Healdsburg Highlights By Barbara Barrielle - June 2017
As I write this, we are just one week off from the event of the year in Healdsburg…every year. I can remember my first
And then there are those farm animals and the kids who have raised them. Such love and attention goes in to bringing pigs, cows, sheep, chicken, bunnies and more to maturity to present to their families and peers. The auction for these farm animals is bittersweet because the monies raised support FFA and 4H but it also means these young farmers part with a pig or lamb they have raised from a baby. It is truly the growing up moment in an agricultural community and this annual parade is the verification that, tourists restaurants, fancy hotels and all…we are a community of farming and agriculture. We do not forget this and, as a community, we come together at the end of May to remember our fallen soldiers and remember our roots in Healdsburg are farming. Period.
Oh, and don’t forget the cake walk! Please send your photos and stories from this year’s FFA parade as well as those from years past to me at barbarabarrielle@gmail.com and I will place them in my social media feeds and in next month’s column.
I will share one of my FFA stories at the risk of having my daughter, Charlotte, now 19, hate me for recounting her Sir Rusty story one more time. Sir Rusty is the name of the steer that is auctioned off every year to raise funds for FFA. Usually, 4-H and FFA kids sell these to their friends and neighbors but raffle tickets can also be bought at the Fair. I am always good for $20 worth (no one has yet hit me up this year) and when my daughter was about ten, I stopped by the Sir Rusty booth (every year the steer gets the same name although it is clearly not the same steer!) to buy a few more tickets. She got excited and asked the lady in the booth if Sir Rusty would come live with us if we won. The lady laughed and told Charlotte that only half of Sir Rusty would come to your house and that he would be delivered in packages for your freezer! As I lunged through the booth to put this vile woman out of her earthly misery, my daughter, with eyes wide in disbelief, started sobbing and did not stop crying over the fate of Sir Rusty for two entire days. And she did not eat meat for two solid years in deference to Sir Rusty. Lady in the booth; you have no idea the emotional damage you did!
Summer begins in Healdsburg and I hope this community figures out a way to open the pool at a decent time and keep it open into the Fall when it is still hot and when we deserve to have a public pool.
Healdsburg Chamber
I highly recommend getting on the Healdsburg Chamber of Commerce’s email list. The Chamber has amazing events and mixers, even for non-members, and they are the best consolidator of local activities. Check outwww.healdsburg.com and simply join the list and head to the next mixer for wine and nibbles as well as the opportunity to meet people from all walks of life in our community.
Alexander Valley Film Society and My Film
Don’t forget to get on the email list for the Alexander Valley Film Society and Film Festival at avfilmsociety.org. Not only do they throw a wonderful local film festival but the film society screens wonderful films throughout the year (I just saw “Obit” and “I Called Him Morgan”) that you would normally never find in a small town like ours. Very good entertainment and fun little events like drive-in theatre at the Cloverdale Citrus Festival Grounds make the Alexander Valley Film Society a wonderful additional to all of Northern Sonoma County. In Healdsburg, their home is the wonderful wine-and-food friendly Raven Film Center www.ravenfilmcenter.com.
Crossing fingers that the film I produced “Veracruz” makes it into the Alexander Valley Film Festival. It premiered at the Sonoma International Film Festival to much applause and we will be thrilled to show it at as many wine country locations as possible. The story of career low life criminal, Jimmy Hill, and the last job he has to do before getting out of the life and over to Mexico, with or without his heroin-addicted love, Luly, and the host of bad guys that are after the two of them. Check out the trailer and photos at facebook.com/veracruzmovie and make sure you “like” our page!
