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Village Matters: The Gift of Surprises
By Ann Christoph. I had just washed my hair and was at the beginning stages of getting ready to go to work when the phone rang, “Channel 9 is down at the garden. They’re going to do a news story on...
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Village Matters: Savoring a Mother’s Kitchen
By Ann Christoph. It was a “Leave it to Beaver” kitchen, Mexican style. Simple stained and varnished plywood cabinets, well-loved and clean. They had the original 1960s slim copper handles with the...
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The essence of days of yore
The holidays are associated with that Norman Rockwellian image of our country, where families are warm, loving and together; and where everyone lives in one of those villages with the clustered...
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Village Matters: Not Always a Downward Slide
By Ann Christoph. Last week I had to hunt in the depths of my drawers and closet looking for my ballet outfit and shoes. There they were under piles of department store bags and exercise clothes from...
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Village Matters: Reaching Out With Maestro
By Ann Christoph. We were desperate for new cats. In November of 2002 our two cats died of cancer within weeks of each other. For a while we were just in shock and in our grief couldn’t think of any...
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Village Matters: Nix the Negative Trailer
By Ann Christoph. My dad was a member of the Optimists Club because he really needed it. Sometimes he just couldn’t resist putting a negative spin on things, “Those are really nice new shoes you...
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Village Matters: Cultivating Community
By Ann Christoph. Barbra Streisand’s lilting nostalgic song at the Oscars Sunday night brought back not only the first time I saw that movie “The Way We Were,” but memories of how I was then in 1973....
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Village Matters: Old Times, New Generation
By Ann Christoph. “It’s all part of the trainee program.” That was the phrase that has lingered as I think of that summer day on our farm in Wisconsin, the day the powers-that-be decided to butcher...
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Village Matters: Window Racket
By Ann Christoph There was some racket at last week’s Heritage Committee meeting in the council chambers. Historical consultant Jan Ostashay spoke to a roomful of residents concerned about the status...
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Village Matters: The kids are not all right
By Ann Christoph. Growing up in a Victorian farmhouse was not as romantic as one might think. For one thing there was only one bathroom and it was near the back door in the former “wash room.” In the...
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Village Matters: Match.com for Houses
By Ann Christoph. Who was Nina Koshetz? This world-famous Russian opera singer performed leading operatic roles in Russia and throughout Europe, and gave concerts accompanied by Rachmaninoff, her...
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Village Matters: They’re Disposable
By Ann Christoph Ours is a town of causes and we’re often asked to contribute, sometimes by buying a chance on a raffle. This time my friend won a three-day stay in a cabin in Big Bear Lake and...
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Village Matters: Don’t Ask How Much
By Ann Christoph My first remembrance of Arnold Hano is of standing in the kitchen of the Lamont Langworthy-designed house he and Bonnie had built in Bluebird Canyon. It was the mid-1970s and Fred...
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Village Matters #218: Treasuring a Hometown Feeling
By Ann Christoph Walk into a room crowded with partiers chatting animatedly. Glasses are raised. Hors d’oeuvres on tiny plates are being balanced. There are conversations that are hard to break into....
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Village Matters: Colony Collapse?
By Ann Christoph. Beekeeper Charlotte Bell “Shared the Buzz on Bees” at the South Laguna Community Garden Park on Saturday. As our local bees buzzed happily on the intense yellow pollen amid the white...
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Village Matters: Exercising Freedom
By Ann Christoph. Were the famous founding fathers who wrote and voted for the Declaration of Independence that we celebrate this week just like some of the leaders of our home-created organizations?...
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Village Matters: Is There Magic?
By Ann Christoph. I dreaded the prospect of getting married, walking down that aisle. What if that man waiting for me at the altar was the wrong one? “How will I know when I’ve met ‘the one,’ the...
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Village Matters: Why aren’t we the happiest place?
By Ann Christoph We’re not even in the top 14 happiest places nationwide, according to a University of Vermont study that correlated cities across the country with the numbers of positive and...
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Village Matters: Let Nature Sing
By Ann Christoph Ever wonder why Laguna Beach became an art colony? Yes, it’s beautiful but there’s more to it than that. The artists who sought out Laguna around the turn of the last century came...
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Village Matters: A Resource as Precious as Yosemite
By Ann Christoph. Ever feel like an anachronism? Out of place, out of step with those around you? As we see the community around us bit by bit losing the charming features that mark the best of our...
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