Thank you to you and your staff for using this platform to keep us aware of what you are doing. It's easy to get lost in the overwhelming news cycle, and not notice this kind of win.

Trout lilies in bloom, a spring ephemeral in New England. Yellow blossoms and leaves speckled brown and green on a forest floor covered with last year's fallen leaves.

Took a walk in the woods with a friend today, needed some time to breathe. Found these beauties on a side trail we took on a whim.

Statue of U.S. Grant at the Portland Museum of Art in Maine. This statue was rejected by the people who commissioned it because it did not portray Grant as heroic enough for their purpose. Instead he appears contemplative and even worn down, a man who appreciates the devastating toll of the Civil War.

Today's Letter reminds me of this statue that I saw for the first time this past October, and to me it feels like it fits right in with Lincoln's words.

Would you consider adding protecting voting rights & ending gerrymandering to your list? I think our right to vote underpins so much of democracy.

Trout lily leaves sprouting up through last fall's dropped leaves on a forest floor

Trout lilies are up. Spring is here.

It's a lovely medieval manuscript in the Insular style, similar in "flavor" to the Book of Kells but from Northumberland England. Lots of "knotwork," often of stylized animals

The Book of Lindisfarne has stylized cormorants in the borders throughout, and I always thought the feather detail was an exaggeration for decorative emphasis. Now I am not so sure they exaggerated very much.

As a veterinary worker, if I strike May 1, pets will suffer. I suggest if you have a non-emergency vet appt that day, reschedule it. Create a "slow" day for us, but let us be there for urgent and emergency care, so we can "strike" in spirit but be there for the innocent. Plz pass this on.

I've seen 2 "influencers" so far saying Don't Go To No Kings, We Need To Do MORE, and I think they're wrong. The real message is, If this many of us are here on a Saturday, imagine what WE are doing during the week.

4"x4" oil painting of a fall landscape: a large maple in a roughly mowed open field, with a treeline in the near background and low mountain ridges receding to the far background. The sky is choppy soft ridges of clouds.

One of my tinkerings with oil painting, a tiny landscape.

Your light & shadow control is so vivid I can taste the breeze and feel the water flowing thru my fingers. I keep zooming in and out to look at your brush strokes

Just-after-sunset sky through bare tree branches, saturated pink clouds and deep blue sky - fleeting intense color on the first evening of Daylight Savings Time

So pink and blue it doesn't seem real

As if it weren't already clear, international redemption for the USA is going to require accountability for the profound betrayals of trust to our diplomatic partners.

Sen. Whitehouse to uncover connections between Trump, Russia, and Epstein. YouTube video by Senator Sheldon Whitehouse

Somehow this almost-neutral-voice reading of findings ends up sounding like a villainous spy thriller. Connects some dots. Fascinating. Frightening. Enlightening. www.youtube.com/live/ylvTFvJ...

Read and share all over..he nails it

LetsGetIntoIt2025 (@letsgetintoit2025) Minnesota is still teaching us every day through their actions. CorePower Yoga is a corporation with studio locations all over the country. This Minneapolis studio had a “No Ice” sign on the front...

This is the kind of courage that gives me motivation to stand up. substack.com/@letsgetinto...

Many heavy icicles from water seeping through a rock face. Trees atop the ledge. Sun shining through the tree trunks. Power line thru the upper left frame.

Real, serious ice. Not the fake pretentious stuff.

😆 cats

The trolls are working overtime, and the copycats think it's fun to pile on. The rest of us need to make racism uncool. To quote Amanda's Mild Takes, "Ew."

While we are horrified by the news out of Minneapolis and the Portlands, this is even more dangerous. It's just not as loud. We need to make noise.

A year ago, our world got worse. A year ago many of us felt like we might not be here today, but guess what, you, reading this, you still are. This isn’t some sort of motivational speech or anything, but it’s a reminder.

It’s never “too little, too late.” We have to power to make things better and we have the power to stop them from getting worse.

People were saying it was “too little, too late” to make things less bad a year ago today. They were saying it a year ago next week and a year ago next month. And guess what?

We still have elections, and we are winning the vast majority of them. We still have the judiciary, maybe not the Supreme Court, but most things don’t actually get there.

Today is not going to be an easy day, because, yeah, things are 100% worse than a year ago, but, that doesn’t mean we stop fighting or that it’s too late to make things better, to create the country and world we want to live in. We still have the power, and, this year has shown that in spades.
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If you ever make the trip, please let me know (I think you know how to reach me). Would enjoy meeting you there - it's relatively close for me.

That was a fun story. Have you been to the Beineke?

More of THIS, Less Dystopia! YouTube video by Ariella Elm

youtu.be/WnVBL8ONvGE

Screen capture of Democracy Docket web page showing "Sign Up for Our Free Newsletters"

Subscribing to the newsletter is free.

It does. I actually like both of his photos. But it's amazing what a different crop can draw your eye to.

Cropping of image by Peter Marteka: winter on a foggy winter day, bare branches and snow, a fence line and a gate, with more trees in a misty background.

Roughly

Or an even tighter crop on the solitary tree, bringing the two fences and the background trees more into play. But I think a bit more of the snow in the foreground should be included then.

Oo, I *like* that. Thank you for sharing it.