First of all, thank you Gabe for your treatise on Humanure and Andy's insights on his last blog. I learn so much from all of you! Since I missed my posting schedule as set out by Kira, I thought I would check in with a quick note and a few more resources to ponder.
Although, it is discouraging to read the results of the G8 Summit and realize that "Curious George Bush" (aka "George the Idiot") is still up to the same 'ole monkey business, his days are numbered. Since our nation lacks leadership, we can choose to take action in our personal lives and perhaps inspire our family members and neighbors to take positive action also to reduce our carbon footprints.
So what am I doing this week? Although still a bit pathetic---I am becoming more informed. I have been shopping at Costco less and buying local. This week I will continue eating vegetarian/vegan and try to eat at home more. I will attend the Sierra Club event on Thursday (see description below) instead of driving 100 miles RT to see Josh Ritter at a free concert. I will try to get my act together and contact the City of Orem this week to order a compost bin and encourage my neighbors to use it also---even though the thought of saving garbage repulses me.
Check out 2 outstanding articles from the latest Catalyst Magazine: http://www.catalystmagazine.net/pdfs/0708/catalyst_0708.pdf
1) page 12 "The Low Carbon Diet"
>>>don't miss this web site they refer to since it is an amazing resource: http://www.empowermentinstitute.net/
2) page 16 "...how the food industry pimped my breakfast"
We are going to be counted after all in our new "Church of the Sierra Club People"...
David & I will attend "Lightbulbs to Leadership House Party"! Watch the video, then throw a party!
http://action.sierraclub.org/site/GetTogether?gettogether=activity_splash&cal_activity_id=1120
The Sierra Club is holding hundreds of house parties across America on Thursday, July 17 to help send the message that to really solve global warming, we need to change more than lightbulbs -- we need to change direction. We need action that is strong, urgent and bold enough to get the job done.
It was fun to see Kira & Andy's clothesline this week. Check out the chart from the "Low Carbon Diet" article and you will see how many pounds of C02 they reduced. When I was a kid and even when we were first married with kids---we used to dry our clothes (including all the diapers) on the line, walk to the corner grocery store---we didn't have a dishwasher, color TV, air conditioner or a furnace; of course we only had one car, we walked to school, we always ate leftovers, we returned our glass bottles to the store so they could be refilled... It is amazing how this is going full circle and people are now realizing "in the name of progress" has really screwed us. In this regard, the good 'ole days may have been just that.
Look forward to hearing from some of you---although I think we have all been in touch. We know how Gabe is reducing his footprint lately---he need not say too much on this topic. Perhaps, we can just encourage one another to not give in to the "gloom & doom" as we read about food wars, water shortages, global energy crisis and instead work toward a bit more self-sufficiency (kitchen gardens, cisterns, solar panels, etc). This is a challenge in a culture and my personal life style of dependency. We have a long road of re-learning ahead of us!
Thanks for listening. Love you, Lakshmi
Monday, July 14, 2008
Monday, June 2, 2008
Earlier today I was doing some online research for work, and came across some depressing news which I emailed out as follows:
From an article on sustainability and consumption:
I had the pleasure of being a keynote speaker with Yvon Chouinard of Patagonia at a "net impact" event late last year. He has done as much as any CEO to make sure that his company is respectful and protective of the environment. Yet in front of 100 net impacters, he said (I am paraphrasing), "I have talked to some serious scientists, and most of them believe we have passed the point of no return. We have no hope left to save the Earth."
Hopefully that is not 100% accurate. Unfortunately, it is actually possible that it could be true. The full article can be found here and presents a good case for reducing our consumption.
Feeling impossibly overwhelmed, I sent this out as an email to some of you (those on this blog who's emails I have in my EPG email account). Mom (Lakshmi) wrote back this response, pretty much capturing what I also was feeling:
What a challenge and it does look grim in a global economy down to our personal households. It seems our meager attempts, whatever they may be (vegetarian/vegan eating, recycling, shopping less...) are a little too late and certainly not nearly enough to address the issues of the 9 billion people arriving! We actually can't pat ourselves on the back---since even the most conscientious among us are still not doing much after all!
Coming home from work I got to process a bit, and here is how I would respond to my own hopelessness from earlier today. [Warning, significant God-talk and Bible references follow. This is my world-view with less translation than it sometimes receives and perhaps with a degree of assumed "kingdom theology." Hopefully the gist still comes across and if not I can add comments as needed.]
I think you are probably right - in the end it probably will take war(s) to really wake us up to the enormity of the problem and effect the significant change in our lifestyles as well as the very infrastructure of our society. Kira and I are wearing ourselves out just trying to get our edible landscape (garden) going, and while I think it is a good way to be spending our energy you are right, it is all a drop in the bucket compared to the magnitude of the problem. (I do however think we live in a democratic economy - how I spend my dollars is my economic vote. And, as we learned in Florida, every vote counts.... at least half! But I agree, my individual actions seem inconsequential in comparison to the overwhelmingly "obese" infrastructure I live in.)
It's funny, Kira and I were visiting this church yesterday and the pastor was preaching from Revelation, talking about these images of God's final, sovereign, good reign. The fullness of God's kingdom come. God's perfect reign of peace, wisdom, holiness, and love over all creation finally come to fulfillment. And his application was to topics of worry - worrying about your money, or your job, or whatever. The message was "God is in control." A fine message. But if you take the book of Revelation as a whole, it is speaking to the epic struggle of Good versus Evil. God versus Satan. Who will triumph? What is really happening in our world? To all appearances, God seems many times absent. But Revelation tells a different story. It tells a story of God's victory and paints a beautiful picture of God's final reign. The larger message of Revelation is not necessarily "God cares about your provisions, your dented car, your mortgage bill, etc." (though I believe God does care about those things). I think the larger message of Revelation is "People of God: when the story of the world around you looks desperately hopeless, remember that God is telling a different story. A story of hope and redemption and healing and God's kingdom come. And God's story is ultimately the one that will prevail." [Remember Revelation was written before Christianity was the religion of the empire, while Christians weren't exactly popular and the future for the people of God probably looked pretty hopeless.]
So I think it takes a Revelation perspective to look the enormous problem laid before us squarely in the eyes and say "This story of hopelessness is not going to determine my actions. I am going to live believing a different story from the one I see. Believing that God's kingdom will come, and that - ushered in through Jesus - God's kingdom is coming now, today." And because God's kingdom is coming now, today, we are free as the people of God to prophetically build gardens and serve the poor and research the cure for AIDS and build community and seek to help usher in any of the other bazillion facets of God's kingdom come.
From an article on sustainability and consumption:
I had the pleasure of being a keynote speaker with Yvon Chouinard of Patagonia at a "net impact" event late last year. He has done as much as any CEO to make sure that his company is respectful and protective of the environment. Yet in front of 100 net impacters, he said (I am paraphrasing), "I have talked to some serious scientists, and most of them believe we have passed the point of no return. We have no hope left to save the Earth."
Hopefully that is not 100% accurate. Unfortunately, it is actually possible that it could be true. The full article can be found here and presents a good case for reducing our consumption.
Feeling impossibly overwhelmed, I sent this out as an email to some of you (those on this blog who's emails I have in my EPG email account). Mom (Lakshmi) wrote back this response, pretty much capturing what I also was feeling:
What a challenge and it does look grim in a global economy down to our personal households. It seems our meager attempts, whatever they may be (vegetarian/vegan eating, recycling, shopping less...) are a little too late and certainly not nearly enough to address the issues of the 9 billion people arriving! We actually can't pat ourselves on the back---since even the most conscientious among us are still not doing much after all!
Coming home from work I got to process a bit, and here is how I would respond to my own hopelessness from earlier today. [Warning, significant God-talk and Bible references follow. This is my world-view with less translation than it sometimes receives and perhaps with a degree of assumed "kingdom theology." Hopefully the gist still comes across and if not I can add comments as needed.]
I think you are probably right - in the end it probably will take war(s) to really wake us up to the enormity of the problem and effect the significant change in our lifestyles as well as the very infrastructure of our society. Kira and I are wearing ourselves out just trying to get our edible landscape (garden) going, and while I think it is a good way to be spending our energy you are right, it is all a drop in the bucket compared to the magnitude of the problem. (I do however think we live in a democratic economy - how I spend my dollars is my economic vote. And, as we learned in Florida, every vote counts.... at least half! But I agree, my individual actions seem inconsequential in comparison to the overwhelmingly "obese" infrastructure I live in.)
It's funny, Kira and I were visiting this church yesterday and the pastor was preaching from Revelation, talking about these images of God's final, sovereign, good reign. The fullness of God's kingdom come. God's perfect reign of peace, wisdom, holiness, and love over all creation finally come to fulfillment. And his application was to topics of worry - worrying about your money, or your job, or whatever. The message was "God is in control." A fine message. But if you take the book of Revelation as a whole, it is speaking to the epic struggle of Good versus Evil. God versus Satan. Who will triumph? What is really happening in our world? To all appearances, God seems many times absent. But Revelation tells a different story. It tells a story of God's victory and paints a beautiful picture of God's final reign. The larger message of Revelation is not necessarily "God cares about your provisions, your dented car, your mortgage bill, etc." (though I believe God does care about those things). I think the larger message of Revelation is "People of God: when the story of the world around you looks desperately hopeless, remember that God is telling a different story. A story of hope and redemption and healing and God's kingdom come. And God's story is ultimately the one that will prevail." [Remember Revelation was written before Christianity was the religion of the empire, while Christians weren't exactly popular and the future for the people of God probably looked pretty hopeless.]
So I think it takes a Revelation perspective to look the enormous problem laid before us squarely in the eyes and say "This story of hopelessness is not going to determine my actions. I am going to live believing a different story from the one I see. Believing that God's kingdom will come, and that - ushered in through Jesus - God's kingdom is coming now, today." And because God's kingdom is coming now, today, we are free as the people of God to prophetically build gardens and serve the poor and research the cure for AIDS and build community and seek to help usher in any of the other bazillion facets of God's kingdom come.
Tuesday, April 15, 2008
Urban Humanure
Option 1: Destroy the earth on autopilot.
Option 2: Ass what you can doo for your country.
SQUEEZE YOUR PEACE!
A (com)posting about Gabe's urban HUMANURE experiment! Butt first, a little back-ground:
- Humanure composting is the name given to describe the thermophilic (hot) composting of human excreta, kitchen and garden scraps, and a local and readily available carbonaceous material (straw, sawdust, leaves, newspaper). It is NOT the throwing of raw human excrement onto fields. It is NOT the mouldering (cold) composting process that most conventional composting toilets use. It IS composting in a thermophilic way: releasing the latent thermophilic bacteria that lives in everyone's excreta by using the proper ratios of "greens" (human extreta, kitchen and garden scraps) to "browns" (carbonaceous material), achieving temperatures that kill all harmful pathogens and bacteria, letting the pile 'season' for a year, and producing the most nutrient-rich, 100% safe, pathogen-free garden soil you could possibly ask for.
- Groundwater use in the US exceeds replacement rates by 21 billion gallons a day. Americans use three times as much water as everyone else in the world while 1.2 billion people lack access to fresh water. UN: "Water shortages will cause wars in the 21st Century."
- We believe it is civilized to shit in drinking water. However, there's not enough water on earth for the entire world to adopt the civilized practice of defecating in water and then treating it. The practice is unsustainable.
- We dump 3.619 trillion gallons of polluted sewage water into US coastal waterways each year. 7 million Americans get sick each year from swallowing it.
- The US is losing topsoil about 18 times faster than the soil formation rate. Worldwide only 42 to 84 years of topsoil remains. Both North Africa and what is now the Saharan Desert used to grow food, but both were de-forested and over-farmed without compost (the same agricultural model that we implement).
- To keep the nutrient-depleted topsoil producing we manufacture 140 million tons of chemical fertilizers a year: the #1 source of water pollution.
- Sewage plants (and city drinking water plants) "treat" all water with a chemical not found in nature called Chlorine. Chlorine is known to cause severe memory problems, stunted growth, reproductive problems, cancer, and death in mammals. Over 10,000 cases of cancer each year are directly caused by consumption of chlorinated drinking water. Our culture justifies its use by citing no alternative.
- The process of composting humanure and applying it to agricultural land solves both the problem of sewage-pollution and of diminishing topsoil!
find out MORE!
- www.JenkinsPublishing.com - Here is the whole process laid out plain on the website for the coolest shit expert on earth: Mr. Joseph Jenkins, author of the acclaimed Humanure Handbook (which I own and highly rectal-mend)
-----------------------------
-----------------------------
THE URBAN PREDICAMENT:
I've wanted to compost humanure in my own backyard ever since I first studied it and experienced it firsthand while volunteering on organic farms in N. Carolina and California. What always stopped me was the simple fact that I had no backyard!
THE POOR URBAN ARTIST'S CHALLENGES TO COMPOSTING HUMANURE:
1) PERMANENCE: I’m a renter and I constantly live under the threat of having to pick up again and move all my stuff (whether because rent gets raised, or because the housemate downstairs who got addicted to heroin has started to light things on fire and throw paints at me). Given that a humanure compost pile usually takes about a year to build, then needs an additional year to chill-out undisturbed, the conflict becomes clear: how can I provide a stable environment for my humanure pile for at least 2 years (I feel like I’m talking about a pet dog. I guess both are warm and smell sort of funny from time to time) when I can’t even provide a stable environment for my urban self!
2) PORTABILITY: When I move next, since neither leaving the work of my behind behind (serious fines from the landlord and the city), nor throwing it in the garbage (bad karma from earth) are cool options, I need to be able to take my pile with me! How could I relocate my compost pile to wherever I moved to? Since I don’t own a car or truck, and neither do any of my close friends (god bless their car-less ways!), and I’d rather do just about anything then drive a car full of shit around, I have to think about being able to transport all that I own via Xtracycle longbikes at any given moment. How could I transport my compost pile on an Xtracycle?
3) COMMUNITY: I’m surrounded by housemates and neighbors who are culturally mainstream (though my some of my musical roommates sing about “the revolution,” as Abbie Hoffman pointed out: “hanging up Che Guevarra posters and smoking pot doesn’t make you a revolutionary”) city people who would freak out if they found out (or even slightly sniffed) what I was doing and where I was putting it. After I got fined, they’d take away my warm little humanure pile in a scary truck, kill (“cleanse”) it in the chemical chambers, and when they were sure it was dead, they’d dump its remains into the San Francisco bay. Yikes! Maybe I should buy my humanure a diary and hide it in the attic…
4) LAND: Compost piles need land to sit on. The problem for me is that the closest bit of exposed earth (not covered by concrete or asphalt) to me is the public park 3 blocks away. Beyond that, the only space on this planet earth that I legally have any jurisdiction over, like many urbanites, consists of only the small concrete patio area where we keep our trash, recycling, and green-waste bins.
Option 2: Ass what you can doo for your country.
SQUEEZE YOUR PEACE!
A (com)posting about Gabe's urban HUMANURE experiment! Butt first, a little back-ground:
- Humanure composting is the name given to describe the thermophilic (hot) composting of human excreta, kitchen and garden scraps, and a local and readily available carbonaceous material (straw, sawdust, leaves, newspaper). It is NOT the throwing of raw human excrement onto fields. It is NOT the mouldering (cold) composting process that most conventional composting toilets use. It IS composting in a thermophilic way: releasing the latent thermophilic bacteria that lives in everyone's excreta by using the proper ratios of "greens" (human extreta, kitchen and garden scraps) to "browns" (carbonaceous material), achieving temperatures that kill all harmful pathogens and bacteria, letting the pile 'season' for a year, and producing the most nutrient-rich, 100% safe, pathogen-free garden soil you could possibly ask for.
- Groundwater use in the US exceeds replacement rates by 21 billion gallons a day. Americans use three times as much water as everyone else in the world while 1.2 billion people lack access to fresh water. UN: "Water shortages will cause wars in the 21st Century."
- We believe it is civilized to shit in drinking water. However, there's not enough water on earth for the entire world to adopt the civilized practice of defecating in water and then treating it. The practice is unsustainable.
- We dump 3.619 trillion gallons of polluted sewage water into US coastal waterways each year. 7 million Americans get sick each year from swallowing it.
- The US is losing topsoil about 18 times faster than the soil formation rate. Worldwide only 42 to 84 years of topsoil remains. Both North Africa and what is now the Saharan Desert used to grow food, but both were de-forested and over-farmed without compost (the same agricultural model that we implement).
- To keep the nutrient-depleted topsoil producing we manufacture 140 million tons of chemical fertilizers a year: the #1 source of water pollution.
- Sewage plants (and city drinking water plants) "treat" all water with a chemical not found in nature called Chlorine. Chlorine is known to cause severe memory problems, stunted growth, reproductive problems, cancer, and death in mammals. Over 10,000 cases of cancer each year are directly caused by consumption of chlorinated drinking water. Our culture justifies its use by citing no alternative.
- The process of composting humanure and applying it to agricultural land solves both the problem of sewage-pollution and of diminishing topsoil!
find out MORE!
- www.JenkinsPublishing.com - Here is the whole process laid out plain on the website for the coolest shit expert on earth: Mr. Joseph Jenkins, author of the acclaimed Humanure Handbook (which I own and highly rectal-mend)
----------------------------------------------------------
THE URBAN PREDICAMENT:
I've wanted to compost humanure in my own backyard ever since I first studied it and experienced it firsthand while volunteering on organic farms in N. Carolina and California. What always stopped me was the simple fact that I had no backyard!
THE POOR URBAN ARTIST'S CHALLENGES TO COMPOSTING HUMANURE:
1) PERMANENCE: I’m a renter and I constantly live under the threat of having to pick up again and move all my stuff (whether because rent gets raised, or because the housemate downstairs who got addicted to heroin has started to light things on fire and throw paints at me). Given that a humanure compost pile usually takes about a year to build, then needs an additional year to chill-out undisturbed, the conflict becomes clear: how can I provide a stable environment for my humanure pile for at least 2 years (I feel like I’m talking about a pet dog. I guess both are warm and smell sort of funny from time to time) when I can’t even provide a stable environment for my urban self!
2) PORTABILITY: When I move next, since neither leaving the work of my behind behind (serious fines from the landlord and the city), nor throwing it in the garbage (bad karma from earth) are cool options, I need to be able to take my pile with me! How could I relocate my compost pile to wherever I moved to? Since I don’t own a car or truck, and neither do any of my close friends (god bless their car-less ways!), and I’d rather do just about anything then drive a car full of shit around, I have to think about being able to transport all that I own via Xtracycle longbikes at any given moment. How could I transport my compost pile on an Xtracycle?
3) COMMUNITY: I’m surrounded by housemates and neighbors who are culturally mainstream (though my some of my musical roommates sing about “the revolution,” as Abbie Hoffman pointed out: “hanging up Che Guevarra posters and smoking pot doesn’t make you a revolutionary”) city people who would freak out if they found out (or even slightly sniffed) what I was doing and where I was putting it. After I got fined, they’d take away my warm little humanure pile in a scary truck, kill (“cleanse”) it in the chemical chambers, and when they were sure it was dead, they’d dump its remains into the San Francisco bay. Yikes! Maybe I should buy my humanure a diary and hide it in the attic…4) LAND: Compost piles need land to sit on. The problem for me is that the closest bit of exposed earth (not covered by concrete or asphalt) to me is the public park 3 blocks away. Beyond that, the only space on this planet earth that I legally have any jurisdiction over, like many urbanites, consists of only the small concrete patio area where we keep our trash, recycling, and green-waste bins.
SOME SOLUTIONS:
Taking on the challenges one by one has revealed interesting, and always comical, solutions to overcoming humanure hardship.
1) Permanence: I can't do much about this one except have a temporary storage space for when I'm finding a new place. My thought at this point is that if I have to move suddenly and need a temporary place to store my stuff, I can always store my compost bin in a self-storage unit with all my other possessions for $30 a month. If I'm going out of the country for a year or more, I have friends at the local community garden who said I could leave my bin there with a padlock on it until I got back.
I solved #'s 2, 4, and part of 3 by realizing that a standard city garbage bin was my answer. With it's wheels I can rope it onto the back of my bike and haul it around. With it's inconspicuous and dirty reputation, a garbage bin won't draw the attention or undue curiosity of anybody in my community, provided I can keep the smell down. Given that the only piece of land I have jurisdiction over is the cement patio where the garbage bins are stored, what else could I store it in, but a garbage bin!?
EXPROPRIATED BY ALIENS:
Noun 1. Expropriation - taking out of an owner's hands (especially taking property by public authority).
With public authority, I expropriated a garbage bin from a Walgreens who I (and common sense) figured could deal for a day without a bin. I left them this message in place of their bin:
“Your compost bin has been abducted by aliens from the planet under this paved one, who will conduct experiments on it for the sake of science. Be comforted by the knowledge that our science will one day save this planet. You can call 415-330-1300 (NorCal waste) to get another one for free. Warmest Regards. (geek victory #634)”
THE SMELL:
3) Community: making sure my community was cool with it had a LOT to do with smell control.
Some of you have heard the story of the infamous "poo suitcase" that I used on my houseboat Gypsy, and how a whole office building was shut down for a week from the smell that was left in their bathroom after I'd flushed the contents of the poo suitcase down their toilet (they thought it'd been a terrorist threat... seriously). The last thing I wanted was the NYPD to come out again, and this time all the way out to San Francisco...
What I didn't know then was that to keep your shit from smelling, you have to have a LOT of carbonaceous material mixed in with it. The way nature lets you know that you need more carbonaceous material in your humanure is by smelling. Smelling is evidence of an anaerobic process - that is, the humanure not getting any oxygen and turning into a liquidy putrid sludge. Carbonaceous material (leaves, straw, sawdust) keeps the pile fluffy and aerobic and not smelling. How much carbonaceous material to put in your pile is simple: if it smells, put in more.
NO SAWDUST IN SF:
The Humanure Handbook recommends that you use a carbonaceous material that's local and readily available. The author uses sawdust, getting a truckload delivered to his New England farm every year.
In the heart of San Francisco, where there is no straw, no usable sawdust (all the local carpentry shops use chemically treated and kiln dried wood), and no Fall season that produces leaves, I thought for a moment that I'd run into a problem.
The answer however, is simple enough: what carbonaceous material do cities have TONS of - that blows down the sidewalks and gutters, and is replenished every single day? The answer is excess newspaper and cardboard. Now, I haven't yet figured out a way to simply and cheaply shred cardboard (all though finely shredded cardboard I bet would make SUCH good carbonaceous material) but newspaper's easy to tear with my hands, easy to carry on my bike, and it's fun to shit and piss on it when there's a politician, advertisement, or 'scare story' staring at me from inside my bucket!
So far, my compost bin doesn't smell AT ALL, even if you're standing right next to it! What I do is, after I pee or poo into my 5-gallon bucket, I tear up 2-4 issues of the San Francisco Chronicle and throw it on top. After my bucket gets full I carry it downstairs to the expropriated garbage bin/ now compost bin, and dump it in. Then I tear up about 10 SF Chronicles and throw that on top, like a fresh falling of leaves in the forest.
WHAT'S-HIS-BUCKET?
My toilet set-up is ultra simple and also lends itself to low odor. I went to the hardware store and bought a new 5 gallon bucket with a leak-proof lid for $10. Then I went to the salvaged building supply store and bought a toilet seat for $3. I put a covering of 2-4 SF Chronicles at the bottom of a fresh bucket, then I put the lid on top, and I place the bucket next to the conventional toilet in the bathroom upstairs (the closest bathroom to my tent on the roof). When I need to excrete, I just take the leak-proof lid off and do my thing, putting the toilet seat on top of the bucket if I have to poo. After I'm done, I throw my toilet paper into the toilet and then rip up 2-4 SF Chrons and throw those in. Then I replace the leak-proof lid.
After I've filled a bucket (about a week) I walk it down to my compost bin and dump it. I then use a toilet brush, some eco-cleaner, 
and just the slightest bit of hose water to clean the bucket as best as I can. It's important to dump the resulting sudsy graywater into the compost pile and not outside on the sidewalk, as doing so would pollute the environment. I've found that leaving my bucket filled for too many days and not dumping it results in stronger odors and makes it harder to clean the smell out later (the bucket is only plastic after all, not stainless steel).
THE LAST WIPE:
My housemates have actually started warming up to the idea of Humanure. In fact, my housemate Israel borrowed the Humanure Handbook from me and is currently poring through it in the other room (they've yet to try it however). My girlfriend Sonya has peed in the bucket a couple times and is working up her comfortability gradually. I haven't had any neighbor or house-visitor complaints about smell or unsightliness. In fact, I've been surprised at the positive reception I've gotten from just about everybody I've told about it.
I remember what it was like to poo when I was Pace's age. It always made me want to sing, sitting on that smooth white donut with my pants pulled down and feeling the wonderful release of a bowel movement. I thought I'd lost that joy forever. But now, Ah, now I feel I've rediscovered what it means to poop with joy. Now every time I do it I feel like I'm linked-in again to the planet, my home - and the innocence, and the redemption that comes when one participates in the great interdependent symphony of life. (*fart*)
Who knew that saving the planet could be so
Sunday, March 30, 2008
Wild Wind
Hey everyone. I haven't posted yet because the thought of giving away stuff/meeting a new person/posting on a blog every week was quite daunting to me, and sometimes when I feel daunted I become stagnant or evasive (a flaw, I acknowledge.) So I appreciate this new schedule (thanks Kira!) and I'm happy to share some of my thoughts with you all.
I should start by saying that when I moved from the East Coast to San Francisco a little over a year ago, I brought as little stuff as I could manage. Like most people, I do have too much stuff, but the majority of it is back in New Jersey in my Dad's house, and not in my little room (or my little closet) here in SF. I do have pants/shirts in my dresser that I never wear and should (and will) give away when I get around to it, but I've been enjoying the challenge of approaching this notion of downsizing, simplifying, getting-rid-of-stuff in regards to my "job", my music. (I put job in quotations because music is what I spend most of my time doing, it is my hopeful, desired job, but at this point I am far from depending on it for food/rent.) In thinking about necessity and simplicity, I remembered a quotation that I wrote on my eighth grade yearbook page: "The simplest things are the greatest things." My best friend's aunt said it, and I thought it was poignant and true. I still think it's poignant and true. What are the simplest/greatest things for you? For me, I would say:
-Love (for family, friends, Gabe)
-Music
-The natural world (water, trees, mountains, animals)
I think it's interesting how interconnected these things are. Literally all of my songs are inspired by the natural world and the love in my life.
This brings me to music as "job", and the music industry. The grand majority of artists pursuing a music career these days work within a very clear, and a very expensive (and profit-driven,) paradigm. They hire a manager, a publicist, a booking agent, and sometimes a radio promoter. They have a very fancy website. They tour in buses and on airplanes, covering as much ground, and playing to as many people as they possibly can in a given year. They plug into enormous sound systems, often using many microphones, speakers, and moniters. They perform, most often, in bars (venues want to bring in as much cash as possible, and alcohol sells!) The BIGGER and MORE of all of these factors=the more successful you are, we are to believe.
But all of these factors are so far from simple...so far from the simplicity and greatness of music in its true form, which is what draws me (and many people I know) to music in the first place! It's all so far from the very spirit of music making! I understand that with no regard to how the industry works, I could very easily spend the rest of my life playing my songs to myself and my friends and family, and that is not my goal. I do want to share my music more widely, and I do want to support myself doing it. But what can I use and what can I "get rid of" from that paradigm, in aiming to preserve the source and true spirit of my music? To personalize and prove this point further, many of my songs mourn the death of animals by the roadside, they express wonder in the oceans, thankfulness for the forests; in one song i have the lyric "what i live for...it's in the passing wild wind." How strange and inconsistent to sing these words from my heart, and then to pursue a musical lifestyle that pays no respect to these values? To spend half the year in a car/on an airplane, injuring animals and polluting the air, and missing the beauty around me because I'm moving too fast. Besides sounding like a rather hellish existence, that sort of strikes me as a double-life.
What elements of that accepted industry paradigm are like so many other things we currently believe we need (laptops, TVs, cellphones, ipods, etc etc) but perhaps should be examined more closely, if we are yearning to move away from our incredibly wasteful American lifestyles? (Watch www.storyofstuff.com if you haven’t already.) I have Gabe to thank for introducing me to the bike tour as one potential step in an awesome direction (and for getting the wheels in my brain turning on many of these issues, for that matter.) Though bike touring is scary because a)it's never really been done before and b)it's very physically challenging, it is also extremely rewarding, and in keeping with the spirit of more simple, less-wasteful, less-destructive living. You can literally feel the wild wind on your face as you go. (You can also feel car exhaust sometimes, but you have to take the bad with the good, and besides, that vile smell just reminds you of why you’re on your bike in the first place.)
In addition to exploring alternatives to car/plane touring, other standards I am exited to try and phase out more and more are playing in bars, and playing into big sound systems. Last weekend the Sonya Cotton Band played a show in an intimate acoustic venue that was more like a living room than a bar (they did sell beer, but only on a small scale, out of an ice bucket.) Playing without mics and moniters, being able to hear each other naturally and respond to each others dynamics, with no mediation, was so freeing and inspiring. It felt like we were tapping back into the source of why we sing for people, why we perform (which is something I've been forgetting lately, feeling disheartened after many shows where I now realize I felt disconnected from myself, my band, our sound.) Also, not having to worry about dominating a room full of drunk people was ideal. I'm currently in the planning stages of booking a show in a church, on a hilltop, and in an artist's collective. And Gabe and I are looking into purchasing a bluegrass microphone, so the whole band can sing into one microphone when we play live, and hear each other with our own ears, without moniters filtering and altering our sound. These ideas are starts, and I feel that I have a lot more thinking and figuring out to do on this subject. (Also, to consider the seemingly impossible: what if a red carpet was rolled out infront of me--a label comes to me and offers a record deal/a world tour/etc—what would I do? What sort of success am I truly after?)
As for more people in my life, honestly the most important person is my Dad. Slowly over the past couple of months, and weeks especially, my Dad has started becoming an important presence in my life again. Starting when I was in middle school he started going through a lot of intense stuff, and keeping it all to himself. Therefore, he stopped communicating with his family to a large extent, and I haven't felt close to him since.....maybe since 5th grade? In the past several years since he split up with my mom things have gotten more ugly and I've had a whole lot of anger towards him. This makes me think of your posting, David, about letting go of old grudges and angers, and how much weight you can relieve in forgiving. I honestly didn't think I could ever let go of this anger, not in the foreseeable future at least, but since he's started opening himself to me, I've noticed my anger beginning to seep away. I've felt my heart begin to open. Today on the phone we said "I love you"...That was a big deal! It felt really good.
I can't resist mentioning the other quote from my eighth grade yearbook page, which was: "Go West, paradise is there." (From a Natalie Merchant song.) I do feel that since coming out West to San Francisco I've been so fortunate in the people I have met, and continue to meet. When I lived in New York City, I had few new and meaningful relationships. Here I've made such wonderful friends. I find it true that people here are more open; people are happier too, and that rubs off. Most recent exciting people include: Anton and Scott/Elena. Anton plays violin in a string metal band (we met at Alemany Farm where both our bands were playing.) We met up in the park the other week and played music together. I may help him write songs for a movie score he is working on. Scott is Gabe's friend (they met in Cuba years back), and Elena is his girlfriend. I've been talking with Scott about the possibility of recording my new album in his studio (he's a sound engineer.) Gabe and I invited Scott and Elena over the other night to watch a movie with us, and we all had a really good time and agreed we are excited to hang out again.
Okay, I think that's all. Thanks for reading, and please share any thoughts you have. Also, thanks for including me in this blog-- I’m honored to be included in this family affair! I've really enjoyed reading peoples thoughts so far. And Dave and Yasi, I look forward to meeting you guys someday soon. Perhaps when Gabe and I are on tour up North in September?
Sonya
I should start by saying that when I moved from the East Coast to San Francisco a little over a year ago, I brought as little stuff as I could manage. Like most people, I do have too much stuff, but the majority of it is back in New Jersey in my Dad's house, and not in my little room (or my little closet) here in SF. I do have pants/shirts in my dresser that I never wear and should (and will) give away when I get around to it, but I've been enjoying the challenge of approaching this notion of downsizing, simplifying, getting-rid-of-stuff in regards to my "job", my music. (I put job in quotations because music is what I spend most of my time doing, it is my hopeful, desired job, but at this point I am far from depending on it for food/rent.) In thinking about necessity and simplicity, I remembered a quotation that I wrote on my eighth grade yearbook page: "The simplest things are the greatest things." My best friend's aunt said it, and I thought it was poignant and true. I still think it's poignant and true. What are the simplest/greatest things for you? For me, I would say:
-Love (for family, friends, Gabe)
-Music
-The natural world (water, trees, mountains, animals)
I think it's interesting how interconnected these things are. Literally all of my songs are inspired by the natural world and the love in my life.
This brings me to music as "job", and the music industry. The grand majority of artists pursuing a music career these days work within a very clear, and a very expensive (and profit-driven,) paradigm. They hire a manager, a publicist, a booking agent, and sometimes a radio promoter. They have a very fancy website. They tour in buses and on airplanes, covering as much ground, and playing to as many people as they possibly can in a given year. They plug into enormous sound systems, often using many microphones, speakers, and moniters. They perform, most often, in bars (venues want to bring in as much cash as possible, and alcohol sells!) The BIGGER and MORE of all of these factors=the more successful you are, we are to believe.
But all of these factors are so far from simple...so far from the simplicity and greatness of music in its true form, which is what draws me (and many people I know) to music in the first place! It's all so far from the very spirit of music making! I understand that with no regard to how the industry works, I could very easily spend the rest of my life playing my songs to myself and my friends and family, and that is not my goal. I do want to share my music more widely, and I do want to support myself doing it. But what can I use and what can I "get rid of" from that paradigm, in aiming to preserve the source and true spirit of my music? To personalize and prove this point further, many of my songs mourn the death of animals by the roadside, they express wonder in the oceans, thankfulness for the forests; in one song i have the lyric "what i live for...it's in the passing wild wind." How strange and inconsistent to sing these words from my heart, and then to pursue a musical lifestyle that pays no respect to these values? To spend half the year in a car/on an airplane, injuring animals and polluting the air, and missing the beauty around me because I'm moving too fast. Besides sounding like a rather hellish existence, that sort of strikes me as a double-life.
What elements of that accepted industry paradigm are like so many other things we currently believe we need (laptops, TVs, cellphones, ipods, etc etc) but perhaps should be examined more closely, if we are yearning to move away from our incredibly wasteful American lifestyles? (Watch www.storyofstuff.com if you haven’t already.) I have Gabe to thank for introducing me to the bike tour as one potential step in an awesome direction (and for getting the wheels in my brain turning on many of these issues, for that matter.) Though bike touring is scary because a)it's never really been done before and b)it's very physically challenging, it is also extremely rewarding, and in keeping with the spirit of more simple, less-wasteful, less-destructive living. You can literally feel the wild wind on your face as you go. (You can also feel car exhaust sometimes, but you have to take the bad with the good, and besides, that vile smell just reminds you of why you’re on your bike in the first place.)
In addition to exploring alternatives to car/plane touring, other standards I am exited to try and phase out more and more are playing in bars, and playing into big sound systems. Last weekend the Sonya Cotton Band played a show in an intimate acoustic venue that was more like a living room than a bar (they did sell beer, but only on a small scale, out of an ice bucket.) Playing without mics and moniters, being able to hear each other naturally and respond to each others dynamics, with no mediation, was so freeing and inspiring. It felt like we were tapping back into the source of why we sing for people, why we perform (which is something I've been forgetting lately, feeling disheartened after many shows where I now realize I felt disconnected from myself, my band, our sound.) Also, not having to worry about dominating a room full of drunk people was ideal. I'm currently in the planning stages of booking a show in a church, on a hilltop, and in an artist's collective. And Gabe and I are looking into purchasing a bluegrass microphone, so the whole band can sing into one microphone when we play live, and hear each other with our own ears, without moniters filtering and altering our sound. These ideas are starts, and I feel that I have a lot more thinking and figuring out to do on this subject. (Also, to consider the seemingly impossible: what if a red carpet was rolled out infront of me--a label comes to me and offers a record deal/a world tour/etc—what would I do? What sort of success am I truly after?)
As for more people in my life, honestly the most important person is my Dad. Slowly over the past couple of months, and weeks especially, my Dad has started becoming an important presence in my life again. Starting when I was in middle school he started going through a lot of intense stuff, and keeping it all to himself. Therefore, he stopped communicating with his family to a large extent, and I haven't felt close to him since.....maybe since 5th grade? In the past several years since he split up with my mom things have gotten more ugly and I've had a whole lot of anger towards him. This makes me think of your posting, David, about letting go of old grudges and angers, and how much weight you can relieve in forgiving. I honestly didn't think I could ever let go of this anger, not in the foreseeable future at least, but since he's started opening himself to me, I've noticed my anger beginning to seep away. I've felt my heart begin to open. Today on the phone we said "I love you"...That was a big deal! It felt really good.
I can't resist mentioning the other quote from my eighth grade yearbook page, which was: "Go West, paradise is there." (From a Natalie Merchant song.) I do feel that since coming out West to San Francisco I've been so fortunate in the people I have met, and continue to meet. When I lived in New York City, I had few new and meaningful relationships. Here I've made such wonderful friends. I find it true that people here are more open; people are happier too, and that rubs off. Most recent exciting people include: Anton and Scott/Elena. Anton plays violin in a string metal band (we met at Alemany Farm where both our bands were playing.) We met up in the park the other week and played music together. I may help him write songs for a movie score he is working on. Scott is Gabe's friend (they met in Cuba years back), and Elena is his girlfriend. I've been talking with Scott about the possibility of recording my new album in his studio (he's a sound engineer.) Gabe and I invited Scott and Elena over the other night to watch a movie with us, and we all had a really good time and agreed we are excited to hang out again.
Okay, I think that's all. Thanks for reading, and please share any thoughts you have. Also, thanks for including me in this blog-- I’m honored to be included in this family affair! I've really enjoyed reading peoples thoughts so far. And Dave and Yasi, I look forward to meeting you guys someday soon. Perhaps when Gabe and I are on tour up North in September?
Sonya
Thursday, March 27, 2008
Structure, Spontaneity, and Estate Sales
Hi everybody!
Sorry I took so long to post; I definitely missed my deadline, but better late than never!
I've actually been visiting most of you in the last week, so that's my excuse...it was a crazy quarter and traveling takes a lot of energy!
It's Spring Break in my world and I spent it helping my parents move (more on this later) and visiting Grandma/Lakshmi & David/ Kira, Andy & Co. I haven't spent much time with the blog so far, but I am newly inspired to stay in the dialog...
I don't remember if I said this before, but meeting new people has not been difficult this past quarter. Because of the nature of my job at the University of Washington and my work in theatre, I most often feel like I'm meeting too many people...Too many to keep track of and hold as more than acquaintances. Though there are some that have really enriched my life and sense of community in the past weeks.
Mwende- She's a senior at UW and is involved with the Student Labor Action Project (with specific work with garment factories hired by UW in Guatemala). We met this quarter as part of UW's small mixed community. Her mother is Kenyan and her father is Anglo-American. Long ago, Dave and I noticed her and her boyfriend (who is white) on the bus to church. We like noticing interracial couples and thought they were cute. Then, they ended up showing up at our church (which is remarkable, because she has serious baggage with Christianity....namely, British imperialist Christians in Kenya degrading her family's native culture and teaching them that anything Kenyan is evil and dirty). So a while after meeting her officially, I realized that she was the woman on the bus and I couldn't believe the "coincidence". I am honored to be one of the few Jesus-followers in her life and I really dig her!
Our Mixed gatherings have been really fun and I've met lots of other mixed Seattlelites like a German-American woman whose daughter is half-Punjabi (Pakistani) and trying to intentionally nurture her daughter's identity. Anyway, I love that kind of stuff.
I sang in a show recently on campus for Black History Month and shared the stage with local neo-soul artist named Choklate. She just did a show at Dmitriou's Jazz Alley, Seattle's most popular jazz club. She's the first local artist to ever grace the stage.
Since I've been doing more theatre, I've met lots of interesting new folks that have taught me a lot about the business of theatre and, generally, enhanced my life. I recently took a class with Kate Godman, the former casting director of a large Seattle regional theatre, who was a wealth of information and encouragment. My classmates were also amiable and inspiring.
PAUSE: What does it mean to meet a new person? I mentioned in my last post that meeting someone was valuable to me whether I'd see them again or not, but I'm noticing that a lot of my meetings are in very structured contexts (a group meeting, a class, a performance). I find a lot of comfort in structure. Spontaneous meetings actually STRESS ME OUT. As we pursue better community, do I need to grow out of this? Or is it okay that I enjoy meeting people within anticipated structures and not when, say, I haven't taken a shower (I like showers) and need some alone time.
While here in Utah, Kira & Andy and Dave & I were discussing long-term plans for living together. I felt like unless we had a real practical conversation about it, we would continue to mention the dream in passing and it would never happen. So we did and so far, we've envisioned all moving to Mexico in the summer of 2011 to gain some perspective and language development before returning and really planting roots together back in the U.S.. The hardest thing for me in considering living in a house/neighborhood community is the requirement to be comfortable with spontaneity. Kids are really going to mess me up. I'll learn quickly. :)
And speaking of moving out of the country...what would we do with all our stuff!?!?
Would we put stuff we care about in storage (ugh) or give it all away? What would we take with us?
I've given away some books and clothes from our house in the past few weeks. But I also acquired clothes to replace them. Dave and I decided to no longer buy canned food (because of nutrition/health/waste issues). This will upset any habits of having "quick food" like refried beans or soup.
The most intense experience I've had with stuff recently came in helping my parents move. They are downsizing from 1600 sq. ft. house in Portland, Oregon to a 1000 sq. ft. house on the Washington coast. It's a huge step for them that caused a lot of stress and provoked them to face the nature of their relationship with stuff. I'm really proud of them. It was really fun to help turn 5 boxes of pictures into 1 or go through the last few bits of keepsakes I had in the attic and get rid of superfluous items.
I really appreciated being able to touch every single thing in my parents' possession at this point in their lives, because at the point at which they pass away (decades from now) it will be my responsibility to deal with what they have acquired and left behind. I was having flashbacks of going through Auntie Ina and Uncle Herman's house, opening a drawer with ten eyeglass cases and a closet with five irons...[shudder]
A closing thought: one of the best quotes I've ever heard regarding simplicity and poverty was in a Willow Creek Church interview with Shane Claibourne. He said, in effect, "if you have two coats, you've stolen one." Food for thought...
Peace out.
Yasi
Sorry I took so long to post; I definitely missed my deadline, but better late than never!
I've actually been visiting most of you in the last week, so that's my excuse...it was a crazy quarter and traveling takes a lot of energy!
It's Spring Break in my world and I spent it helping my parents move (more on this later) and visiting Grandma/Lakshmi & David/ Kira, Andy & Co. I haven't spent much time with the blog so far, but I am newly inspired to stay in the dialog...
I don't remember if I said this before, but meeting new people has not been difficult this past quarter. Because of the nature of my job at the University of Washington and my work in theatre, I most often feel like I'm meeting too many people...Too many to keep track of and hold as more than acquaintances. Though there are some that have really enriched my life and sense of community in the past weeks.
Mwende- She's a senior at UW and is involved with the Student Labor Action Project (with specific work with garment factories hired by UW in Guatemala). We met this quarter as part of UW's small mixed community. Her mother is Kenyan and her father is Anglo-American. Long ago, Dave and I noticed her and her boyfriend (who is white) on the bus to church. We like noticing interracial couples and thought they were cute. Then, they ended up showing up at our church (which is remarkable, because she has serious baggage with Christianity....namely, British imperialist Christians in Kenya degrading her family's native culture and teaching them that anything Kenyan is evil and dirty). So a while after meeting her officially, I realized that she was the woman on the bus and I couldn't believe the "coincidence". I am honored to be one of the few Jesus-followers in her life and I really dig her!
Our Mixed gatherings have been really fun and I've met lots of other mixed Seattlelites like a German-American woman whose daughter is half-Punjabi (Pakistani) and trying to intentionally nurture her daughter's identity. Anyway, I love that kind of stuff.
I sang in a show recently on campus for Black History Month and shared the stage with local neo-soul artist named Choklate. She just did a show at Dmitriou's Jazz Alley, Seattle's most popular jazz club. She's the first local artist to ever grace the stage.
Since I've been doing more theatre, I've met lots of interesting new folks that have taught me a lot about the business of theatre and, generally, enhanced my life. I recently took a class with Kate Godman, the former casting director of a large Seattle regional theatre, who was a wealth of information and encouragment. My classmates were also amiable and inspiring.
PAUSE: What does it mean to meet a new person? I mentioned in my last post that meeting someone was valuable to me whether I'd see them again or not, but I'm noticing that a lot of my meetings are in very structured contexts (a group meeting, a class, a performance). I find a lot of comfort in structure. Spontaneous meetings actually STRESS ME OUT. As we pursue better community, do I need to grow out of this? Or is it okay that I enjoy meeting people within anticipated structures and not when, say, I haven't taken a shower (I like showers) and need some alone time.
While here in Utah, Kira & Andy and Dave & I were discussing long-term plans for living together. I felt like unless we had a real practical conversation about it, we would continue to mention the dream in passing and it would never happen. So we did and so far, we've envisioned all moving to Mexico in the summer of 2011 to gain some perspective and language development before returning and really planting roots together back in the U.S.. The hardest thing for me in considering living in a house/neighborhood community is the requirement to be comfortable with spontaneity. Kids are really going to mess me up. I'll learn quickly. :)
And speaking of moving out of the country...what would we do with all our stuff!?!?
Would we put stuff we care about in storage (ugh) or give it all away? What would we take with us?
I've given away some books and clothes from our house in the past few weeks. But I also acquired clothes to replace them. Dave and I decided to no longer buy canned food (because of nutrition/health/waste issues). This will upset any habits of having "quick food" like refried beans or soup.
The most intense experience I've had with stuff recently came in helping my parents move. They are downsizing from 1600 sq. ft. house in Portland, Oregon to a 1000 sq. ft. house on the Washington coast. It's a huge step for them that caused a lot of stress and provoked them to face the nature of their relationship with stuff. I'm really proud of them. It was really fun to help turn 5 boxes of pictures into 1 or go through the last few bits of keepsakes I had in the attic and get rid of superfluous items.
I really appreciated being able to touch every single thing in my parents' possession at this point in their lives, because at the point at which they pass away (decades from now) it will be my responsibility to deal with what they have acquired and left behind. I was having flashbacks of going through Auntie Ina and Uncle Herman's house, opening a drawer with ten eyeglass cases and a closet with five irons...[shudder]
A closing thought: one of the best quotes I've ever heard regarding simplicity and poverty was in a Willow Creek Church interview with Shane Claibourne. He said, in effect, "if you have two coats, you've stolen one." Food for thought...
Peace out.
Yasi
Wednesday, March 19, 2008
PART 2: A Little Bit Mo
Well, I thought I would have more to say and only corny things came to mind such as: "The journey of life is like a slow moving river that empties into the sea called death" and then I got a visual on the millions of plastic bags that are floating in the ocean and it was not a pretty site; or "if only American youth today had the social conciousness we had in the '60's" and I thought well none of my kids have a problem with this one, in fact they could use a little boost of capitalism...
I loved the quote that Kira's Dean at Princeton used at graduation from John Adams that actually brought me to tears as I thought of my own father's hard work as an immigrant to this country:
"I must study politics and war that my sons may have liberty to study mathematics and philosophy. My sons ought to study mathematics and philosophy, geography, natural history, naval architecture, navigation, commerce, and agriculture, in order to give their children a right to study painting, poetry, music, architecture, statuary, tapestry, and porcelain".
John AdamsUS diplomat & politician (1735 - 1826)
Wow! The light went on here for me. My dad came to this country to join the American dream of freedom and opportunity, paving the way so that I would have choices. David & I---both immigrant children, and we have the privilege of going to college (me being the first to graduate in my family), have the chance to have professional careers and to own our own home. This was a dream that was shared with me: physical and emotional security; stability that I could give to my children! And we did this in 2 generations. This allows a few of you (Kira, Gabe, Yasi) to have the "options"---such as art, music, going to Princeton---and philosophizing on how the previous generations screwed up the environment, should have done a better job (duh), how we've ruined it for your children in such a short time.... Our parents were involved in survival---putting a roof on our heads and food on the table sprinkled with some culture and hope. David & I were given a ticket and place in line to create something new. We got on board with things like: intentional marriage, intentional parenting, job security, owning a home...which gave us some rest---so that we could then gaze out the window and take note of peace & justice issues...and then have the strong foundations laid so that we could venture out and actually work on them to make a difference... I remember spending many hours in the dining halls and at Bible studies with David discussing our involvement with "saving the world"--- lots of "Big Things" (remember this was a time of political unrest, Vietnam, SLA, the Beatles, "love the one you're with", Nixon...)...but can you love your spouse, children, neighbor? Are you a "peacemaker"? Maybe it's the "Little Things" that count, that then add up to the "Big Thing". Maybe it's the conviction to move in a direction...like faith...like swimming upstream...
Moving right along, when I told David I would list the things that I had "52 More of..." he said it sounded like an "anti-Blog". He's right. The spirit of this is so important---but I have already failed in "52 Less Things". Unless, I lived on a self sustaining compound, off the grid, off somewhere...I don't believe this is possible. [By the way, I think you should all seriously pursue this---"build it and they will come"]. Sanely---can 52 Less Things really matter if the question of "what 52 Things are you acquiring" that offsets the point of 52 Less? I gave away 52 things already in 2008, but I have replaced them all and then some. Needs...wants? Some of both and somewhat relative.
Kira made the statement the other day to me something to the affect: By purchasing that I am saying that my family time comes at the expense of another family's time together since that Mom or Dad had to leave their family to go to work to make this thing so I could buy it. Wow---I hadn't thought of that exactly. I just figured it's called a job---which we should all have---since it contributes to your personal well being (food and shelter) and the well being of society (goods and services that ideally improve quality of life/health). I think we were talking about a bicycle for Pace or something. Poor kid---you could teach him to scoot around on a cardboard. We used to slide down grass hills this way---maybe he won't ever want a bike. Maybe you should sell all of your jewelry too and fund the bicycle making family for a year and they could have quality time together...and they could go out and buy a plasma screen TV... What are we talking about!? If you went to the grocery store this week, someone left their family to plant the crops, pick, pack, deliver, stock the shelves and sold it to you! Kira, we talked about this later and I used the words "torment"---although I agree apathy and resignation are not helpful, but let's not torment ourselves this is also a form of indulgence.
So, before I get to "action points" let me just mention a few of the 52 more people part of this: Joyce & Genevieve who sold Girl Scout cookies to us when we were at Kira's; Kalyan Rai the artist from Park City who is a Tibetan who grew up in India, speaks fluent Hindi and asked me to help his friend Rajdeep Moktan (also from Tibet) who lives in NY get into BYU---emails, phone calls, networking, etc.; Ilsabeth, as well as Kathrine West (Episcopal Rector) & Karen Cope---great little, but serious chats after our yoga classes; Saroj, Grandma's pharmacist who is Sikh/Thai; Linda & Sharon both service folks who wanted to talk and connect about their grandkids, husband's health, etc.; our crazy neighbor Bruce who came over yesterday to resolve a fence issue---just in the nick of time since I wanted to sue his _ _ _---all brief encounters but meaningful. I also avoided people: Margaret Hundal (Uncle Harold's widow) who calls often and must have Alzheimer's, Lash who called Sunday while I was at REI shopping and I haven't called him back yet, many others who are always asking me to attend one more meeting or volunteer for one more thing...
So here are 2 Action Points:
1-Save money, that you have obtained legally, to buy land for the family compound that incorporates the ethics and values you hope to model. In the meantime, identifying the location and what it might look like in practice are good to pursue.
2-Have a "Bloggers Retreat". Perhaps, Ruby's Inn at Bryce Canyon National Park at least 3 days in late spring or early fall weather. Hiking the hoodoos is humbling and needless to say puts all of this in perspective. If you make it down, we can help with some food and lodging. We would need to pick a date and have firm commitments.
Well I am signing off now til next time. I love and respect you all dearly, looking forward to the many new things I continue to learn. As the great Irish poet Oscar Wilde (since it was just St Paddy's Day) said "We are all in the gutter, but some of us are looking at the stars."
I loved the quote that Kira's Dean at Princeton used at graduation from John Adams that actually brought me to tears as I thought of my own father's hard work as an immigrant to this country:
"I must study politics and war that my sons may have liberty to study mathematics and philosophy. My sons ought to study mathematics and philosophy, geography, natural history, naval architecture, navigation, commerce, and agriculture, in order to give their children a right to study painting, poetry, music, architecture, statuary, tapestry, and porcelain".
John AdamsUS diplomat & politician (1735 - 1826)
Wow! The light went on here for me. My dad came to this country to join the American dream of freedom and opportunity, paving the way so that I would have choices. David & I---both immigrant children, and we have the privilege of going to college (me being the first to graduate in my family), have the chance to have professional careers and to own our own home. This was a dream that was shared with me: physical and emotional security; stability that I could give to my children! And we did this in 2 generations. This allows a few of you (Kira, Gabe, Yasi) to have the "options"---such as art, music, going to Princeton---and philosophizing on how the previous generations screwed up the environment, should have done a better job (duh), how we've ruined it for your children in such a short time.... Our parents were involved in survival---putting a roof on our heads and food on the table sprinkled with some culture and hope. David & I were given a ticket and place in line to create something new. We got on board with things like: intentional marriage, intentional parenting, job security, owning a home...which gave us some rest---so that we could then gaze out the window and take note of peace & justice issues...and then have the strong foundations laid so that we could venture out and actually work on them to make a difference... I remember spending many hours in the dining halls and at Bible studies with David discussing our involvement with "saving the world"--- lots of "Big Things" (remember this was a time of political unrest, Vietnam, SLA, the Beatles, "love the one you're with", Nixon...)...but can you love your spouse, children, neighbor? Are you a "peacemaker"? Maybe it's the "Little Things" that count, that then add up to the "Big Thing". Maybe it's the conviction to move in a direction...like faith...like swimming upstream...
Moving right along, when I told David I would list the things that I had "52 More of..." he said it sounded like an "anti-Blog". He's right. The spirit of this is so important---but I have already failed in "52 Less Things". Unless, I lived on a self sustaining compound, off the grid, off somewhere...I don't believe this is possible. [By the way, I think you should all seriously pursue this---"build it and they will come"]. Sanely---can 52 Less Things really matter if the question of "what 52 Things are you acquiring" that offsets the point of 52 Less? I gave away 52 things already in 2008, but I have replaced them all and then some. Needs...wants? Some of both and somewhat relative.
Kira made the statement the other day to me something to the affect: By purchasing that I am saying that my family time comes at the expense of another family's time together since that Mom or Dad had to leave their family to go to work to make this thing so I could buy it. Wow---I hadn't thought of that exactly. I just figured it's called a job---which we should all have---since it contributes to your personal well being (food and shelter) and the well being of society (goods and services that ideally improve quality of life/health). I think we were talking about a bicycle for Pace or something. Poor kid---you could teach him to scoot around on a cardboard. We used to slide down grass hills this way---maybe he won't ever want a bike. Maybe you should sell all of your jewelry too and fund the bicycle making family for a year and they could have quality time together...and they could go out and buy a plasma screen TV... What are we talking about!? If you went to the grocery store this week, someone left their family to plant the crops, pick, pack, deliver, stock the shelves and sold it to you! Kira, we talked about this later and I used the words "torment"---although I agree apathy and resignation are not helpful, but let's not torment ourselves this is also a form of indulgence.
So, before I get to "action points" let me just mention a few of the 52 more people part of this: Joyce & Genevieve who sold Girl Scout cookies to us when we were at Kira's; Kalyan Rai the artist from Park City who is a Tibetan who grew up in India, speaks fluent Hindi and asked me to help his friend Rajdeep Moktan (also from Tibet) who lives in NY get into BYU---emails, phone calls, networking, etc.; Ilsabeth, as well as Kathrine West (Episcopal Rector) & Karen Cope---great little, but serious chats after our yoga classes; Saroj, Grandma's pharmacist who is Sikh/Thai; Linda & Sharon both service folks who wanted to talk and connect about their grandkids, husband's health, etc.; our crazy neighbor Bruce who came over yesterday to resolve a fence issue---just in the nick of time since I wanted to sue his _ _ _---all brief encounters but meaningful. I also avoided people: Margaret Hundal (Uncle Harold's widow) who calls often and must have Alzheimer's, Lash who called Sunday while I was at REI shopping and I haven't called him back yet, many others who are always asking me to attend one more meeting or volunteer for one more thing...
So here are 2 Action Points:
1-Save money, that you have obtained legally, to buy land for the family compound that incorporates the ethics and values you hope to model. In the meantime, identifying the location and what it might look like in practice are good to pursue.
2-Have a "Bloggers Retreat". Perhaps, Ruby's Inn at Bryce Canyon National Park at least 3 days in late spring or early fall weather. Hiking the hoodoos is humbling and needless to say puts all of this in perspective. If you make it down, we can help with some food and lodging. We would need to pick a date and have firm commitments.
Well I am signing off now til next time. I love and respect you all dearly, looking forward to the many new things I continue to learn. As the great Irish poet Oscar Wilde (since it was just St Paddy's Day) said "We are all in the gutter, but some of us are looking at the stars."
Here's to hope...Cheers! Lakshmi
Tuesday, March 18, 2008
PART 1: 52 More and 52 More and More and More
Thank you all for your posts and enlightened comments these last weeks. I have been busy out shopping! But before I forget, Gabe & Dave, thanks for your great comments on the Sonoma Mountain Village response (off the Blog). Dave, it was good to hear about the Aprovecho Community and Gabe your comment: "My hope, surprise surprise, is that our family could make a more radical change, entirely throw out the whole American paradigm and not just try to paint brown shit green, that is, live exactly the same life as before but now just powered by solar energy", was priceless! Sincerely, I appreciate the dynamic conversation and sharing convictions. I have been a slacker on this Blog but have truly been inspired and provoked (also pissed) reading it at times. Let me explain. For example I have been inspired by Kira's comments to reduce egg consumption. It must have hit me at the right moment cuz I threw out the remaining (past freshness date) eggs that I had in the frig that I hardly use anyway and thought---I could do that...Baby Step... The next recipe I made "Tofu Quiche", I used flax meal and made it completely vegan. Didn't miss the eggs... Kira sharing the comment led to inspiring me to take an action that was in my comfort zone. Nothing too noble here. But provoked is just the exhaustion I feel from realizing this is a conversation David & I have led for DECADES---seriously since we were 19 years old (we are 54 now...do the math). We have been at the extremes (not like Gabe exactly) but close to it (our stories would include the shack, the housesit, the empty army barracks, the Boycott Newsletter, etc). We have intensely struggled in every phase of our relationship: to marry or not vs just living together, to have children or not since the end was coming...and during our years in Berkeley to live communally or keep renting or to buy a house or not to buy...and when the kids were little we attended all the protest marches, as well as peace rallies, trying to save ourselves and couciousness-raise for the benefit of our church, neighbors and children. So did we just "sell out", "get old and lazy", "been there, done that", "join the matrix", "compromise our ethics and values" (same as "selling out")? Yes and no...maybe and maybe not... Perhaps we are guilty as Gabe says, being just another cog in the "American paradigm" and I am fully aware and recognize that I am part of the problem...and that you are too. To be human! In India and China there are literally billions of people who are consumers and loving it. They will most surely surpass us in consumption and manage to ruin the environment long before the US of A can even decide to "limit green house gases" or before we can even finish our blogging efforts of enlightening and challenging one another to be better people. So what we do may be "too little, too late". But hey, I'm not saying I'm off the hook or I'm resigning myself to doom by "those people"... We and our fellow Americans are doing a damn good job of this all by ourselves---trouble is, as far as the 3rd world goes, we started something that is now out of our control. The smell of daily burning plastic and choking smog in India is fresh in my mind... So where does this leave the conversation---oh yeah back to being so busy since I have been out shopping. No kidding, here is what I have recently purchased in part: 4GB Pin Drive, 7 Balloons, 3 DVD + R for copies, 3 Lasagna Pans (various sizes), Popcorn Maker for Kira's Birthday, Flat Iron for my hair (not sure I will keep it), a cool and stylish top at REI, 2 Ex-Officio Shirts & 1 pants for David's Birthday (also from REI), Desk top computer with the latest greatest powerful stuff and the WINNER IS: a new Sony Bravia 40"LCD HDTV that arrived today! It is like a very nice (but bigger) computer screen and has an "Energy Star" rating to boot! I am a righteous person because I waited until my one & only 13 year old energy consuming Mitsubishi 32" TV actually died before making this purchase. I am justified because at least I didn't get a 46" or 56" or 60" etc size screen and the energy consuming home theater toys that go with it! I am holy because I'm not like those other people... My consumer religion tells me so!
[Check out cool Sierra Club site that examines "how green is my": TV, Bike, Laundry: http://www.sierraclub.org/howgreen. I scored 90% on my TV test! ]
Since this is so long I will close Part 1 and leave you with this meditation that Gabe & Kira are familiar with:
Found on www.amazon.com
Are My Hands Clean?
by Sweet Honey In The RockFrom the Album Live at Carnegie Hall
Are My Hands Clean?
Lyrics and music by Bernice Johnson Reagon. Songtalk Publishing Co. 1985
Performed by Sweet Honey in the Rock. Sweet Honey in the Rock, Live at Carnegie Hall
I wear garments touched by hands from all over the world
35% cotton, 65% polyester, the journey begins in Central America
In the cotton fields of El Salvador
In a province soaked in blood,
Pesticide-sprayed workers toil in a broiling sun
Pulling cotton for two dollars a day.
Then we move on up to another rung—Cargill
A top-forty trading conglomerate, takes the cotton through the Panama Canal
Up the Eastern seaboard, coming to the US of A for the first time
In South Carolina
At the Burlington mills
Joins a shipment of polyester filament courtesy of the New Jersey petro-chemical mills of Dupont
Dupont strands of filament begin in the South American country of Venezuela Where oil
riggers bring up oil from the earth for six dollars a day
Then Exxon, largest oil company in the world,
Upgrades the product in the country of Trinidad and Tobago
Then back into the Caribbean and Atlantic Seas
To the factories of Dupont
On the way to the Burlington mills
In South Carolina
To meet the cotton from the blood-soaked fields of El Salvador
In South Carolina
Burlington factories hum with the business of weaving oil and cotton into miles of fabric
for Sears
Who takes this bounty back into the Caribbean Sea
Headed for Haiti this time—May she be one day soon free—
Far from the Port-au-Prince palace
Third world women toil doing piece work to Sears specifications
For three dollars a day my sisters make my blouse
It leaves the third world for the last time
Coming back into the sea to be sealed in plastic for me
This third world sister
And I go to the Sears department store where I buy my blouse
On sale for 20% discount
Are my hands clean?
Love you all the best I can :-)
Lakshmi
[Check out cool Sierra Club site that examines "how green is my": TV, Bike, Laundry: http://www.sierraclub.org/howgreen. I scored 90% on my TV test! ]
Since this is so long I will close Part 1 and leave you with this meditation that Gabe & Kira are familiar with:
Found on www.amazon.com
Are My Hands Clean?
by Sweet Honey In The RockFrom the Album Live at Carnegie Hall
Are My Hands Clean?
Lyrics and music by Bernice Johnson Reagon. Songtalk Publishing Co. 1985
Performed by Sweet Honey in the Rock. Sweet Honey in the Rock, Live at Carnegie Hall
I wear garments touched by hands from all over the world
35% cotton, 65% polyester, the journey begins in Central America
In the cotton fields of El Salvador
In a province soaked in blood,
Pesticide-sprayed workers toil in a broiling sun
Pulling cotton for two dollars a day.
Then we move on up to another rung—Cargill
A top-forty trading conglomerate, takes the cotton through the Panama Canal
Up the Eastern seaboard, coming to the US of A for the first time
In South Carolina
At the Burlington mills
Joins a shipment of polyester filament courtesy of the New Jersey petro-chemical mills of Dupont
Dupont strands of filament begin in the South American country of Venezuela Where oil
riggers bring up oil from the earth for six dollars a day
Then Exxon, largest oil company in the world,
Upgrades the product in the country of Trinidad and Tobago
Then back into the Caribbean and Atlantic Seas
To the factories of Dupont
On the way to the Burlington mills
In South Carolina
To meet the cotton from the blood-soaked fields of El Salvador
In South Carolina
Burlington factories hum with the business of weaving oil and cotton into miles of fabric
for Sears
Who takes this bounty back into the Caribbean Sea
Headed for Haiti this time—May she be one day soon free—
Far from the Port-au-Prince palace
Third world women toil doing piece work to Sears specifications
For three dollars a day my sisters make my blouse
It leaves the third world for the last time
Coming back into the sea to be sealed in plastic for me
This third world sister
And I go to the Sears department store where I buy my blouse
On sale for 20% discount
Are my hands clean?
Love you all the best I can :-)
Lakshmi
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