The Rose Festival and the End of an Era

(Before the letter, we want to let you know that we have a new survey up that seeks to further clarify our last polling data and also gauge interest in some ideas we’re cooking up. Thanks for your feedback!)

Ladies and Gentlemen,

Update on June 10th: I was stationed in Bosnia when I first saw “The Sopranos”. I bought the first season on DVD, and I ripped through it in the evenings. These last few weeks were the first time I was able to see the episodes as they aired. All day today, I waited for that final episode.

I’ve been speculating how it would end, but what mattered more were these characters that I’d watched for 6 years now. As screwed up as they were, they felt like friends.

I won’t say a thing about the ending, but if you haven’t seen “The Sopranos”, start from season one and work your way through. Norman Mailer recently referred to the show as the Great American Novel, and I can’t say I disagree with him.

As the opening credits rolled and Tony drove once again over the New Jersey Turnpike and passed Satriale’s, I thought back to Bosnia. Even on a team of 8 guys, only one of my team members watched the episodes with me: a guy named Lewis. Lewis and I couldn’t stand each other most of the time. He thought I was a snotty punk and I thought he was a conniving liar. Both were true, but we watched “The Sopranos” as friends, if only for an hour or two.

—-

It has been an absolutely gorgeous late Spring here in Portland, including a couple 90 degree days (something we don’t usually have until mid-July). I get that global warming is awful, but can’t I at least enjoy it a little? The Rose Festival is in full force here, and every memory of getting out of school comes flooding back. Life is just excellent right now. Here’s a recap:

- Two of my best friends, Cami and Andrew, just had beautiful twin boys.

- John Pattison, our books editor, and his wife Katie found out they’re having a daughter.

- “Christianity Today” ran a cover article on our fearless leader, Donald Miller, and we got a mention. If you’re visiting the site due to that article, prepare to have your minds blown. (And thank you thank you thank you for coming!)

- The Blazers still have the #1 pick in the NBA Draft. I enjoyed watching Cleveland make the Finals the other night, and seeing their fans celebrate in the streets makes me salivate about the possibilities.

- I saw Spoon live, which was an absolute treat.

- My DII fake college basketball team, which I wrote about a while ago, is playing in the National Tournament Final Four.

So, you know, I’m flying high.

But the life of your humble editor is not entirely without conflict. I had to make a very tough decision this week in choosing between the return of two of our oldest writers. After a long hiatus in which he worked as a janitor, wrote a book, and moved to Birmingham, Chad Gibbs got around to writing an article for us.

But as I was getting set to run it, I emailed Brent Bourgeois about Cindy Sheehan. He had the honor of marching with her last year, and I wondered what he thought of her step down as the face of the anti-war advocates. He kindly sent an article on, and I hope you’ll enjoy it. Mrs. Sheehan was a polarizing figure, to be sure, but I think even her detractors should marvel at her fire and determination, because so many people just let the world be.

The triumphant return of Chad Gibbs will be pushed back to next week.

Lastly, I’m proud that our readers chose to study Rick McKinley’s “A Beautiful Mess” for this month’s reading list, and that we’re posting a review of the book this week. Not many know this, but Rick was actually the one who came up with the name “The Burnside Writer’s Collective”. He’s my pastor at Imago Dei, but I’ve also known him since I was in 6th grade, when he worked as a youth pastor at my childhood church. He even let me follow him around for one day at Multnomah Bible College because I wanted to be a pastor (he also bought me a muffin, but didn’t feed me anything else all day. This is part of the reason I’m not a pastor.) If I’m going to list my heroes, the men I want to be like, they would be my dad and Rick McKinley.

Even if that muffin wasn’t very filling.

Enjoy the issue,
Jordan Green
BWC