You may recall that six months ago I posted a picture of Chapman Avenue at sunset. Chapman is a major thoroughfare around these parts that runs due west for much of its length, and there’s a nice hill at one end that allows for good picture taking. I was there at the spring equinox to try and get a picture of the sun setting directly over the street. Sort of a suburban version of Manhattanhenge.

As it happens, I got there a few days too late and the sunset was already too far north of west to get what I wanted. However, I marked my calendar for the autumn equinox and figured I’d try again. This time I got there a bit early, and circumstances conspired to prevent me from going back. So once again the sunset is a little off center.

However, there was less haze this time around and I discovered that in the far distance is not just the Pacific Ocean, but the hills of the Palos Verdes peninsula. So even if I timed it perfectly, I’d never get the sun precisely over the street just as it dipped below the horizon. My quest was a fruitless one all along.

But there are other streets. Perhaps I’ll try one of them next spring.

September 21, 2019 — Orange, California

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AN IMPORTANT UPDATE ON MOTHER JONES' FINANCES

We need to start being more upfront about how hard it is keeping a newsroom like Mother Jones afloat these days.

Because it is, and because we're fresh off finishing a fiscal year, on June 30, that came up a bit short of where we needed to be. And this next one simply has to be a year of growth—particularly for donations from online readers to help counter the brutal economics of journalism right now.

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Because over the challenging last year, and thanks to feedback from readers, we've started to see a better way to go about asking you to support our work: Level-headedly communicating the urgency of hitting our fundraising goals, being transparent about our finances, challenges, and opportunities, and explaining how being funded primarily by donations big and small, from ordinary (and extraordinary!) people like you, is the thing that lets us do the type of journalism you look to Mother Jones for—that is so very much needed right now.

And it's really been resonating with folks! Thankfully. Because corporations, powerful people with deep pockets, and market forces will never sustain the type of journalism Mother Jones exists to do. Only people like you will.

There's more about our finances in "News Never Pays," or "It's Not a Crisis. This Is the New Normal," and we'll have details about the year ahead for you soon. But we already know this: The fundraising for our next deadline, $350,000 by the time September 30 rolls around, has to start now, and it has to be stronger than normal so that we don't fall behind and risk coming up short again.

Please consider pitching in before moving on to whatever it is you're about to do next. We really need to see if we'll be able to raise more with this real estate on a daily basis than we have been, so we're hoping to see a promising start.

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