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About The daily Astorian. (Astoria, Or.) 1961-current | View Entire Issue (Feb. 20, 2015)
OPINION 4A THE DAILY ASTORIAN • FRIDAY, FEBRUARY 20, 2015 Living large is easier in a tiny house S earch some apparently innocent words in Google and you’re in for an offensive onslaught — slavering packs of predators lurk in the weeds of the Internet Serengeti, delighting in ambushing unsuspecting eyeballs. So you’ll be happy to learn the loaded phrase “cabin porn” does not inevitably lead to photos of Viagra-popping sodbusters and buxom schoolmarms, but to hundreds of cabins, shacks, alpine shelters, huts and other enviable little habitations. Set amidst fantasy- igniting natural scenery, cabinporn. com’s photos are Matt pornographic only Winters in the sense that they make us long for things in short supply in 21st century American life: Simplicity, immediate connection to lands and waters, silent surroundings and free time to enjoy them. Raptly gazing at the images, we imagine lives without mortgages, dining on fresh trout caught in a sinfully pretty Scottish lake. Submitted This small Swiss house is one of many fantasy-inducing offerings on cabinporn.com There are hundreds of other stylish vernacular beach homes in our area. built-in storage — land yachts for smelly bachelors. Factory-made tiny houses will need years of seasoning and customization to attain anything like the character of a multigenerational cabin at the beach or in the mountains. However, they have instantaneous appeal in being better scaled to suit young people just starting out and older people shedding the mass of possessions that encrust our lives. Resources like thetinylife.com accurately report that a typically sized, modest family home can easily end up costing more than $1 million by the time principle, interest, repairs, insurance and other expenses are IDFWRUHG LQ 0RGHUQ $PHULFDQV GRQ¶W owe our souls to the company store as did the character in Tennessee Ernie Ford’s song Sixteen Tons, but our houses DUH RIWHQ VHHP PRUH OLNH SUR¿W FHQWHUV for the mortgage-industrial complex than domestic sanctuaries for our families. Snobbery and classism are intimately bound up in our housing choices, with the tar-paper shacks and mining-company towns of Ford’s day now replaced by trailer parks, which the mass entertainment media uses as symbols of low-class laziness and tastelessness. Elites who would claw your eyes out for making a racial slur somehow feel it’s acceptable to call somebody “trailer trash” because they reside in a small, manufactured house. In contrast, I think of my Grandaunt Bertha who lived in a tiny trailer in Salt Lake City. The interior was almost literally carpeted and wallpapered in her psychedelically colored crocheted afghans. She somehow managed to live in humor and dignity on about $385 a month in Social Security. Poor? Hell yes. But what a gal. I’d share a talcum-powder scented trailer with her for a hundred years before I’d spend an afternoon in one of Donald Trump’s pretentious hotel suites. 3HRSOH¶V KRXVHV UHÀHFW RXU VRXOV DQG there’s an inverse relationship between IDQF\ DQG IXO¿OOPHQW 2I WKH KRXVHV ,¶YH owned, the only one I truly regret selling is P\IRRW1HZ0RRQWUDLOHUE\WKH8QLRQ 3DFL¿F 5DLOURDG WUDFNV VRXWK RI /DUDPLH :\R ,W FRVW RII WKH IDFWRU\ ÀRRU in 1953. Used, I bought mine for $1,500 and sold it for $1,800 three years later. If you know of a good one, let me know: I’m thinking of being a trailer person again someday. as we live. Some days, though, I fantasize about being in a place about a quarter the size of where we are now, where my wife and I will each soon have an entire 1,000-square-foot story to ourselves once Submitted unctional and practical, small dwellings Elizabeth leaves for college. The Wreckage in Ocean Park, Wash., is a notable local example of coastal vernac- work on a human scale. Often they’re constructed of stones and wood from KHDSSHDORIVQXJDQGHI¿FLHQWKRPHV ular architecture. the construction site or nearby, or from with lots of individual character has exterior view on the company’s website salvaged items. “Vernacular materials, most recently found expression in the (tinyurl.com/ktl7r77) reminds me quite a WHFKQLTXHV DQG IRUPV´ LV WKH RI¿FLDO 7LQ\+RXVH0RYHPHQWJHQHUDWLQJPXFK lot of the sheepherder wagons that Basque architectural term for it. We shouldn’t interest at both ends of the demographic and Hispanic men used to reside in for over-glamorize all these utilitarian DJHVSHFWUXPLQWKH3DFL¿F1RUWKZHVW7KLV PRQWKVDWDWLPHLQWKH5RFN\0RXQWDLQ homes: For every elegant and organically week at the Seattle Home Show, a display high country when I was a boy. Later beautiful resident-built dwelling, there are PRGHO E\ 6DOHPEDVHG 7LQ\ 0RXQWDLQ supplanted by cheap campers, these wood- perhaps a thousand shanties where no one Houses caught the eye of attendees and a and-iron framed contraptions had roomy, should have to live. But when time, space, KING5 news crew (tinyurl.com/o6e4s64). shellacked canvas roofs, cook stoves materials and skills come together in just It is indeed a cute little house, though an ventilated by tin stovepipes, and plenty of the right combinations, little handmade houses are one of the highest expressions of human creativity. On our coastline and Northern California — most famously in Carmel before the XOWUDZHDOWK\FRORQL]HGLW²3DFL¿FEHDFK pines and ocean-delivered lumber were long used to build homes that feel like they’ve naturally grown out of hillsides — fully formed and inviting. In the past I’ve mentioned The Wreckage in Ocean Park, Wash., as the starring local example of shipwreck-salvage architecture. There are hundreds of other stylish vernacular beach homes in our area, though winter storms and neglect have devoured a good many. 7KRXJKQHYHUDQHSLWRPHRI¿QHGHVLJQ my own house has been a good example of deferred maintenance — something you can’t get away with for long in this climate where blackberry vines and English ivy soon cover anything that stands in one place for too long. Thanks to the kind and incredibly diligent crew at Dr. Roof, — M.S.W. Photo courtesy of Matt Winters everything is now literally safe and sound Matt Winters sometimes wishes he still lived in his 1953 New Moon trailer, an elegant- Matt Winters is editor of the Chinook Observer and Coast River Business Journal. again, and we’ll probably be here as long ly efficient and inexpensive housing option. F T Open forum Too simple T he farmer vs. environmentalist editorial “Convince us; don’t sue us” (The Daily Astorian, Feb. 9) was amazingly naive. Not only was it full of silly hyperbole, but it was misleading as well. Going through the legal process is like bombing a nation? This is one of the most irresponsible pieces of writing I have read in a long time. The legal process is there for a rea- son, and any group that does not take advantage of it is foolish. It’s not like only the environ- mentalists have the ability to use lawyers. The farming lobby is rich and has batteries of lawyers just like the environmental lobby. If the edi- tor thinks otherwise, he hasn’t been around the capital much. His edito- rial leaves the impression that some- how people on polar opposites of im- portant issues should try to convince each other of their positions. Come on. The editor can’t be so amateurish as to really believe this. Does he read what he writes before he publishes it? Let the legal process go. It has served us well, and will continue to do so into the future. You only have to fear it if you don’t have a case. Wow. The editorial “Time to Re- store the Natural Balance” (The Dai- ly Astorian, Feb. 10) could not be more simplistic. The editorial board again shows its near inability to un- derstand a topic before writing about it. What gives? Have they read the history of humankind “assisting nature in maintaining the right balance”? It isn’t very good. Think of this: The Army Corps of Engineers is going to destroy 11,000 birds. The Corps of Engineers. The people who build dams and dredge the Columbia. Why should we trust them with our wild- life? This whole issue needs more serious study by wildlife profession- als. A solution has to be based on the interests of all the wildlife con- cerned, and not just the economics. The editor’s reference to cormo- rants as mini-pterodactyls is cute but obtuse. It misses the point. The cormorants should not be penalized for being successful hunters. If we are supposed to be the wise species (that’s what the sapiens in Homo sa- piens is, after all), we should be able WR ¿JXUH RXW WKLV SUREOHP ZLWKRXW destroying 11,000 creatures. The editor makes it sound as easy DVÀLFNLQJDOLJKWVZLWFK0D\EHIRU him, it is. DON ANDERSON Astoria ÀDZHG VFLHQFH DQG D PDQLSXODWLRQ of research data to the point that even Dan Roby — the lead Oregon State University investigator who conducted this 18-year research, monitoring and evaluation program (paid for by the Army Corps) — was compelled to submit a com- ment letter. Roby’s letter states that use of le- WKDOWDNH³LVTXDQWL¿HGXVLQJDQDO\- ses with unknown uncertainty, large outside the available Greed and exploitation extrapolations data, and methods that apparently ow discouraging that the hu- have never received independent man race, with a population in peer review. These analyses do not excess of 7 billion, has such little XVH WKH EHVW DYDLODEOH VFLHQWL¿F LQ- tolerance for other species that we formation and are substantially less resort to lethal means to safeguard rigorous than analyses identifying our greed and exploitation of earth’s other salmon recovery objectives resources. For 18 years, the Army in the National Oceanic and Atmo- Corps of Engineers’ effective cam- spheric Administration’s (NOAA) SDLJQ DJDLQVW ¿VKHDWLQJ ELUGV KDV 2014 Supplemental Biological Opin- brainwashed the public and shifted ion for the Federal Columbia River the at-fault perception of salmon de- Power System.” cline from human-caused factors. Roby’s letter also states “the se- The Army Corps’ fast track solu- lection of the Preferred Alternative tion to the natural predator “prob- in the draft environmental impact lem” at East Sand Island is based on statement (DEIS) is neither rigor- H T HE D AILY A STORIAN Founded in 1873 ously science-based, nor defensible IURPDVFLHQWL¿FSHUVSHFWLYHUHJDUG- less of its merits as a management policy for resolving this natural re- source management issue.” (Full OHWWHU LQ ¿QDO HQYLURQPHQWDO LPSDFW statement (FEIS) at http://tinyurl. com/robyltr) To no avail, the Wildlife Center of the North Coast has submitted multiple requests over numerous years to the Army Corps for the re- lease of annual cormorant baseline diet data that is now used to justify lethal actions. That public domain data has not been subjected to full peer review. Suppressing this underlying in- formation in an effort to prohibit public scrutiny creates an atmo- sphere of public distrust and hints of conspiracy. We encourage The Daily Astorian to do its homework before LQÀXHQFLQJSXEOLFRSLQLRQZLWKUKHW- oric and misinformation. SHARNELLE FEE executive director, Wildlife Center of the North Coast Astoria STEPHEN A. FORRESTER, Editor & Publisher • LAURA SELLERS, Managing Editor BETTY SMITH, Advertising Manager • CARL EARL, Systems Manager JOHN D. BRUIJN, Production Manager • DEBRA BLOOM, Business Manager SAMANTHA MCLAREN, Circulation Manager
