​Ovando, Montana in the Blackfoot Valley where "a river runs through it."

May 31, 2020

Shortly after Memorial Day weekend, the leaves and blossoms seemed to spring forth overnight! Crab apple, choke cherry and off my deck, apple blossoms.
​

​
​A sight out my window yesterday was iconic of the return of Work and Play. Of course, the ranchers have never stopped working.

​In many ways, this worldwide Covid-19 pause is a germination period for many new directions. The one that stands out for us is the hundreds, probably thousands, of living room musicians who perform the feat of playing collectively with others scattered around the world. While it is not entirely new, it has caught on in a big way among professionals and nonprofessionals alike, and it relieves some of the frustration of concert-goers marooned in their own living rooms.

Music is an act of love that conveys what words can't. That is what is brought home to me as I watch the various musical offerings during this pandemic. So many of these musicians, performing from their own homes, radiate the love of what they are doing and what they are doing it for. I will carry their voices and faces, in those huge mosaics, forever. 

Here is a performance of the Napa Valley Festival Orchestra—always a favorite summer event—performed remotely. The downside is the lack of physical presence, the upside is that the audiences expand appreciably in quantity and in distance. Even pastors of churches have commented that their congregations have grown now that people can participate from home. Upsides-Downsides.

This is what people have seen in other years.
This is what all of us can see today virtually as Festival Napa Valley’s Remote Ensemble performs “Va, pensiero,” from the opera Nabucco by Giuseppe Verdi. It is "dedicated to all essential workers whose heroic efforts safeguard the health and safety of our communities. The Ensemble consists of 126 past and present Festival Napa Valley musicians, all of whom recorded their parts from home while following our virtual conductor, Zach Salsburg-Frank."

The Brooklyn College Choir had been preparing for performances with the New York Philharmonic when the pandemic struck. Pianist Harrison Sheckler conceived the idea of a virtual performance of “You’ll never walk alone” from the musical Carousel as an antidote to the loneliness of isolation. “Hopefully, the words, ‘you'll never walk alone,’ along with the visual of 300 people from 15 different countries joining together offers the audience some comfort and peace during this time.” 


​As we have our Memorial Day in May, Australians and New Zealanders have their ANZAC Day in April. Having watched the Amazon Prime series Gallipoli—not an easy watch—I was overwhelmed by the degree of suffering of so many ANZAC (Australian and New Zealand Army Corps) troops for what was a largely unsuccessful campaign. In 1915, they were part of an Allied expedition that set out to capture the Gallipoli Peninsula of Turkey. The objective was to capture Constantinople, the capital of the Ottoman Empire. The campaign dragged on for eight months and ended in a stalemate, taking a huge toll on the Allied forces with 56,000 deaths, including 8,709 from Australia and 2,721 from New Zealand. 

​Now meet Isaac and Nora, two talented siblings from Quimper, France (originally from Seoul, South Korea) singing a Cuban song “Veinte Años,” accompanied by their father on the guitar.

Isaac (11 years old) plays trumpet and drums, Nora (8 years old) sings, plays accordion and ukulele, while their father Nicolas accompanies them on guitar, Uncle Thomas on accordion, Romain on the tuba, and many musician friends.

Here, the person who is filming them is their mother, Catherine.  I'm in love with this little girl, and you will be too. The song means "Twenty Years" and I can only imagine where she will be in twenty years. I hope it is a good place.

Isaac and Nora sing "Veinte Años"



From the very young musicians to a very old one with a heart-warming story that is the subject of an Oscar-winning documentary, The Woman in Room 6. Here is a short introduction to Alice Herz-Sommer, who at 109 was described as the world’s oldest pianist and a tribute to the power of music to bring joy into a life even in difficult times. 

Bring back the kisses, the laughter and voices!
The cheers for the goals
Bring back hugs, applauses, oles;
bring back the children to school
Bring back the movies and popcorn and theaters;
the music and live concerts
Bring back the joy, wave the sadness away.
 
Sing! Don’t cry! 
Let the bad things blow away in sighs..
It’s not worth it to be bitter.
Life is filled with little things
that give it meaning!

Bring back the warmth and people in the street
Toasts in the sun, blown kisses
Bring back good news and waking up with the feel of your touch 
Bring back laughter, everyday life; the routine and 
Fixing the world in the corner bar.
 
Sing! Don’t cry! 
Let the bad things blow away in sighs..
It’s not worth it to be bitter.
Life is filled with little things that give it meaning!

                 (Thanks to Yolanda Hay in Mexico City for her translation)

____________________________________________________________________________________

​While we are in Russia, I would like to introduce you to another musical prodigy I am following. He is not the grandchild of a famous conductor or opera singer, but he has the same remarkable talent that has won the hearts of Russians everywhere! (And mine too.) Here is Elisey Mysin at age 5, in the Russian version of America's Got Talent. 
​

​Speaking of non-humans, there is one group for which the coronavirus has been a boon, not a curse. Give a thought to the many creatures in zoos who are suddenly free of crowds of gawkers. The places are quiet now with only natural sounds surrounding them through their days. The perfect thing, it seems, for love to blossom. Consider these pandas in Hong Kong.
​

   It began with an invitation from
Angela Williams on Facebook,
“Everyone welcome.
Let’s all get out and show our community support in these trying times."

Load up in your favorite hot wheels
and join us!!
Meet at Trixis parking lot,
cruise the metropolis of Ovando,
then highway to Helmville
​and cruise that metropolis!

“There were about 50 cars,” Leigh Ann said.
 
Angela has been one of the people in town busily
​making face masks for any who want them.
Bravo! Angela, and all of the dragsters who lifted spirits in two metropolitan areas!



​_______________________________________________

​

Now here is another human wonder. Imagine an 11 year old girl with the voice of an opera singer. Not to be missed is this extraordinary performance by Pavarotti’s grand-daughter, Maria Cristina, performing with an orchestra. You will be stunned!

Services were still performed and broadcast from an empty St. Peter's Basilica. In some places, outdoor services were performed and people attended in their cars. 
​

​The Stray Bullet Cafe is still making take-and-bake casseroles and Trixi's Antler Saloon is offering take-out pizzas for the weekends. Fred has kindly appeared on my porch with groceries. Howie is making up spray sanitizers and Peggy has been making masks. 

I had a new bird at my feeder! One I never knew existed: A Hepburn's finch, also called grey-crowned rosy finch. A handsome bird and I am ever-so-happy to see it.
​

​

 

​We will all carry different impressions of this time, but the one that will stay with me the most is this rare sense of social intimacy that has come with social distancing!

​Never before have we been able to share a common experience with people around the globe, all from their living rooms, balconies or front doors! I am moved by the sight of people in small towns and city neighborhoods joining together to applaud their tired first responders returning home from their shifts. It is as if we are all discovering who we really are and what we care about.
​

In Becca Nolan-Olsen's neighborhood in California, "neighbors are putting teddy bears and rainbows in their windows for little kids to walk around and look for as a distraction from the current situation." 




​There are so many creative ways that people have found to cheer their other home-bound neighbors, near and far. Often it is through that universal language, music! Here is a favorite of mine from France, as members of l'Orchestre National de France perform together from their homes. Quite a feat! Notice that the kettle drum player has to improvise with ladle and spoon! Ravel would be smiling.
 (Watch the video full screen by clicking here. Or click on the image below.)
​

This reminded me of a similar feat of virtual music from Eric Whitacre. Here he performs a work he composed, with 147 singers from 12 countries, all from their homes via Skype: Eric Whitacre's LUX AURUMQUE

This was followed by an even more amazing feat: The 2011 Virtual Choir video features 2052 performances of 'Sleep' from 1752 singers in 58 countries, individually recorded and uploaded to YouTube between September 2010 and January 2011. The special effects in this video really bring home the global nature of the event. (Click here to watch full screen.)
​

March 31, 2020

Snow! That was the forecast. Friends in southern latitudes will be aghast at the thought of snow in Spring (or perhaps anytime), but Howie Fly tells me it once snowed on the 4th of July. Sheltering in place can be a way of life in the winter here. Thank goodness our town has a sense of humor, on display the minute you enter the town from the west and are greeted by this sign.​

​Here are two of my favorites: The first is two Mayo Clinic doctors--NOT in their living room alas, but on a break offering up a song.  Bless them all!
Two Mayo Clinic Doctors on a Break

The second is a grandfather entertaining his grand-daughters as they all shelter in place.
​​
“I wrote this little song for my granddaughters to make them feel good about themselves. As you’ll see they seem to like it. I hope it brings a little joy to you and your children, as well. T. A. Kuepper” https://twitter.com/i/status/1244024932259913728​

Yersinia Pestis is on the move, traveling more invisibly than ships or caravans. It rises out of the steppes of Central Asia with the Mongol hordes who are among its bearers. It travels first in the lungs of the bobac marmot from places like Issyk Kul in present day Kirgystan. From there it hitches a ride on fleas that find transport on rats and finally humans. It follows the caravan routes east and west along the Silk Road making use, with the Mongol armies and traders, of the opportunities of free passage within the Mongol Empire made possible by the Pax Mongolica. [It] finds transport on merchant ships, which carry it gratuitously and unwittingly throughout the Mediterranean. Following the caravan routes, it reaches the Crimea in Southeastern Europe in 1346… and moves on into Western Europe and North Africa.
                                                      --Sheri Ritchlin, A Farm in Marin: Portraits in Time from Pangaea to Point Reyes  
​

March 28, 2020

​I spent a lot of time in the 14th century while researching for this book, though it was only one chapter. I focused especially on the Roman poet Petrarch and Boccaccio, who gave us a first-hand portrait of the decimation of his city, Florence. It was hard to imagine that 75,000,000 (up to 200,000,000 by some estimates), would perish from this pandemic. But the worst of times was surely after World War I when 500,000,000 people died of the Spanish Flu; more than had died in that terrible war.

How things have changed since then! There was no television, internet or iphone to spread the word, mobilize first responders, send out warnings and instructions—wash your hands, stay six feet apart!—and keep people who are ordered to shelter in place in communication with their friends and loved ones.

Technology has given so many people a role to play in this growing crisis. Democracies have given individuals a voice and many are using it via social media. Listen to the poignant call to his people of Irish prize-fighter Conor McGregor:

As I write, Howie Fly has just slipped up on my porch to fill the bird feeder, which he and Peggy provided me with a few years ago and keep filled religiously. Looking out on my finches, sparrows, juncos and other feathered visitors, I am filled with their peaceful industry, going about their daily routine without thought of coronavirus or the growing restrictions on human life around the world. I find that I need the digital interconnections to be balanced with the analog quiet of birds and trees and sky. I use analog in a nontechnical way simply to mean nondigital. (Apologies to those who know better.)

Speaking of Sky, here is an update: On clear evenings in the Valley, Venus is bright in the Western sky, not far below the Pleiades—the brilliant cluster in the shoulder of the constellation Taurus. Mars, Jupiter and Saturn are low on the southeast horizon as dawn begins, Jupiter the brightest. What can be seen only with a telescope or an astrologer’s eye is Pluto, sitting invisibly between Saturn and Jupiter. Saturn and Jupiter were heraldic combinations in antiquity. Some have joined Kepler in asserting that a conjunction of these planets in 7 BC accounts for the Star of Bethlehem.   Other have described the conjunction during that era as denoting a change of Ages from Taurus to Pisces in the precession of the equinoxes.  Actually, this conjunction takes place every 20 years, though in different signs of the zodiac. It is that hidden presence of Pluto that makes a difference. Saturn and Pluto were in conjunction in 1914-15, 1947 and 1982. Not the best of times, yet periods that brought global change: a new world order and the birth of international institutions after 1947 and in 1983, the birth of the World Wide Web and the Internet. My friend Sarah Livia Brightwood likes to speak of the Restoring Twenties, as the counterpart to the Roaring Twenties of the last century. Let's hope!

What is important to me here is that as our skies grow clearer with lack of traffic, and as we have more time in our isolation, we can find some analog peace by simply looking upward. Bright Aldebaran is shining just below the Moon and those three bright planets are together at dawn. You can follow the sky events here:                       https://skyandtelescope.org/observing/sky-at-a-glance/

My friend Cynthia, in hard hit Chicago, is sheltering in place with her family and making a walking video, though she admits that indoor walking lacks the satisfaction of the outdoors. My cousin Marcia is an artist who does much of her work indoors but finally countered the stir-crazies by going for a drive, ending up at a drive-in place and buying a hot fudge sundae. I bet a hot fudge sundae never tasted so good!

Linda Barry, a film producer living near the hard-hit Los Angeles area, emailed that she is taking advantage of her family's isolation to finish a six-episode series she's been writing. Her daughter Aja is "partaking in the district's distance learning via Google Classroom, keeping up with her classes."   

                                (Photos by Sally Mahe)     




Please take care and be well everyone!
​
​Sheri

​                                                                  Šumava mountains, Czech Republic
 
I not only feel connections in space but also in time. Like the 2200 year old hermits, I can lift my eyes unto the hills in all directions here and also pick up lasagna from the Stray Bullet Cafe below if I run out of food. Or replenish from the Blackfoot Store. So far, Howie and Peggy have me in good shape.

                                                                                    Ovando, Montana
 
Surely, in the worst of times, this is the best of places.
 
Be well!
Sheri Ritchlin

March 22, 2020
 
On March 10, I returned from Mexico City, after attending the 100th Birthday Party of my “Madre Mexicana" Yolanda Batiz de Hay. I have been her Gringa Hija since 1978 and I am now Comadre to her daughter Yolanda and godmother to her grand-daughter Jimena. On the day of my flight, there were over 114,000 coronavirus cases worldwide, though only 15 listed in Mexico and none in Montana.

I stayed with a friend in Mill Valley, planning to meet with someone from the East speaking at a conference, but all conferences and events in the Bay Area were cancelled and we were asked to “shelter in place.” I moved up my flight back to Montana to March 18th. San Francisco International Airport was virtually empty. Spooky. There were four people on my plane. It was like flying in my own Lear Jet.

My friends Howie and Peggy Fly met me at the airport in Missoula, an hour from Ovando. Peggy had emailed to ask if I would like them to pick up anything at Walmart or Costco. I sent a list of ten things, apologizing for the quantity. She emailed back: “We checked your larder and you are out of sugar, low on oatmeal, out of fruit-nut bars and chocolate covered almonds…" and more.  In my town of 50, people do these things! On this date, March 18, there were over 118,000 cases worldwide. Only eleven in Montana.

I had planned a 14 day quarantine in my hermitage over the Stray Bullet Café. Peggy explained that all businesses were closed down except Fred’s Blackfoot Store across the street. If I needed something, Fred would deliver it to my porch and put it on an account to be paid later.

Then Kathy of the Blackfoot  Angler, and the town herald, sent out this email to all residents, very much in keeping with the spirit of the town.
 
Time to relax and be patient folks.  And time to stay together as a community.  With that thought:
1.  If you are in need of assistance, please reply to this email with what is needed and we can see if someone can assist you.  From a distance.
2.  If you are NOT in need of assistance, but wish to help others; let folks know via this email how you can be of service [prescription/food/mail PU and delivery etc].  From a distance.
Most of us are use to isolation so it is Just Another Day in the Valley, so we'll get thru this just fine; and this isn't going to last for ever.  But for some this isn't normal so reach out to help those.  Just a phone call or an email can be uplifting.  So hang in there folks!  These be interesting times!

And the following Ovando businesses are here to help you thru these times:

Blackfoot Commercial Co: Open 7 days a week from 8 to 5 M-Sat, 10 to 4 Sundays. Subject to change. Shelves are looking good, as they can get their supplies. Call 793-555 for more information.

Trixis Antler Saloon: Closed for dining. Closed Mondays only. Take out available between noon and 6. Call 793-5611 in advance [or 793-5049 in case she ran home for a minute]. All menu items available. Lights will be off to discourage drive up diners but she is there! Or call 793-5049 after hours for more assistance.

Blackfoot Angler: Opening weekends only starting the 28th: 10 to 4. 1 person at a time. Licenses available on line. Supplies arrive first of May. Not a lot in stock but there if you need them. Call 793-0018 for information.

 The Stray Bullet Cafe:  Available for take and bake casseroles just place your orders... spaghetti casserole, lasagna, chicken enchiladas, tater tot casserole or special requests! 
$30 each and serves 8 easily! 

 Blackfoot Community Bible Church:  Will not be having services this week, or any until the restrictions have been lifted.  They are going week by week but urge those of you interested to congregate on-line via the Lolo Community Church's FB Live program Sunday at 10:45 am via https://www.facebook.com/Lolo-Community-Church-128712677142175/
 
It was the first day of Spring. Joe Bradshaw wrote that the bluebirds and meadowlarks  had arrived on the Flats. There were now 305,000 cases worldwide.

Last night I read this poignant public Facebook post from Claudio Nardini in Scotland. It is worth sharing with anyone who does not take this seriously or who ignores  restrictions:
 
Today was a real eye opener. 
We decided to remain open to provide a takeaway service for what I thought would be a few people grabbing the opportunity to appreciate a walk along Largs prom…. 
I can't believe how busy the prom was. Crowds of people walking hand in hand, hugging, grandmothers holding babies, teenagers sharing drinks, elderly people galore mingling with others of all ages. Wow! Just Wow!
 
Now, I have strong links to two other countries in Europe and have witnessed this virus develop by talking regularly to family in both Italy and Spain. This nonchalant attitude was rife in both those countries only a couple of weeks ago. Italy yesterday announced almost 700 deaths in the preceding 24 hours. They can't cope, even after creating thousands of extra spaces in hospitals they are inundated with new cases. I heard the saddest news yesterday that they are letting people over a certain age die as they have to concentrate their efforts and resources keeping younger people alive. They are already calling the older generation 'heroes' as they will now be sacrificed. It now looks like Spain is headed in the same direction even though both countries have been in total lock down for a while now. 
Seeing the prom rammed with people and dozens of cars queuing for the ferry today like nothing was out of the ordinary really saddened me. I should have been overjoyed, the till was ringing constantly and coffees and ice creams were flying out the door. I wasn't because it reminded me of the images my family and friends were sending me only a couple of weeks ago and now look where they're at. I sent them a photo of today's packed prom and they couldn't believe it especially when we should be using their recent experience as an example. 

Everyone at work today was overcome with a strange feeling of guilt, almost as if we were contributing to this madness. For this reason we have decided to completely close this evening until this whole thing blows over. 

An announcement not long ago pointed out it's spreading faster here than it did at this stage in both Italy or Spain. Please please please stay at home if you can, I couldn't bear seeing what is happening to my relatives happen here too. Cxx
​
Today there are 31 cases in Montana. 337,679 worldwide. If you have been following the arithmetic, that’s over 223,000 new cases in 12 days.
 
Please take care and be well,
Sheri Ritchlin

SheriRitchlin.com