Author: Kathryn Harnish
Kathryn Harnish is currently pursuing her Masters in Social Work at the University of New England after a long career in the software industry. With her husband, Rob, she owns and operates Took a Leap Farm, a small goat farm and state-licensed creamery in southern Aroostook County. Kathryn brought her progressive voice to the 2020 campaign for the Maine House in District 144.
Every now and again, when my constitution is strong, I will take a peek at the Facebook comments related to local news stories. (Yes, I know.) And on Wednesday, perhaps feeling the special optimism that only comes on a spring-like day, I was emboldened to read comments following an article about this week’s hearing on…
“It’s absolutely horrible to be alone,” and “You have no idea how much I miss this,” posted with a photograph of the setting sun. These are the last two Facebook posts from an Aroostook County woman before she passed away from COVID-19 last week. They haunt me…I can’t stop thinking about them. Cindy Johansen, former…
Former state representative and chair of the Maine Grassroots Republican Caucus John DeVeau apparently wants to send white nationalists and sovereign citizens an engraved invitation to come to Aroostook County. Earlier this summer, DeVeau presented the Aroostook County Board of Commissioners with a resolution that would have made The County a Second Amendment Sanctuary. Deveau…
Six years ago, a library conference took me to San Francisco — and into the midst of the biggest party I’ve ever seen. On the day before the city’s storied Pride Parade, the Supreme Court of the United States held that “the right to marry is a fundamental right inherent in the liberty of the person and … that couples of…
After seeing thousands of posts, editorials, signs, and so on disparaging unemployed workers here in Maine, I’ve had enough. And while I suspect that I am preaching to the choir, my hope is that there is at least one person who will read this and rethink their perceptions of what it means to be without…
When I ran for the Maine House as a progressive in a staunchly conservative district, I did so with the full knowledge – and eager anticipation – of the need to listen in a spirit of openness and respect to those constituents with beliefs that were vastly different from my own. As a local representative,…
Sometimes, legislation that has zero chance of passing winds its way forward in Augusta or Washington…and does an enormous amount of harm just by virtue of having been pushed into the public square. Here in Maine, several anti-transgender bills, introduced by Representatives Beth O’Connor (R-Berwick) and Mary Anne Kinney (R-Knox) and Senator Lisa Keim (R-Oxford)…
Nearly twenty years ago, on a busy Friday night just before Easter, bouncers at JB’s Pub in Elgin, Illinois, removed an angry, intoxicated patron from the crowded bar after he harassed a female guest. Less than an hour later, he returned, wearing fatigues, sporting a newly-shaved head…and carrying four guns with more than 200 rounds…
Have you seen Oscar’s Oasis yet? It’s a wonderful French-Korean animated TV series featuring an unlucky but determined lizard as its protagonist — I find him especially endearing, as he reminds me of my chihuahua, Oliver, for some odd reason. The first episode, entitled Bad Trip, introduces us to Oscar as he struggles to access…
I grew up in a rural part of Pennsylvania with far more Old Order Amish than new immigrant neighbors, but during my senior year of high school, I befriended a young woman who immigrated from Romania to live with her father, a doctor at our local hospital. She came to the U.S. during the worst…