CHAPTER 30: Up In Smoke
Sheriff Dave Russo’s dark eyes swung back and forth from Jackson to Grace as they drank beer in Ginnie’s small kitchen. Shaka lay on the linoleum floor in the middle looking up and waiting for someone to notice him. Jackson leaned over and gave the big dog a good scratch under his chin.
The Sheriff scrolled through Grace’s pictures of the garage and its arsenal, its dragon eggs and drones. He felt great discomfort at the break-in. “Do not send me this info,” he said, shaking his head. “Jackson, what were you thinking?”
Ginnie entered the kitchen and her daughter, four-year-old Cheryl, followed. “Uncle Dave!” yelled the four-year-old as she ran to the Sheriff. He handed Grace her phone, scooped Cheryl up. “Hey, bunny,” he said, giving her a kiss.
“Dave,” said Jackson, “we could sure use your help.”
The Sheriff took a breath. “Jack, you know we can work together on this,” he said.
“How do we do it so this Reading/Patton/Boyle guy doesn’t just disappear?” asked Grace.
“You do realize this case is built on evidence compiled by breaking and entering, an old fax number and a Mickey Mouse air freshener hanging in two vehicles in two states, right?” he asked.
“Mickey Mouse! Mickey Mouse!” said Cheryl.
“That’s right, bunny,” said the Sheriff. “Tenuous, illegal, inadmissible.”
Grace and Jackson nodded.
“What time you leavin’ tomorrow?” asked the Sheriff.
“Noon flight,” she replied.
“Jackson,” said the Sheriff, “come by my office tomorrow, ten’s good. Bring Tom.” He gave Cheryl a kiss and handed her to her mom.
“You leavin’, Dave?” asked Ginnie.
“Yeah, work to do. Thanks for the beer. Night, all,” he said, grabbing his hat and coat off a peg in the mud room, closing the door behind him.
“Grace, you can trust him,” said Jackson.
“Absolutely,” said Ginnie.
Grace nodded, looked at Jackson who looked away.
What’s going on? thought Ginnie. Is this Jackson’s transition woman after Molly’s death? He’d die in L.A. and too much liquid sunshine up here for that Cali gal so whatever they have will be temporary.
Jackson watched Ginnie’s face intently. “What?” he asked.
Ginnie shook her head. “Nothing,” she said. “Just thinkin’.”
Jackson gave her a look, grabbed her and Cheryl in an affectionate hug as three loggers removed their boots in the mud room and entered the kitchen. “Get a room!” said one, the biggest man Grace had ever seen.
Ginnie slid out from under Jackson’s arm and welcomed her guests. Beer tabs popped as Ginnie spooned out bowls of chili con carne.
The guests helped themselves to salad and corn bread, then sat on benches at the long wooden dining table. Cheryl jumped from knee to knee milking the attention as only a four-year-old can.
After the meal, Shaka fell asleep in his favorite spot next to the fireplace, and Cheryl curled up in her Mom’s lap in an overstuffed chair slipcovered with a gray and red-flowered print.
Jackson leaned against a wall while nervous loggers sat on the bench and the couch. Grace set her phone on the coffee table, clicked on the recording app.
“The point was to salvage log the area, not get arrested,” said Big Lou. “If I had to do it again, I’d log in secret, then publicize it.”
“Yeah,” agreed another, appropriately nicknamed Moose. “We wanted to prove a point. We could’ve done that without getting stuck in legal hassles. Big mistake there.”
“I disagree,” said Jorge, the oldest of the three. “We stood up for what we believe. We can salvage areas quietly in the future, but we had to go on the record, at least once. No, I wouldn’t change a thing.”
“Ginnie, what do you think?” asked Grace. Ginnie studied the wood burning in the fireplace and stroked Cheryl’s golden hair.
“I hate the legal nightmare,” she said, “but I’m glad these men were willing to show the country that what’s happening up here is just plain wrong—wrong for the people, wrong for the forest. It’s ruining this country.” She looked at Grace with her direct clear gaze, “Preservationists don’t care about us or our forests. They want control. I stand behind these guys a hundred percent.”
Grace saw Jackson’s affection for Ginnie reflected on his face and felt her heart skip a beat. The loggers were silent. Moose said, “Ginnie, you tie the Yellow Ribbon Alliance together and, well, we love ya.”
Ginnie blushed. Embarrassed silence was followed by self-conscious laughter. “Coffee?” she asked as she laid Cheryl down in the big chair, covering her with a blue and white blanket edged in sateen. The sleepy child fingered the silky edging and dozed.
Ginnie flushed everyone out of her small kitchen except for Big Lou who started on the dishes. “Grace, I hope you can put this in perspective,” said Ginnie. “We’re fighting battles on multiple fronts. Civil disobedience is just a small part.”
“It’s complicated,” said Grace.
“Used to be easier,” said Big Lou. “When people were both producers and consumers, they got it.”
Ginnie passed him a casserole dish. “Let that soak,” she said. “Back then people understood and respected the link between resources and the quality of their lives. Now just a tiny percentage of us provide everything, all the raw materials and energy to feed, clothe and shelter the world.”
“Specialization,” said Grace. “Freed up people to look beyond the basic to making movies, software, cars, flying to the moon, whatever. We’re all specialists now in a far more diversified economy.”
Ginnie nodded. “But by concentrating people in cities, far removed from resource extraction, resource specialists like us are invisible. The disconnect between what we produce and what they consume is huge now. The great urban-rural divide is built on that disconnect. Into this vacuum comes the crisis industry flaming controversy for a buck.”
Big Lou rinsed plates and shook his head. “Even when we do manage to agree on how to balance logging and conservation, they can’t support us. They need an enemy. No money in solutions; just in conflict.”
“Are you complaining that you’re misunderstood and exploited?” asked Grace.
“We’re complaining,” said Ginnie, “that a caste system has developed between people who do the dirty work and those who are removed from it,” said Ginnie, choosing green and blue striped coffee mugs from a cabinet, arranging them on a tray.
“People are disconnected from where their computers, electricity or eggs come from. Stuff just appears magically,” said Ginnie. “Meanwhile, corporate lobbyists hand out piles of cash to clueless legislators, selling them on gawd-awful ideas, making the least viable possible through massive subsidies.” She shook her head. “They’ve forced rivers into concrete channels, paved over the rich soil in the valleys with housing and miles of malls that now stand vacant. Think on the mess that is wind and solar generation, on car batteries and lithium mines. Tragic! Now they’re pushing for subsidies for burying forests and pulverizing limestone so they can sell carbon credits to billionaires as a tax dodge!” She shook her head. “Limestone and trees are water storage, natural aquifers!”
“They’re pushing fishermen, farmers and ranchers off the land and sea using preserves and sanctuaries,” said Big Lou. “It’s a land grab.”
Ginnie patted him on the back. “They sip vegan lattes oblivious of their connection to the loss of bison habitat, the Great Plains being plowed under and forever lost to non-native soybeans.” She shook her head. “The industrial complex is expanding,” she said. “The disenfranchised are growing, connecting with conservation refugees scattered around the planet.”
“Revolution comin’,” muttered Big Lou.
The coffee was ready. Ginnie handed the pot to Grace and picked up the tray, headed for the living room. “I’m sure,” said Ginnie, “some truly believe they’re doing God’s work ‘saving’ the spotted owl, but many are just milking controversy or raiding the treasury. Some is NIMBYism, Not In My Back Yard, gone global. An elitist, out-of-sight, out-of-mind, preservationist fantasy,” she said.
Ginnie distributed mugs. Jackson took the pot from Grace and poured. Grace moved over by the mantelpiece where she studied family photos—Cheryl as a baby, Shaka as a puppy, Ginnie and Cheryl and her husband who was working overseas.
Jackson is better looking than Ginnie’s husband, thought Grace. A handsome rich widower, the town catch. It’s obvious Ginnie already loves him. If that husband doesn’t come back... She didn’t want to think about it, but she grudgingly knew they’d be good together.
“Put on some music, guys,” said Ginnie, heading back to the kitchen with Grace following. “Our current situation does not represent a responsible and respectful relationship of people with Earth. The United States needs to reflect on its outrageously wasteful use of resources, its nonchalant attitude in the face of abundance delivered to its doorstep. Our needs must be met by responsible industries working within common sense guidelines, not outsourced to exploitive operators.”
Ginnie handed the casserole dish to Grace who dried it silently as Austin Moody sang:
They've torn Portland all to pieces / Let Chicago go to hell / There's people leaving New York City / Like they rang the fire bell
But they call themselves enlightened / And cancel those who don't agree / I wish all these folks / Who claim they're woke / Would just go back to sleep
I'm just sayin' / Have we all lost our minds? / I'm just sayin' / Where do we draw the line? / I know y’all think it takes balls / To be singing what I’m singing / But I’m just saying what you’re thinking
“How’d you become the executive director of the Yellow Ribbon Alliance?” asked Grace.
“By attrition,” said Ginnie, leaning against the counter. “The Alliance went through several directors. I was an occasional volunteer until I got serious.”
“What changed you?” asked Grace.
Ginnie looked around. “Good job, Lou. Go join the guys. I’ll be out in a minute.” He left and Ginnie was quiet, searching for the words. “My grandfather worked his way up from an immigrant felling trees to crew boss to owning a pulp mill with my mom and dad, employing 40. I did office work at that mill, met my husband Wade there. The spotted owl greenie stuff started. Vandalism, lawsuits. We fell behind in the bills, got tied up in legal knots. Stress took my Dad. He never met Cheryl.”
“I’m sorry,” said Grace.
“Thanks,” said Ginnie, sipping a beer. “We sold the mill and our land to Masters’ Logging, but we still had debt and jobs were scarce. Wade’s uncle started up a mill about as far away from here as you can get—Romania—offered Wage a job, a good job.”
“You decided not to go too?”
“The plan was that it would be temporary—’til things got better. That’s the plan anyway. Jackson convinced the boys in town to give me a shot at the Yellow Ribbon Alliance.” She smiled. “He told ’em I was angry enough to be effective.” She shook her head, scrubbed the heck out of the casserole dish. “He said, ‘Only someone real angry would want the job.’”
“You’re angry?” asked Grace.
“I could spit nails. I’m a mother with a small child, fighting this crap. My husband, a highly-trained engineer, is working in Romania, for heaven’s sake!” She paused, then said quietly, “We wanted a big family but, due to logistics and finances, we won’t be having any more kids. We face losing our town, we’re underwater on the house, we might get burned out. Yes, I’m angry. I’m angry at reading every day that I’m evil for cutting trees to meet the demand of a consuming public that disowns the consequences of its own behavior. I’m angry at the destruction of our rural economy, the loss of America’s middle class, at what’s happening to our country, to our planet.”
Ginnie handed the casserole dish to Grace who dried it silently as Austin Moody sang:
I'm just sayin' / Have we all lost our minds? / I'm just sayin' / Where do we draw the line?
No offense but common sense / Is the direction that I'm leanin' / Some of ya'll think it takes balls / To be singing what I'm singing / But I'm just sayin', I'm just sayin' / What you're thinking
“I hate,” said Ginnie, “seeing eco-tourism and fire fighting offered as options we should embrace. I hate watching our jobs and opportunities being exported while we’re reduced to waiting tables for elites with summer homes built from massive wealth accumulated from ‘clean’ jobs that ignore the costs they can’t see. We’re all dependent on the basics: mining, drilling, ranching, fishing, farming, logging.”
Ginnie turned on the dishwasher and leaned back against the counter. “This is a class issue,” she said. “We’re ‘the deplorables’ to be beaten down and driven out. The middle class is collapsing and the US is guilty of eco-colonialism as it exploits, all over the globe, the natural resources we can’t live without. See why I have to fight?” she asked. “For my Dad, my family, for Tom and Erica, for everyone.” She sighed.
“Sooner or later,” said Ginnie, turning out the light, “there will be a reckoning. I just hope it comes while we still have a mill, so we can live out our lives in peace in the place we love, here in Silvercreek—at least that is, until it all goes up in smoke.”
