In place of our old scheduled Zoom sessions to find out about our NE Village, you can stream the online recorded video “101” session anytime. Afterward, just ask us questions on the phone at 503-895-2750.

●     “Introduction to Northeast Village” is a 9-minute video all about the activities and services our Village offers. The narrated slide show describes the Village’s purpose, how it operates, and how to get involved. This is the overview for potential members and volunteers.

No need to show up for a meeting or register for a Zoom session; just watch it at home on your connected device or computer at your convenience. Tell your friends and neighbors. Maybe join them over coffee to watch!

●     And we have people to tell you their experiences, in another accompanying video.

“Why I'm Involved in Northeast Village PDX” is a 10-minute video of four Northeast Villagers who are members and volunteers. They’re enthusiastic about our Village, and that enthusiasm can be contagious. Share this video with friends and neighbors, too.

●     “Introduction to Northeast Village PDX” (Villages 101)

When:

Community for Positive Aging (new name for Hollywood Senior Center) 1840 NE 40th Ave, Portland

No reservations required, just show up.

There will be a NE Village booth at the Hollywood Farmers Market on June 11. This is an opportunity for members of the community to learn about what NE Village has to offer.

Please let friends and neighbors know that we will be there ready to give them information and answer their questions.

Call for current Villagers to volunteer at the booth: Watch your NEV e-mail for an invitation and instructions to sign up to work at the table.

●     NEV Booth

When:

Where: Hollywood Farmers Market

Hello current and would-be bikers! There are more monthly bike outings scheduled.

The organizer is different each time. Contact the organizer to let them know you want to participate and get more details about the ride.

●     Monday, May 16, 1pm, to North Portland

Contact: e-mail Lin McAtee llmcatee@msn.com

●     Sunday, June 26, with Sunday Parkways, to Northeast Cully

Contact: e-mail Margaret Baldwin margaretnepdxvillage@gmail.com

●     Wednesday, July 13, to Laurelhurst

Contact: e-mail Craig Lindsay lindsaycp@hotmail.com

●     Sunday, August 21, with Sunday Parkways, to East Portland beyond I-205

Contact: e-mail Margaret Baldwin margaretnepdxvillage@gmail.com

If you would like to ride but don’t have a bike, Craig Lindsay has several bikes he is willing to loan.

We will require that you have a helmet, a working tail light, and a bright jacket or vest. If it is raining, we’ll postpone the ride to another date.

Please check with either Margaret or Craig (contact information above) with questions and comments. We’ll be looking for more leaders and rides for the future.

We welcome our new members to NE Village and hope you get to know them.

Martha Calvert lives in the Madison South neighborhood. She moved to Portland 12 years ago from Toledo, Ohio.

Martha enjoys music and likes reading thrillers, mysteries and suspense novels. She also likes books about ecology and animals. Martha enjoys spending time with her family, and she is looking forward to participating in Village activities and social events.

Marianne is a lifelong Oregonian. She moved to the Hollywood District in 2009 after living in southeast Portland, Bend, and Gresham.

She says, “My activities/hobbies have been sidelined due to my husband's five-year illness and recent death. I enjoy travel and at some point will take some short trips, especially to the coast.”

Reconnecting with old friends at NEV Happy Hour on the Alberta Street Pub’s patio in March.

Doug Egan and his wife Susan Bach were early supporters of NE Village, joining when it opened in 2016. Doug had hoped to teach a tai chi class for Vllagers, but a series of health issues prevented him from volunteering and being as active as he would have liked.

Despite this, he always enjoyed quarterly potlucks and talking with other Villagers about what they were doing and how they viewed the world. After a heart attack in 2018, Village services provided transportation to cardiac rehab, and those twice-weekly conversations with volunteer drivers were truly bright spots in his day!

During the fundraising campaigns of many organizations, you have undoubtedly heard the familiar pitch that your donation to a non-profit may be matched by your employer.

NE Village is a non-profit that you might be able to help that way. So if you or your friends or relatives are employed by or have connections to a company that does match, please consider making a donation to NE Village.

Click the following link to a website listing some matching companies: 360matchpro.com/matching-gift-companies/. Not all employers are listed, and some do not publicize this benefit well, so also check with your current or former employer to see if they have a matching funds program.

Then, if you qualify for a match, make the donation to:

 (“fbo” means “for the benefit of”). Then notify your company. It’s a win-win for everyone.

Northeast Village is pleased to announce that we will be hosting a series of virtual live presentations with local Portland area authors.

NEV member and avid book lover Joan Malling was inspired to create the series after watching a similar program aired from Paris that showcased authors discussing their work. She enlisted the support of her longtime friend and fellow NEV member Roberta Dyer, former owner of Broadway Books. The two women collaborated in organizing the program that will run for several months over the remainder of the year.

The series kicks off on May 20 with Chris Santella.

Chris Santella is an avid fly fisherman. After writing and publishing many fly fishing articles in the early 2000s--for very little money--he realized that if he wanted to continue to write about his passion, he’d need to find a better way to monetize his efforts. This led to the writing and publication of his first book, Fifty Places to Fly Fish Before You Die (Abrams). Santella, very satisfied to have published a book, thought that was that and prepared to return to doing corporate marketing work. But Fifty Places did well, his editor at Abrams asked him if he knew anything about golf, and a series was born.

Since 2003, Santella has published 23 books, including 17 in the “Fifty Places” series covering a host of outside sports and their marquee locations. In this presentation, he’ll describe the path that led him to book writing and share some of the inspiring images from the books.

Chris Santella is freelance writer based in NE Portland. He’s the author of 23 books, and is a regular contributor to The New York Times, Washington Post, Gray’s Sporting Journal, Trout, and a host of other periodicals.

When: Friday, May 20, 3-4pm

Where: Zoom video

Registration is required and is open to everyone.

Click here to register on our NEV Calendar.

Watch for more author announcements; you can check our NEV Calendar for events titled “Author Series.”

Volunteer and Member Roberta Dyer 

Roberta Dyer’s name might ring a bell with members of the Village community. That’s because for almost 30 years, she was co-owner of a business beloved by many, Broadway Books in Sullivan’s Gulch. Click here for books she recommends for our reading.

Roberta’s journey began in 1966 when she pulled up her roots in a tiny community in Southern California that didn’t even have a bookstore. She relocated to seemingly sophisticated and exciting Portland so she could attend Lewis and Clark College. Roberta pursued a double major in English and Theater. Ever since, her life has revolved around books. Upon graduating from college, Roberta’s first job was with a book distributor, and for more than a decade she worked in various jobs in the book world.

One day, while riding a bus on Broadway, Roberta was hit with the observation that the street desperately needed a bookstore. Thus, Broadway Books was born. Roberta’s vision was that the bookstore occupy a “third place” for her customers: a refuge from the busyness of both work and home life. Partnership best describes how Roberta conceived of her relationship with customers. She would curate a collection based on her interests and knowledge, customers would make suggestions and requests, and together the parties would work in symbiosis.

Broadway Books became a community gathering spot whether as somewhere to simply have a conversation about your favorite new book or to attend a reading by a renowned author. When asked for an example of accomplishing one of her career dreams, Roberta’s eyes teared up. When she overheard parents reading to their children or a child reading aloud was her response.

Roberta’s generous spirit displays itself in giving back to the community at large. Since she retired in 2015 she has volunteered on medical wards at Providence. Roberta volunteers for the Village by offering members rides to medical appointments, taking them on walks, and helping them organize their homes.

Roberta and her husband Bob Durand have been married for 49 years and have a son. When Roberta mentions her five-year-old grandson, you can almost see sparks of love flying from her heart.

We are all looking forward to Roberta’s next unique project, the local author series--described in this newsletter.

Interviewer Tracy McDonald asked Roberta Dyer, our newsletter’s May Spotlight subject, for a list of books she might recommend to members of the Village. Here is her list.

One Hundred Years of Solitude by Gabriel Garcia Marquez

The Alexandria Quartet by Lawrence Durrell

Cutting for Stone by Abraham Verghese

The Spirit Catches You and You Fall Down by Anne Fadiman

The Tender Bar by J.R. Moehringer

The Art of Eating by M.F.K. Fisher

The sun is shiny and warm through my patio doors, the cat is snug away in the bedroom, and we have a splash of Zinfandel in our glasses; Jane reads chapter two from White Oleander by Janet Fitch. A few paragraphs in, we both spontaneously gasp; I remark, “Ingrid is relentless!”

I met Jane Braunger at a Northeast Village PDX anniversary event at the Radio Room. I felt a bit awkward as a new member, and because of my low vision, I was also awkward about where to put myself.

Jane graciously spoke up and suggested I sit across from her. We began chatting and soon dove into a conversation about the Movie group, going over comments about the film “Harold and Maude,” which the group had just discussed. Eventually, books entered the discussion. I mentioned that a friend, who lives in Tampa and loves reading aloud, has been reading to me every Wednesday.

During 2020 while we all kept ourselves at home, we read 14 books, or rather she read 14 books to me! This friend has said how much more she gleans from a book by reading out loud.

I also mentioned that I have my own personal library of books, several of which I hadn’t read yet. “I liked the idea,” I told Jane, “of someone picking a book from my shelves they would enjoy and reading it to me, discussing the book as we progress--a mutually beneficial connection!”

Jane replied that she loved the idea and would like reading aloud. We have been reading once a week since mid-February. We so appreciate--exclaiming in the moment--the way an author constructs a sentence, a stunningly descriptive image, a marvelous metaphor, the gripping story.

We both want to recommend this idea to NEV: to read a book--or two!--together with someone else in the Village. Become Book Buddies!

Jane Braunger recommends this article about aging issues and volunteers in our Village Movement, written by Tammy La Gorce of The New York Times: “Generation X Volunteers Want to Help You, and One Day Themselves, Age at Home.” Click this link to The New York Times website: nyti.ms/3t6mwvW.

Wait! You can’t get the entire article from behind the paywall; you don’t subscribe to The New York Times, because it’s expensive?

That’s what your public library is for, sharing the publications! Our office manager Teri McKenzie taught us how to access periodicals, right from your device or computer at home, if you have an account at the Multnomah County Library:

“Once you log in to your multcolib.org account, go to the Research tab > Research Tools. From there, type in the name of the periodical (e.g., NY Times) or scroll down through the list of periodicals to select it. Then follow the prompts".

"For me, in searching for this article 'Generation X Volunteers Want to Help You, and One Day Themselves, Age at Home,' I was led to another Research Tools and Resources login screen. That took me to a bar where I entered the name of the article, hit ENTER, and up came the article. At that point I was able to read it directly online, save it as a PDF file, or I could e-mail it to myself. If you enjoy reading the whole paper, this may not be the best option, but for an occasional article, I like this free service.”

Submit news, reviews, articles, photos by June 15, or inquire with early-stage ideas.

To: jeanne.bear@gmail.com