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Jump to navigationJump to searchThe Woodpecker Menace by Ted Olinger (view source)
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The Key Peninsula is a small spur of land on the Puget Sound in Washington state, shaped - you guessed it - like a key. Its resident are disparate and include both incomers and those who'd see themselves as pioneer settlers. But they're joined in a communal sense of island living. It's on a much smaller scale, but I think most British people can identify feel affinity with identifying as an islander. It flavours our relationship with continental Europe in so many ways.
But life on the Key is also eternally rural. Your neighbours live not next door, but miles away down unmade roads. You'll probably be as familiar with the local wildlife as you will with them. And isolated people are often eccentric and idiosyncratic. Why shouldn't they be? They're not bothering anyone. Ted Olinger's stories about his life on the Key evoke all these things and more. A young family, desperate for a good night's sleep, do battle with the Northern Flicker woodpecker who has taken up residence on their roof and whose woodpecking not only keeps them awake but also threatens the physical structure of their home. A not-so-kooky-after-all neighbour nails protest poems to trees. Employing a gardener gets you your very own shaman.
