This past year has been surreal. Phrases once taken for granted, like “innocent until proven guilty,” are now painfully laughable.

Within 24 hours of being arrested, I was tried and convicted in the media. Before I ever saw a judge, or heard the actual charges, people from Gold Beach all the way to Eureka, were hearing a vilifying, sensationalized version from the radio, television and newspaper.

Business-wise, the damage was done no matter the final outcome. Personally, it was just beginning.

The following six months of court dates ended with a dismissal, but it felt like six months of walking in the dark, never knowing what was coming or when the bottom might fall out.

Business almost stopped completely, Christmas sales were non-existent and every month posed the question, “Will this be the month we close a business I’ve had open for 12 years?”

Maj. Dominic Oto of the Oregon National Guard had unfinished business when he came home from war. He had been in the same armored vehicle as de Solenni, part of a convoy heading to Kandahar on Sept. 20, 2008. In fact, Oto told an Oregonian reporter, he and de Solenni had tossed a coin to see who would have to drive.

“I lost the coin toss, so I was driving,” Oto said. “That’s probably what saved me when we got hit by a 500-pound IED.”

The 37,000-pound vehicle was thrown 20 feet in the air. Oto suffered two herniated disks in his back and a dislocated shoulder and was sent back to the United States a week later. De Solenni was killed instantly.

“When I got back, I was a mess,” Oto said. “I had a lot of guilt over Bruno passing. I really did feel in my heart of hearts that he was a better man than me.”

“I think about him all the time. Always part of my mind is there in that day.”

That’s what happened last week when I submitted my column about square-foot gardening. There just wasn’t room to include these photos that  illustrate the SFG technique in my back yard.

Saturday I picked carrots I planted last October and they were crisp and sweet. I bought some butternut squash and leeks at the farmers market and made a wonderful soup to celebrate Canadian Thanksgiving Monday. The recipe is below.

Nevertheless, the world is full of experts. Many of them will tell us, with great authority, exactly what separates human beings from other mammals. Some experts say that what makes us different from other animals is opposable thumbs. Others say the difference between kids and cats is the size of the prefrontal lobe of their brains.

Me, I think it’s our capacity for denial. No other animal is capable of selective awareness. To a dog, what is, is and what ain’t doesn’t even exist. Of all mammals, only humans have the ability to deny the obvious.

And we’re capable of some amazing techniques in order not to see or hear anything that might make us face an unpleasant truth. I saw something a couple of weeks ago that totally cracked me up, and I’ve been giggling about it ever since.

The Highway 101 traffic corridor flowing through a row of national chains and fast food outlets is not Crescent City’s most elegant physical feature.  

It is good to show where the monument (designed by architect and City Councilman Charles Slert) is proposed to be located at the S curve.  However, the white frame mock-up there (now replaced by a sign with flags) was misleading, because the monument is a solid geometrical block on an 80-foot pad with five flagpoles, and upward facing night lighting that cost money daily and is bad for wildlife near Elk Creek.

In urban design terms, H Street is appropriately centered about halfway between the 101 corridors and beautiful Pebble Beach Drive. H Street is slowly becoming an attractive, walkable civic center. From the county administrative offices, one passes the freshly painted veteran’s building, the historical society museum, and the county courthouse. The street has a calm, pedestrian friendly feel with small residences and businesses as one continues on to the Front Street Park with an ocean view vista. 

At the proposed S curve location, the monument becomes a poorly recognized drive-by element in an intersection that is already filled with a variety of visual distractions.  The tail end of the southbound 101 lanes is already awkward for pedestrians and cars. There would not be enough space for it to stand out and gain the civic respect deserved of such a monument.

Perhaps the lure of classic cars brought you here this weekend. If so, welcome to Del Norte County.

It’s a place where you can experience solitude while soaking in world-class scenery, but you’ll have plenty of company in Beachfront Park during today’s 18th annual Sea Cruise. After all, what could be better than strolling a bayside greenway, weaving through hundreds of automotive beauties?