Once, when we were both in fifth grade, my best friend, Mack, who was an even better friend of my older brother, Dug, became the proud owner of a plastic boat. 

It’s a sad fact. One in seven seniors across America is threatened by hunger. Some 8.3 million seniors faced the threat in 2010. This is a 78 percent increase since 2001 — and a 34 percent increase since the start of the not-so-Great Recession in 2007.

In the obscure demographic cubbyhole that is La Grande, on the edge of the vast wilderness, with its aw-shucks atmosphere and gee-whiz views, the most brutal thing you expect is winter storms.

A bushel basket of important issues face state legislators this session in Oregon’s capital, Salem, and Washington’s capital, Olympia — state prisons, the public pension system, education, health care, gun control, public safety, bipartisanship.

“Act as if what you do makes a difference. It does.”

— William James

Winters in the Minam Canyon are long and the days short. The sun pops up around 9 and disappears again at 3.

A reader recently asked if it was too early to remove winter debris from under trees and shrubs and the answer is a resounding “yes!”