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Lifestyle

by Dr. Susanna Hoffman

January is  when the year’s crop of sweet, juicy oranges begin to arrive in markets. After many months from blossom, to bud, to fruit, they have now ripened on the trees of California and Florida, been plucked and crated, and delivered to stores awaiting their annual appearance.  Oranges are a major crop in the United States. Spanish settlers brought them to America in the 1500s, having acquired them only a century or so earlier from the Arabs. The Arabs in turn had transported them from Southeast Asia to then disperse them on their forays about the Mediterranean. Oranges gave the farmers and cooks of Spain and elsewhere a new taste treat to play with. Soon they developed many types, the Seville and the Valencia among them, and added orange to many of their culinary delights. Following that tradition is an unusual, but stirring preparation for fish, incorporating both orange and Mediterranean-style sweet wine, with a touch of ancient, woody bay leaf.

19 January, 2009 /

by Dr. Susanna Hoffman

So standard are the selections in our markets, we rarely see some of the hundreds of varieties of citrus fruit that grows about the world. But every now and then, a sample of one of the ancient or very new sorts comes our way. Some are:

Kumquats - are a small citrus fruit, looking rather like orange fingerlings, that grow on a bushy shrub with dark green shiny leaves rather than a tall tree. They originated, were eaten, and admired in China and were unknown in the West until they were brought to England in 1846 by Robert Fortune, a specimen collector for The London Botanical Society. He envisioned them as a landscaping ornamental, not an edible, and that was how they first spread across Europe and to the Americas, as a garden shrub. Their bushiness is useful in creating boundaries and privacy, plus they are pretty and when blossoming, fragrant. They also taste wonderful, raw or cooked like powerful, but tart little oranges. In cooking they soften up. They are only available for short seasons once or twice a year.     

19 January, 2009 /

Fourteen year old MacKenzie Mansour, from Lone Oak, TX, has been skiing with Telluride Adaptive Sports Program this past week. MacKenzie has a rare genetic condition known as Williams Syndrome. That has not stopped her from enjoying our mountain. I had the privilege of skiing...

17 January, 2009 /

  Regina in namaste
Regina Zwilling

Ana Forrest’s life is grist for the mill of the daytime soaps: She was born crippled, and growing up experienced physical abuse, drug addiction, epilepsy, and bulimia.

Forrest took her first yoga class at age 14, becoming an instructor at 18.  Over the years, a passion for healing herself and others led to complementary studies: Native American medicine/ceremony, homeopathy, martial arts, and psychotherapy.

In the end, Forrest came to embody a spirit who has overcome trauma and chosen the warrior’s path of compassion.

Forrest Yoga challenges students to access their whole being in support of physical, mental, and emotional growth. The idea is to clear emotional and mental blocks that dictate and limit our lives using deep breathing and vigorous sequences to generate heat and eliminate toxins. Long holds in the pose progression flush out the system, oxygenating and rejuvenating every cell of the body.

15 January, 2009 /

Shrink Rap

by Dr. Susannah Smith

Often, as a systems consultant or coach, I get asked to help resolve a conflict within an organization.  In systems theory, there is no such thing as “interpersonal conflict.”  Instead, any conflict is viewed as a falling out of role, with role specifically defined as “the attitude with which one takes up authority in relation to a task.”  Conflict, then, is viewed as a place to begin understanding the culture of an organization.  If one approaches a conflict as interpersonal (they don’t get along; they have a personality clash), then one misses the opportunity for a systems solution.  Moreover, if conflict is dealt with on a personal level, the organization will simply produce the same type of conflict somewhere else, among or between new participants, until the systems issues are identified and resolved.  Each conflict or difficulty within an organization is also “mirrored” throughout the organization.  If you are having trouble getting responses for timely procurement, then you can predict that every level of the organization is having some similar type of difficulty.

14 January, 2009 /

Telluride chef, Cindy Farney organized a progressive dinner on the San Miguel Valley Floor, on 10 January 2009. TIO's Eileen Burns was on hand to record the Full Moon event, which had participants cross country skiing to various food and drink stations. Check out Eileen's...

12 January, 2009 /

[click to hear Elisabeth Gick on Tibet]

Nt 438 Elisabeth Gick first came to Telluride in September of 1979, like so many of us, an "accidental tourist.”

“The beauty of the valley sucked me right in and has not let go yet.”

Gick’s children, now adults, went through school here, and she started a very satisfying landscaping business, Outer Spaces, while also becoming deeply involved in a number of non-profits, including Mountainfilm and the Out Loud lecture series.

“I consider myself incredibly lucky to be living here.”

A few years ago, Elisabeth caught the travel bug, visiting interested Nepal in 1999, Vietnam and Cambodia in 2002, India for three months in 2005, India again for three months in 2006-2007.

12 January, 2009 /

Leslie and the girls #F3FB4 In October 2008, Telluride local Elisabeth Gick and daughter Leslie were spending one last afternoon in the town of Ganzi in upper Kham, eastern Tibet, enjoying the sunshine after many snowy, cold days, when they spotted a sign over a door that read “Tibetan Hospital.” A young man spotted the two women and asked in fluent English if he could help.

Then magic unfolded.

The young man, whose name is Lobsang, explained that the abbot of Ganzi nunnery was in charge of the hospital as well as an orphanage for girls. He took Elisabeth and Lesley to meet the man, who was 75 and dressed from head to toe in leather, not red robes.

11 January, 2009 /


Shrink Rap

by Dr. Susannah Smith

Resolution: a “decision to do something or to behave in a certain manner” (wordnet.princeton.edu/perl/webwn).

The tradition of making New Year’s resolutions goes back to 153 B.C., when Janus, a mythical king, was placed at the beginning of the Roman calendar.  Janus has two faces: one that looks back into the past, and one that looks forward to the future.  He became the symbol for making amends for past transgressions, asking for forgiveness from past enemies, exchanging gifts, and making resolutions to be healthier in the future.  January, named after Janus, became the first month of the new year in 46 BC when Caesar dedicated a calendar that more closely reflected the seasons.

31 December, 2008 /