John Darling

John Darling

John Darling: We’re all divine sages

John Darling: “The ‘it’ I am looking for is that elusive, usually sentimentalized, grossly exploited thing called Christmas Spirit — which is supposed to be a giddy, blessed, childlike abandonment of the normal hurried, self-centered, worried, grabby, type-A personality we have the rest of the year.”

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John Darling

John Darling: The Discipline of Bliss

John Darling: “I don’t want to go to France. I want to be here. I want to drive through the leafy streets of Ashland, where I’ve gotten used to the slow pace of traffic.”

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John Darling

John Darling: Blinded by the light

John Darling: “Even though it’s trying to become a hyper-spender geezerville, that’s not gonna happen. It’s a city now, not a town, and that means it’s a mix and the people who happen to be young and poor and have kids will always find ways to live here and bring in those new streams of energy.”

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John Darling

John Darling: Pioneers and motorcycles

John Darling: “As Helman built his mills around Ashland’s Plaza (essentially creating Ashland), the locals fought for the homes they held for 12,000 years. The settlers occasionally had to hole up at a fort built on Wagner Creek. Within five years from the first claim here, the Shastas and Takelmas were gone, decimated by our diseases or removed to remote reservations ….”

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Columnists

John Darling: The middle of nowhere — the best place to be

John Darling: “Remember, continental drift, evolution and destruction of dinosaurs by an asteroid (not to mention racial harmony and environmental sustainability) all once were considered the province of unstable, dangerous, barking-mad thought criminals – and we wouldn’t get anywhere if we didn’t keep pushing our way outside that box called normal.”

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John Darling

John Darling: A love letter to Oregon

John Darling: “Oregon, he explained, was kind of laid out in four bands. Left to right, you have the coast, then the western valleys along I-5, which is what most people think of as Oregon (lots of firs and hills), then the mountains, then the two-thirds of Oregon which is desert, a fact which almost no one outside Oregon knows.”

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John Darling

John Darling: Ashland — the town that always says ‘yes’

“You’ll notice the very energy of the vortex makes that system of yours evolve and change and soon it’s not working that great for you. The vortex makes you let go of it. What’s next? I don’t know. You walk, you hike the trails, you talk with your widening circle of friends. Soon it starts becoming more clear, the next arm of the spiral dance.” 

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John Darling

John Darling: ‘A Portable Blessing’

“We in Ashland often delude ourselves that we’ve created the most perfect of worlds and must hold it close to our breasts, that this blessing is portable, is not outside us and is ever present in our genes and cells and souls, ready to flow like heat lightning on a summer night.”

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Latest posts

Obituary: Jefferson Tully Straub

Obituary: Jefferson Straub, 78, passed away Feb.25, 2023, in the arms of his wife, Kelly Nash Straub. A celebration of Jeff’s life will be held at the Ashland Congregational Church at 2 p.m. Saturday, May 6.

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Oregon Fringe Festival announces lineup

Productions of all kinds and sizes abound at the Oregon Fringe Festival, which will begin its five-day run of unfiltered creative outpourings in Ashland on April 26. Celebrating its 10th anniversary, the festival is produced by the Oregon Center for the Arts at Southern Oregon University.

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Cascade-Siskiyou National Monument seeks next Artists-In-Residence

Cascade-Siskiyou National Monument officials are accepting applications for the annual Artist-In-Residence program through April 17. Selected artists receive a residency at the monument during the early summer months, where they will spend time creating art while surrounded by the monument’s natural beauty.

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