The Barometer Online

It's here. No hiding. No crying as you pour over your million-and-a-half-page voters' guide (okay, the state voters' guide is only 64 pages, and you don't have to read it all). The time has come for Oregonians to cast their ballots and put their names next to their candidates of choice.

A friend once told me there are two kinds of peace. The first one is false, when everything is made peaceful not because it is right or just, but because people have artificially forced the peace to happen. He called this "the peace of the grave" because in that kind of peace, something dies in order to bring it about.

It's a long way to the finish line when you are a long distance runner. I ran cross country and track in high school and college, ran road races competitively for many years and also coached track and cross country in Hawaii and California so I have some insight into how difficult races can be.