LET TERS
FAREWELL, SHEKLOW
It was with mixed feelings that I read
Sally Sheklow’s annual Thanksgiving col-
umn (EW, 11/22). Her contributions to the
Eugene Weekly have always been, for me,
the highlight of your publication. Her writ-
ing covered local, global, personal, politi-
cal and societal matters. And this was her
last column for the Weekly.
The quality of Sheklow’s pieces, plus
their timeliness, has contributed excellence
to the Weekly’s material.
I’ll also miss the boldness she brought
to her writing, which she so skillfully com-
bined with kindness and a big dose of hu-
mor.
Lynne Schwartz
Eugene
STUCK WITH GUNS
In response to John Kiely’s letter to the
editor (Letters 11/9), I agree, Congress
has been woefully inactive in passing sen-
sible solutions to our nation’s gun violence
problems. However, he was in error; I have
been a sponsor of the ban on bump stocks
since the bill was introduced on Oct. 4.
After the horrific events in Las Vegas,
I stood with former representative and
VIEWPOINT
gun violence survivor Gabby Giffords and
Representative John Lewis on the steps of
the U.S. Capitol Building and called on
Republican Leadership to take immedi-
ate action to curb gun violence. That same
day I went to the House floor and called
directly on Speaker Ryan to name a Select
Committee to investigate the causes of and
lessen the potential for gun violence and to
bring to the floor a vote on comprehensive
background check legislation that includes
closing the gun show loophole and the in-
dividual internet sale loophole.
In addition, I firmly believe bump
stocks and other devices that convert a
semiautomatic weapon into something
that is virtually a fully automatic weapon
should be banned. That’s why I joined as
an original co-sponsor of the Automatic
Gun Fire Prevention Act, which would ban
such devices.
I’ve pushed for sensible, commonsense
solutions to our nation’s gun problems for
years. The unfortunate reality is that Re-
publicans will not allow a House vote on
any gun control legislation — no matter
how sensible it is. I will continue to push
for better legislation to curb our nation’s
gun violence problem, but frankly until the
majority changes, we will be stuck with the
status quo.
Congressman Peter DeFazio
Springfield
EUGfun!: How do these outdoor heaters fit
into the city climate recovery plan?
Sharon Blick
Eugene
WELCOME TO POTTERSVILLE
ALL LIVES MATTER, ETC.
In the last Eugene Weekly (11/20, pg.
3), I see a big ad from the city of Eugene
with a photo of bundled-up folks getting
warm by a fire. The ad says there will be
tents, fire pits and outdoor heaters in the
Park Blocks.
Wow, is the city finally doing some-
thing for the homeless people? But no,
this is EUGfun! Fun for the people who
already have shelter and heat at home. For
them, it is not only legal for them to have
tents and fires in the park, but funded by
the city! Wow.
The Egan Warming Center (run by St.
Vinnie, not the city) only operates when
the temperature is below 30, and they
served more than 1,600 homeless people
last winter. FYI: 32 degrees is freezing.
The Egan Warming Center needs more
volunteers. I just signed up on their web-
site at eganwarmingcenter.com. You can
too.
Also, a question for the folks running
I’m sorry, Kate Lemley (Letters, 11/30),
that you had your lawn sign stolen. Yes,
black lives matter; so do brown, white and
any other color.
If you could move past your color-blind
attitudes, you would see a world that will
only find peace and justice when we focus
on kindness and love — no distinction by
race, religion, etc.
Suggested reading for you is the Dalai
Lama, Dr. King and Sri Chinmoy (“Be uni-
versal in your Love. You will see the uni-
verse to be a picture of your own being”).
Don French
Eugene
ROLL OVER, VAN GOGH
In reference to Karen Lee’s comments
regarding digital art and its absence of a soul
as stated by printmaker Tallmadge Doyle
(Letters, 12/7): I agree wholeheartedly with
Doyle and strongly disagree with Lee.
As a working full-time artist, I know that
B Y E D WA R D J . K A M E ’ E N U I
Ode to the McKenzie River
QUESTION: WHICH RIVER QUENCHES THE THIRST OF APPROXIMATELY 200,000 PEOPLE?
W
hat is the sole water source for
Eugene?
I didn’t know the answer ei-
ther, and I actually live on the
McKenzie. Like you, I know
now: the McKenzie River.
There is another question you are no doubt now ask-
ing: So if you live on the McKenzie, do you fly fish?
No, I don’t. I know, it’s hard to fathom, and I’ve
endured the puzzled disdain of many a fly fisher-
man, particularly those who have yet to master the
upstream mend. I’ve been asked many, many times:
“How do you live on the McKenzie and not fly fish?”
I should have a witty retort, but I don’t. I’m still
working on it.
I’m also working on learning more about this in-
credible river, although I’ve been quietly resistant to
reaching after the facts about the McKenzie. It’s as
if I’ve secretly harbored the idea that learning more
technical stuff about this river would actually dimin-
ish its beauty.
Clearly, I’ve not fully abandoned my Keatsian
English undergraduate roots when it comes to nature.
John Keats, the English Romantic poet well known for
“Beauty is truth, truth beauty,” insisted that we accept
the uncertainty, mystery and doubt about the natural
world “without any irritable reaching after fact and
reason.” He had a point, one that I unwittingly em-
braced without fully acknowledging it.
But Keats would no doubt change his mind if he
knew that the “truth beauty” of the McKenzie was
threatened. No doubt, he would insist on an “irritable
reaching after fact and reason.” He might even turn to
4
December 14, 2017 • eugeneweekly.com
real science for his facts and reason.
The bold truth is that the boundless beauty of the
McKenzie River is not a given, or as poets and phi-
losophers like to say, immutable — far from it.
As trite as it sounds, rivers like the McKenzie are
indeed “… the veins and arteries of our communities.
They give us clean drinking water and are the life-
blood of the ecosystem that sustain us all,” as Amy
Kober of American Rivers writes in Water Currents
on April 7, 2015.
Don’t misunderstand my concern. The McKenzie
is not on the list of America’s Most Endangered Rivers
of 2017, at least not yet — not like the Colorado River
in the Grand Canyon, which suffers from a battery of
threats including a proposed industrial-scale construc-
tion project and radioactive pollution from uranium
mining, or the Smith River in Montana, cherished for
its floating and fishing but threatened by a proposed
copper mine at its headwaters, or our own Columbia
River and its outdated dam operations threatening the
healthy runs of salmon.
The McKenzie is not immediately threatened. Your
drinking water is safe, for now. In fact, the McKenzie
River is one of the cleanest and healthiest rivers in the
nation, asserts the McKenzie River Trust (MRT).
But it wouldn’t take much to change this course of
events, because much of the McKenzie, according to
the MRT, “runs through privately owned land, leav-
ing it vulnerable to development of a kind that could
forever alter its pristine character.”
A month after I moved to the McKenzie almost a
decade ago, I was consumed by it, which provoked my
inner Keats to offer this ode to it:
I now live on the river,
where the McKenzie widens and
moves judiciously
and today threateningly,
a few quiet steps
from my door.
I arrived here late in life,
but each day,
the McKenzie cleanses
the cold worry from my hands.
I now know, I will die here.
A week ago, it snowed on the river,
wet flakes the size of taro leaves
fell magically and relentlessly.
I watched the snow and
understood its purpose
as it fell on Ray’s rock
with the quiet nod of a promise.
Whether you live on the McKenzie — a 90-mile trib-
utary of the Willamette River — drink its clear and clean
water, angle its fish, float and bounce on its strong cur-
rents or simply enjoy it from a distance, you intuitively
understand that it represents a singular promise — one
that an 18th-century Romantic poet fully understood
about such natural forces: Beauty is truth, truth beauty.
What more do we need to know about a river?
Edward J. Kame’enui, a University of Oregon professor in the Depart-
ment of Education, is a resident on the McKenzie River. He also served on
the faculty of the University of Montana (1980-83), and Purdue Univer-
sity (1983-1987) prior to his appointment at the UO in 1988.