the mountains. Herring is going to look for power sites along Sucker Creek to the Illinois River, down it to the Rogue and on to the ocean. He will also investigate the possibility of opening a safe trail to the famous Oregon Caves out from Grants Pass.
    Mr. Herring desires also to find a route for a trail down the Rogue River that will connect Grants Pass with the tidelands. He couple will finish their trip by October 15, at which time they will return to Portland, where Mr. Herring will make an extensive report of this trip.
Morning Oregonian, Portland, September 26, 1910, page 13