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Mountain View News Saturday, February 8, 2025


Weather Wise


WALKING SIERRA MADRE -

 The Social Side by Deanne Davis

6-Day Forecast Sierra Madre, Ca.

A note from the Editor: 

Our beloved columnist 
and friend took a bad 
fall last week, but she will 
be back as soon as she is 
able to Walk Sierra Madre 
Again. In the meantime....
her Valentine's message 
from February 8, 2023 is 
reprinted below.

 
Sun Ptly Cldy Hi 70s Lows 40s 

 Mon: Ptly Cldy Hi 60s Lows 40s 

 Tues: Ptly Cldy Hi 60s Lows 40s 

 Wed: Ptly Cldy Hi 60s Lows 50s

 Thur: Rain Hi 60s Lows 50s 

 Fri: Rain Hi 60s Lows 50s

Forecasts courtesy of the National Weather Service

SIERRA MADRE CITY MEETINGS

SIERRA MADRE CITY 

COUNCIL MEETING

February 25, 2025 5:30pm

THIS MEETING WILL BE HELD 
IN THE COUNCIL CHAMBERS!

As part of the City of Sierra Madre’s 

COVID-19 transparency efforts and The 
Brown Act provides the public with an opportunity 
to make public comments at any 
public meeting. Public comment may also be 
made by e-mail to PublicComment@CityofSierraMadre.
com by 3:00 p.m. on the day of 
the meeting. 

Emails will be acknowledged at the Council 
meeting and filed into public record. The 
public may also comment in person at the 
meeting.

The meetings will be streamed live on Foothills 
Media website at foothillsmedia.org/sierramadre 
and broadcast on Government 

Access Channel 3 (Spectrum)..

“All you need is love. But a little chocolate now and then 
doesn’t hurt.” Charles M. Schulz

“Oh, if it be to choose and call thee mine, love, thou art 
every day my Valentine.” Thomas Hood

“Being deeply loved by someone gives you strength, while 
loving someone deeply gives you courage.” Lao Tzu

Valentine’s Day is Tuesday [it was in 2023] and I hope all 
my readers are totally prepared with a card and/or some 
flowers. Possibly a dinner reservation, or maybe you’re 
planning to cook your Valentine’s favorite dish…something 
like a beautiful piece of salmon with some roasted veggies 
or a medium rare filet and a baked potato, followed by 
something chocolate and champagne. Thinking of chocolate 
and champagne makes me think about holding hands. And 
walking somewhere lovely with your Valentine. Sierra Madre abounds with lovely places to walk where there are trees 
and flowers and exquisite gardens. Walking and talking is a very romantic thing to do and might even lead to kisses… 

Question for you: when, if ever, was the last time you read Elizabeth Barret Browning’s famous sonnet, “How Do I Love 
Thee?” Probably not since you were in high school. In case you didn’t know, “How Do I Love Thee?” is sonnet number 
43 taken from Sonnets from the Portuguese, a book first published in 1850. It was dedicated to her husband, Robert 
Browning. Anyway, here it is and it’s pretty nice:

“How do I love thee? Let me count the ways.
I love thee to the depth and breadth and height
My soul can reach, when feeling out of sight
For the ends of being and ideal grace.
I love thee to the level of every day’s
Most quiet need, by sun and candle-light.
I love thee freely, as men strive for right.
I love thee purely, as they turn from praise.
I love thee with the passion put to use
In my old griefs, and with my childhood’s faith.
I love thee with a love I seemed to lose
With my lost saints. I love thee with the breath,
Smiles, tears, of all my life; and, if God choose,
I shall but love thee better after death.”

I never said anything as poetic as that to my Valentine, the adorable, ever-patient, John, who is now residing in heaven 
where every day is Valentine’s Day, and love abounds all over the place. No, I never quoted Elizabeth Barrett Browning to 
him, but I did write about love. I’m nowhere near as romantic as Elizabeth, but I wrote about love like this… 

“The Best of Marriage”

“Sometimes when you are gone, I sit at your desk and look out your window at the sky.

And I think of you and how much I love you.

So many years we’ve spent together, mostly sunny with just a little bit of rain.

I treasure these years which have flown by us.

I’ve grown to love you, respect you, admire you, need you more with each one.

There is so much about you that makes me want to be the best that I can be.

It makes me smile each time you walk into a room.

How many thousands of times have I watched you enter the space where I am,

And each time I feel pleasure, delight, at just the sight of you.

You make me laugh; you make me think.

You make me challenge myself, you make me want to be the best me I can be.

You’ve even taught me to enjoy college football... Go Trojans!

I love just to talk with you, to exchange the ordinary stuff our days are made of,

Conversations that are the flour and salt of life.

You are ever in my mind.

You are the other half of my heart.

You are, very simply, the one person selected by God to be my lover, my friend, my husband.

I have known you for more than half my life. The best half.

We have shared all there is in life:

Joy, sorrow, laughter, tears, death, birth, pleasure, misery, poverty, not quite so poverty,

Pride in our children, and absolute disgust with them,

And always, always we have had each other to hold on to.”

Sometime soon, if you haven’t already done it, tell your special Valentine how much he or she means to you. Kisses and 
holding hands are good…maybe even better than chocolate. Even if you totally scoff at Valentine’s Day, it’s never too late 
to say I love you.

“One is loved because one is loved. No reason is needed for loving.” Paulo Coelho

“Love grows more tremendously full, swift, poignant, as the years multiply.” Zane Grey

The picture today is the last Valentine’s Day John and I spent together. We went to Sena in Monrovia and our waitperson 
said she wanted to take our picture. So she did and I shall be forever grateful for that moment of kindness.

In a world where you can be anything you want to be…Be KIND!

My book page: Amazon.com: Deanne Davis

There are adventures galore available there:

True tales of early California, a story about a well-traveled violin,

Emma Gainsworth and her horrific encounters with pumpkins,

So many Kindle stories to enjoy. Take a look!

1630 AM EMERGENCY RADIO & 

Free on-air publicity for local events

 Sierra Madre’s EMERGENCY radio station is now accepting scripts for 
Public Service Announcements (PSAs) about community events. PSAs 
will be broadcast on the air at no charge. The station operates 24/7 and can 
be heard at 1630 on the AM dial.

 Any local non-profit or non-commercial organization can have their 
event information broadcast to the public on Sierra Madre Community 
Information Radio. The station covers the city of Sierra Madre, plus 
surrounding areas of Pasadena, Arcadia, and Monrovia. 

Your event must:

• Benefit a non-commercial or non-profit entity
• Be open to the public
• Be of general interest to local citizens


Just 
write a Public Service Announcement that describes your event and 
e-mail it to radio@cityofsierramadre.com. 


LETTER TO THE EDITOR 

Our Natural Disasters All That Natural?

Wildfires, earthquakes, floods and tornadoes are natural disasters which come with the territory when living on planet earth. But 
what California and the rest of our country has witnessed in the last several decades isn’t “all” natural.

Eight of the ten largest wildfires in California’s recorded history have occurred in the last five years and ten out of ten since 2003. 
Our burn season now starts earlier lasts longer and the fires have become more deadly. Cal FIRES budget has increased from 
1.1 billion to 3.0 billion since 2014 and the California FAIR plan is woefully underfunded (no one really knows how much) to 
accommodate the losses incurred by the Palisades and Eaton Canyon fires. Finally, the insurance industry has largely stopped 
underwriting homeowner insurance in our state

In the short term we need to become smarter about where and how we build in the long term we need to get serious about the gorilla 
in the room IE climate change 

This means reducing our reliance on fossil fuels such as coal oil and gas which continues to heat up our planet exacerbating these 
catastrophes 

Our U.S. Congress recently passed several significant pieces of bipartisan legislation (bipartisan infrastructure law and inflation 
reduction act putting us on a path to reduce our reliance on fossil fuels and move to a clean energy economy

Rebates and tax incentives are available to California homeowners and apartment dwellers go to: HTTP:// WWW q.energy.ca.gov/
programs dot FAQ dash IRA for info. We have a long way to go to mitigate the effects of climate change so if you want to volunteer 
and you’re part of the solution grassroots organizations like CItizens climate lobby, 350.ORG, Extinction Rebellion, or the Sierra 
Club are looking for help 

Bob FICAS 

Sierra madre

Mountain Views News 80 W Sierra Madre Blvd. No. 327 Sierra Madre, Ca. 91024 Office: 626.355.2737 Fax: 626.609.3285 Email: editor@mtnviewsnews.com Website: www.mtnviewsnews.com