Past and Present

I finally saw the documentary "Clearcut" about my hometown, Philomath, on Sundance. In the 22 years since I left Philomath, it seems that nothing has changed politically even while the population quadrupled and fields that once grew nothing but grass are now housing subdivisions. The struggle between the conservative religious right and their insistence on controling the liberal elements of the community has not changed since I lived there. It was there in my house as my ultra-conservative dad and ultra-liberal mom tried to keep it together through the Reagan years.

For those of you who don't know, until a few years ago, Philomath High School grads were given a no-strings scholarship in the amount of OSU's tuition to use at any college. The Clemens Foundation, the legacy of a timber baron for the children of his logger employees, funded the scholarships as well as the swimming pool my sisters and I learned to swim in, the track we ran on, and the fields our schools sat on. But something so pure can't last. The Foundation board used their money to try to control the actions and behaviors of the student body--a policy so antithetical to the spirit of the scholarship. It was sad to watch the right and left elements finally explode apart.

I'll always be nostaligic for the bucollic setting of my childhood, but I'm glad to be free of the politics.