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Empty nest: An excerpt from "Dusty Women"

Columnists

Author's Note: Diana Newquist Parson is from Ottumwa. She and I have something in common: we both know first hand The Big C, although mine is in remission, while Diana's is still snapping and snarling, gnashing its teeth and playing its tricks. I invited her to write the following piece. Her books can be found on Amazon. This is an excerpt from my upcoming book: “Dusty Women.” As in “Ashes to Ashes, Dust to Dust.” It’s a book about ordinary women facing death and handling death. While this section tries to capture what happened when I was diagnosed with uveal melanoma in my ...

The right to be left alone

Columnists

"The makers of our Constitution undertook to secure conditions favorable to the pursuit of happiness. ... They conferred against the Government the right to be let alone -- most comprehensive of rights and the right most valued by civilized men." -- Justice Louis D. Brandeis (1856-1941) The ...

They'll come for baseball. They'll remember Iowa

Columnists

There is something pretty incredible about seeing the baseball world descend on a small Iowa town of just several thousand residents. Today, the Minnesota Twins and Philadelphia Phillies will take the field in Dyersville for the return of the MLB at Field of Dreams. For baseball fans, it’s ...

Dave Dawson

Your View

Here in Ames you are gerrymandered into District 4 for our representative in the House. This means you are stuck with the red counties up in Northwest Iowa. They have given us Representative Feenstra who has refused to take 90 million in earmark money. While districts represented by lawmakers like Mariannette Miller-Meeks, Ashley Hinson, and Zach Nunn regularly secure tens of millions in local project funding for roads and bridges, water infrastructure, health and human services, flood mitigation, education, and childcare, our representative has given us 0. If we turn out at the ...

Hubbell and annexation

Columnists

Two very different topics are vying for my attention right now, so I’m going to write about both: the Iowa Data Center Decision Tool, developed at the University of Iowa, and the meeting of the Marshall County Supervisors that I attended on Wednesday morning. My website ...

A word of caution to the Marshall County Supervisors

Your View

I read that you are considering providing wind turbines to generate electricity. I read some time ago that they come from China and are known to break down and difficult — almost impossible to repair at all. They destroy topsoil, kill birds and if placed near residences, people have complained of headaches, difficulty sleeping, anxiety not experienced before the nearness of wind turbines. As a word of caution, please talk with people who lived near wind turbines before your decision is made if they haven't already moved away.