Made a difference, this quarter.

Q: One of the original goals of this quarter was to improve the state of body/mind through a combination of exercise and improving habits that promote mental health. Looking back on the quarter, have you succeeded in these things? if not, please explain.

Well it's kind of funny, like with everything else I've learned this quarter, what I initially thought would be the course of action, was anything but. That doesn't mean that I've improved my mental health through exercise and relaxation, but it does mean that how I've done that looks a lot different, and I've learned a lot even from the lulls during the quarter, when I fell off of the horse, and had to learn from my mistakes, live with them, and just get right up. First of all, You can't expect yourself to become an exercise fanatic overnight, and despite my best intentions, I think I'm hard wired to over analyze things, and this causes a great deal of anxiety in my life, and anxiety is the acid that corrodes mental well being. My intention was to create a healthy state of mind, so I could comprehend and do some serious analytical thinking about big issues. In the past it's been hard to delve into these things passionately because I've had to work, and like all working adults, I have responsibilities. So I thought, 'wow, here is an opportunity to practice some self health type stuff, continue reading literature, and wrap up all of the things that have been going on in my brain, and unbeknownst at the time, prepare myself for the work that I want to do my senior year. It doesn't look like linear progression, I can say that. I have ridden my bike more, and taken alternate transportation, and have been conscious of the decisions I make, more than I have ever been in my whole life, and regardless if I've fucked up here and there, I have a place to start. I know what I want. It's simple really, I kind of candidly outlined it, on the "short list" picture: Exercise, eat vegetables, spend time with family and friends, and do meaningful things. It's really that easy. Thanks to this quarter, or should I say, the freedom allotted, I've been given the time to process and really think about what it is I want out of life and who I am, and that doesn't mean that I've plateaued. Life is this constant changing thing, and part of being wise, and "growing up" is weathering this change with responsibility to your body and mind. It feels great to have committed to a project. Everyday I have ridden my bike, and even in the morning, when I'm too tired, I've taken the bus. I've eaten less meat. I've committed to these things and I've done them. And it hasn't been easy, it's been very hard at times. These are big life changes, and towards the end I went through a pretty dark cloud to appreciate what is really meaningful. Again, sorry for sounding high highfalutin, but this is the venue to do so. So in that sense, I know now: Yes, when I eat shitty food, it makes me feel like shit. When I exercise I feel better. When I'm doing something meaningful I feel a sense of purpose in life that fills me up. When I'm spending time with family and friends I feel great. Simple. This quarter I've had time to flex my head and refine, process, practice, think, ruminate, about all these simple things. So the end result is not a super happy, in shape me, working for the lead enviro group, but still, what I am is happy. I am happy with who I am. I've decided to take small, realistic steps in the right direction and I've succeeded in doing so. I said I was going to find out how other people can do these things, but I forgot that I need to first figure out how to apply these things to myself. I need to ground myself first. I'm working on that. And I am satisfied with the results, and wouldn't change the road I've taken to get here.    

Numbers!

Number of miles ridden on my bicycle: 580
Number of miles ran:100
Amount of money spent on the bus: $150
Hot Yoga classes completed: 28
Hot yoga poses completed during those classes: 700
Amount of money spent over the course of the quarter at various farmer's markets (University, Queen Anne, and Capital Hill): $200
Amount of money spent at the capital Hill Food Co-op over the quarter: $480
time spent during "writer's block": 40 hours

Composting!

This one is very, very simple.
Low tech. While I could have bought an Ikea composter, this is easy and simple. You put food scraps into a bin, it's that easy, creates great garden compost (minus the plastic that shouldn't be in there) and cuts down on gaseous build ups in land fills. This is just a Kirkland kitty litter tub converted for the purpose.

Little, daily actions, that amount to some big things in the long run. Or at least we can hope. It's a start.

Short list

Mother Earth News Fair

This weekend (June 1-2) Lucas and I have planned to attend the Mother
Earth News Fair in Puyallup Washington, and although we got a belated
start on Saturday, we ended up seeing everything we came to see in one
day, with some time to spare. Granted we missed some of the keynote
speakers and a rad DIY solar Panel class, all green stuff was consumed
over the course of one day: heirloom seed displays, compostable
toilets demonstrations (well not literally), a show room of electric
cars, award-winning chickens and roosters, a Yes! Magazine kiosk
selling back issues of Yes! for really cheap (I think I was actually
most excited about this deal all day), a bearded man giving a
demonstration about worm composting to farmers and asking anyone if
they wanted to “fondle” the finished, wormed, soil.

All in all the fair was what it was, to be expected. I was surprised
that there weren’t any food venders, and we had to settle for the
Puyallup fair regular concessions (In Western Washington there are
about 200 farmer’s markets alone, you think that for such a high
profile event they would offer more locally grown food?)

And then there is that question that always sneaks around in the back
of your mind…when you really have to go number two, and you’re
thinking to yourself as you sit on the porcelain what kind of poor
person can afford a compostable toilet? Don’t get me wrong, a bunch of
people congregating together to spread some green cheer and push
sustainable products is a great thing, but the question does come up,
and it is an interesting one. If you’re scraping buy, if you’re eating
top ramen for dinner every night, it’s hard to get stuck on the moral
implications of dinosaur shaped chicken nuggets, or what kind of
renewable energy you should be using.

No offense people, but you need some more 101 classes for poor folk
and at risk youth, and less toilet demonstrations. And we want to see
more poor folk and less of the post-environmental movement baby boomer
types. Not that any of this is bad at all, but we gotta open this
market up a little bit! Remember, everyone an environmentalist not
just those savvy intellectual types who can afford fancy toilets!

Writer's Block

Q: What did you learn from your writing sessions with Lucas, and, based on your original contract objectives what has changed?

Like the rest of the original objectives this quarter, the "writer's block" session between Lucas and I has progressed into it's own direction, and taken on a dimension that is more braided and integrated with the rest of the contract, specifically in regard to this synergy thing that I am always talking about. I originally intended for Lucas and I to meet up once a week for a couple of hours where we would first talk about one of the writer's manuals that we've read, free write, and then bounce back and forth ideas. While we've accomplished this, we ended up meeting more frequently during the week and integrating other elements like bike riding and even bird watching. Originally, I intended for Lucas to copy-edit pieces, but towards the middle of the quarter I was less interested with this and more interested in helping to nurture the creative process.  In this way, nothing has lacked, just opened up.
              Not Everything went as planned. In the ten weeks, there were times when we didn't agree, or we were frustrated with each other and with ourselves. Lucas is at a different place in his life, and he doesn't have the same school orientated objectives as myself, so his writing reflected these factors, and because so, we had to modify our time to accommodate these differences. Again however, these modifications and changes are not bad things and depending on how you look at the situation, were actually beneficial to the learning process.
               Similiar to other components of the contract, differentiating between "official" class time and just the more organic time Lucas and I have spent together presented another challenge. We didn't sit in a class room, or even an area that was restricted by four walls. Most of the time, given then nature of the season, we spent time outside, either in Volunteer Park, or even discussing challenges over long walks through the heart of the city. But in the end, nothing is really missing, things are just gained in various layers, that take more time to process.
                    What comes from this is a shit ton of writing. A lot of gobbled y-goop. Hard stuff. Like preschoolers learning how to paint, only the difference is, the both of us are adult preschoolers, fighting against perfectionism and age. We learned to make mistakes, and get over ourselves, and just write -pages and pages of informal rants, spiels, and bemoans, are the end result. The writing muscles have been flexing though, through the whole thing. A lot of my writing can be self-deprecating, but I've had to get over that. In one hundred years, the chances are, that nobody will even remember any of this shit, and it's important to just do all of this for myself, but that is a lot easier said than done. So, the "publishable essay" format is out the window, and the "one foot in front of the other, lets just learn how to walk, and take it slow, then maybe we'll start jogging, and if we're feeling confident we'll sprint" format is in.

Q: You've talked about the synergy that weaves together the components of the contract into a whole, can you elaborate more on how the writer's block has influenced, and been influenced by this synergy?

Haha. Using the terminology so openly gives it this religious infomercial sheen, "be touched by the synergy! Live a more integrated full life. Know yourself." Um, a good example is a bike trip to Vashon Island that we took in week 7. Instead of meeting up at 6pm like we usually do, we took a whole day, a field trip if you will, to Vashon Island, riding there on bike. Well obviously, we had to take the ferry over from West Seattle, but by the end of the day we had 30+ miles under our belt of up hill bike ride through the island. So the cool thing is, and I've said this before in other areas on the blog, not only were we working on writing, we were exercising, and in a little way, practicing those habits of sustainability that I am always talking about. We spent less money. Got great exercise, and spent half of the day on the beach, identifying birds, and writing in the relative tranquility of the wilderness. Yeah, I mean, this is fodder for half the country who may think Evergreen is a radical hippie sect, but doing this stuff is good for me in multiple ways.

Week 9-10 is the same idea. For the Mother Earth News Fair, we're going to camp, and there will be a last update on this whole experience.  

Malia!

I have to take the opportunity to give a shout out to people who have proved invaluable during this contract, and have been included into the process for better or for worse. For Malia, her inclusion couldn't have been any better. I didn't set out to partner up with anyone, but it would be a misnomer to say that she didn't influence the progression of the contract. I mean, look at her picture. Look how cool this girl is. With her backwards hat, exuberantly displaying her yield. Lettuce form her garden. I've made a big deal about this before. She's gardened before in the past, but I guess I've never had the opportunity to be around produce that doesn't come from the super market, so I was/am incredibly fortunate to spend time with someone who has such a love and appreciation of vegetables! She'll love that I wrote that.

Lucas

I couldn't have done this project without the help of Lucas. Our writer's block was conceived over a road trip to my dad's in Idaho over spring break, and has been four years in the making. We've both agreed on one thing: that we want to become better writers, and what exactly that means, has changed over the course of the quarter. We have have become worse writers for whatever that means, but what really matters is that we took the leap to step out of our skin for a bit and take a risk and just write, despite the fear of failing. I couldn't have done any of this without the support of Lucas. He has been there for me in darker times, even outside of the documentation of this project, so his influence on me, and how he has kept me alive, is too priceless to put into words. For that I am eternally grateful. My comrade. Old friend. You are seriously the best, and I wish that you knew this, and that you can always remember it.

Little things

Writing time during the end game. The most frustrating of times. I have a hard time writing at home because I don’t have a desk or anything and often times get distracted by people watching The Simpsons or laughing or pretty much everything that is an extreme distracter of school work. Even the tree in the backyard full of baby blackbirds is yelling at me, distracting. Distracting. How many of these guys hit our windows or end up drowned in the plastic blue pool in our backyard?

            So I have this routine of catching the 8 bus and getting some coffee at one of the cafes on 15^th Avenue on Capital Hill and just hunkering down and studying. Today I have to work a swing shift at the shelter which starts at four, which puts me into this anxious, rushed state of mind considering how much time I have to write about meaningful ways to make a difference in just under two weeks, and here, I have about 3 hours before I have to go to work and put another study day behind me.

            I sit rigidly, with my hand rested in my hair, in typical writer’s block frustration, staring at a blank computer screen. Blank word documents can be so incredibly oppressive. The way that I am facing, with my back turned to everyone in the café, and my lack of progress open for everyone on the sidewalk to see makes me even the more irritable. But I try and remember what Natalie Goldberg says. “Finally, there is no perfection. If you want to write, you have to cut through and write. There is no perfect atmosphere, notebook, pen, or desk, so train yourself to be flexible.” Lucas tells me he writes on buses now. A pretty girl passes by and makes eye contact with me and smiles. Okay, so this isn’t all that bad. But I still can’t seem to write anything and I have this crap that I desperately need to drain to paper.

            “Does it always rain here this much?” The fella next to me is politely, and daringly, making small talk with myself, who I imagine appears to be flexing all of the unattractive physical attributes of the stereotypical stuffy Seattleite laboring at his Mac Book, unwilling to communicate with anyone around him, but desperately needing the companionship of fellow coffee patrons without having to actually talk to any of them. –So you have to give him credit there for being brave.

            The question is obviously one that someone asks if they’re not from around here. Rain is something that people from out of town fixate on. I’m not sure if this is because, culturally, rain is as much a Pacific Northwest Icon as lets say the Space Needle, or grunge music, or because it actually does rain here pretty much all of the time, and as he asks me the question, it is in fact, raining outside.

            “Yeah it usually does all year round,” I tell him. “But around this time of the year it’s not that bad because it’s warmer outside. Not like the winter time when it’s really cold and rain seems more miserable than the snow.”

            “I also noticed that people don’t use umbrellas,” he says. The both of us look outside at 15^th avenue at all of the busy people going about there things, not really phased by the drizzle. And I never really noticed the mundane details of where I live, but people aren’t using umbrellas. It turns out the out -of -towner is from Chicago, visiting Seattle for four days on a whim, flying solo, which again, I think, it must have taken some guts to talk to a random person. He is soft spoken and I’m not sure if I’ve caught a subtle Midwest accent on him. We talk for a bit. Small Chat. I’m both relieved and irritated at the change of pace someone randomly talking to me and breaking me out of my routine offers up. Relieved because I need a break from all of this and a human conversation feels nice. Irritated because my time is being wasted and I have so much to do. The irritation is not a reflection of him, but just my frustrations with myself. He tells me he’s been to all of the neighborhoods, and we agree that walking is the best way to see a new city. He finds it curious that Seattle has a larger homeless population than Chicago, and although I’m skeptical of actual numbers, I agree that downtown has a large concentration of homeless folk, and I offer up a haphazard explanation for this. The homeless conversation inevitably leads to crime and he asks me how safe Seattle is, and I tell him that compared to Chicago it’s probably safer but that we have some heavy shit going down. I tell him about the problem with police corruption and how last year or so, a police officer named Ian Burke, gunned down woodcarver John T Williams, and how that pissed off a bunch of people, and put the police on edge for a bit.

            All in all, our conversation only lasted about twenty minutes. I politely signaled that I had to get back to my endless work, but offered to exchange email addresses, as an appropriate way, given the length of time that we’ve known each other, to stay in touch. I also decided to write him out a list with all of the best coffee shops and places to eat on Broadway that he could visit before he left, or as he pointed out, when he comes back again.

            “You really really have to try Pho. It’s this, uh, Vietnamese type soup that is delicious and we eat it around here to get us through the long winters. I’ve made you this map. All of these are on broadway.”

            He thanks me kindly in this genuine, soft, awkward way and leaves, but has to come back because he forgot his umbrella. We say our goodbyes twice.

            I can’t stand the café I’m at and leave soon after, but I still have an hour before I have to be at the shelter, so embarrassingly, I end up at another café closer to work, buying a sparkling water, because I have to use the bathroom, and in Seattle most all of the bathrooms need a code to access, usually only given to patrons.

            I’ve banished my bulky mac book, and pull out my notebook, as a last resort, to make up for some lost time, and hopefully write down some of the bones, so the day isn’t completely lost. For some reason this reminds me of a gunslinger in a movie, toting a bunch of high caliber weapons, than running out of ammo and pulling a tiny pistol out of his sock, in a vain attempt to fend of aggressors. It seems to be working. Maybe the day isn’t completely lost:

…After all, this has been a personal thing. Initially I had hoped to write a “publishable” essay about how “ordinary” people could live more environmentally conscious lives, but I soon realized that I can’t tell people how to live their lives, without understanding first, how I live mine.

***

            Sometimes –again, here comes the word oppressive– sometimes, I get this overwhelming feeling of hopelessness. The feeling is very oppressive. Maybe it is something you get when you’re in your twenties. Maybe it’s a feeling you maintain throughout your whole life, and you have to place meaning in the oppressive void. Maybe the feeling is stronger when you don’t believe in god, or there is no hope of redemption, or any of that stuff. Maybe the feeling is made worse, when you’re made to think that there is something wrong with this oppressive feeling of hopelessness and having to pretend that everything is okay, just heightens your sense of disparity. Maybe feeling hopeless is just a part of life. I think that the older you get, or at a certain junction in your life, you really have to sit down with the reality that your time is very short here. I mean really short. Part of you is like, “oh hell, what’s the point, this whole dying thing just serves as a greater affirmation of the whole school thing. You do all this hard work and in the end what do you really get? What is the difference?” Of course, of course this is all a matter of perspective. There is the other part of you, the part that older folk may say, “Yeah, you see. That kid is really growing up.” The part of you that sees the challenge in the whole thing. The monumental challenge of figuring out what truly resonates in your life. Relationships with people. Creating meaning. Making a difference.

            I am reminded of Stephanie Madison, a mother from last quarter, one of my favorite people, someone who wouldn't say anything about her self unless you were to ask her. She turned out to be an amazing person! Over the course of two quarters we found so much out about her, how much struggle she has been through and what issues she is outspoken on. Luckily we got the opportunity to read her essay about what it means to make a difference. She talks about her struggle with MS, and right off the get go she says, "I first want to acknowledge we can all make a difference in someone's life with the little things that we do and how we choose to act everyday. Stopping to let someone to pull out into traffic, helping an elderly women to her car, paying a few dollars for someone who is a little short at the checkout line..." Stephanie goes on to say that these little things are not enough, that we can't just consider these personal actions, we have to look at the forest and not just the trees. We were all wrapped up in this metaphor. When it comes down to it however, these things count. It's amazing how much they count really.

               Later that week I got a message in my inbox. A letter from Dean, the guy that I had met, and had sparked up a random conversation with, allowing myself to thaw and just talk to someone: 

Hey Gavin, it's Dean!

I'm the one you chatted with at the coffee shop this past Monday.

I got back to Chicago Tuesday afternoon.

It's in the 80's here today with full sun. Gross! I know it's probably cool

and raining out by you. Sigh.

Thanks again for taking the time to answer my questions and for all

the suggestions.

I wasn't able to try Pho Cyclone this time around but definitely will

on my next visit.

I enjoyed my time in Seattle. Very much so but at times it was quite

lonely not knowing anyone. You helped bridge that gap and now I feel

a bit more connected there so thanks for that!

Remember, if you visit Chicago let me know and I can return the favor

by being your tour guide.

Thanks again for everything and keep in touch.

You rock! -Dean

         Sometimes it is the little things we do in life. The atitude that we take. The decision to wake up and say, 'yeah so there are some pretty fucked up things in the world, and maybe the train we're all on together can't be stopped, but the least that we can do, is take a chance. So we can say that we actually tried, that we actually did something.  

Exit Interview: Gavin

                     

 1.Congragulations! The quarter is nearly finished up and you’re one step closer to graduating this thing! Are there any surface level things on your mind that you want to get off of your chest before we start?

Yes. I can’t wait to just read a novel without having to dissect it and pick things from it to neatly arrange into writing. Not that I even did a good job at that this quarter. I just want to read a book and enjoy it.

2. Is there any experience that really sticks out in your mind? Any thing worth mentioning?

Well, I think there were a couple of illuminating moments mixed in with a lot of arduous work. I think that half of the challenge was creating a study plan week by week and sticking to it. Towards the beginning of the quarter I remember thinking, wow, they sure do give you a lot of freedom. I even had a conversation with Lucas, ‘Aren’t they (Evergreen) worried that students will take advantage of the personal time and anonymity allotted during an ILC?’ Lucas, who is an Evergreen grad himself, had a simple answer. ‘Why would they care, it’s your education that you’re either improving or fucking up. The decision is entirely yours.’ So yeah, while it would be easy to take advantage of the less than savory  alternative structure to traditional education methods, the responsibility is actually doubled because it’s my education on the line and I don’t have a traditional authority figure keeping me in check.

3. And that’s exactly what they want. That is the purpose of developing a contract in the first place. You’re learning to be the pall bearer of your own education. That is very exciting.

I wish my mom knew that. The only time she talks to me about school is when she hears about a “strap-on sex workshop” at evergreen that she heard on Kiro News Seven radio. After all of this work, I feel that I will never be validated by my family, because instead of going to a typical institution, I go to the school “with the most radical ideologies on the west coast,” according to this Kiro news thing she was talking about.

4. Your mom just doesn’t know any better. If she knew more about the goals that you’re working towards she would be very proud of you. Maybe it would be a lot easier if you just talked to her about it. Be a teacher. That will make her happy. Even if she doesn’t get grandchildren and her only son is going to a communist hippy school, bent on destroying the American Dream. But sorry, I digress. Lets get down to the nitty-gritty details of the contract. Lets talk about the two “synergy components” Doing things that promote a healthy state of mind and Practicing tiny steps towards living a more environmentally conscious life. First part, how are you feeling mentally after this quarter? Was the project a success?

That depends on what you mean by successful. Did I achieve everything that I set out to do? No. Did I try to achieve everything I set out to do? Yes. And I don’t want that to sound like the even losers are winners mantra, I guess what I mean, and I’ve covered plenty of ground with this, is that life habits are not things that are going to be completely changed over the course of a ten week quarter you know? I initially set out to write “publishable” essays; things that ordinary people could follow in their ordinary lives, but then I realized that I first had to understand how I was living my life, before I could get on the pulpit and preach to people about how they live their life. So in the end, the quarter was more of a personal sojourn, than it was anything else. Plus, all that publishable shit is just bullshit. When I’m reaching for those kind of goals I just get really exhausted.

5. That’s amazing. So you finally got over being a perfectionist, and just gave into the joy and immense benefits of learning and making mistakes and getting dirty.

Yeah. Despite my best abilities to fend off anxieties surrounding the work I was doing, -hell, I mean half of the quarter is designed to achieve a grounding and relaxation- I felt phony for talking about all of these green type things. It’s hard to explain. If I go around just talking about little activities to do that promote a more ‘environmentally’ conscious life, then that whole process lacks depth and soul, and doesn’t really explain anything personal about why I would want to do that stuff in the first place. And I’ve had a really hard time explaining that in an appropriate academic way, hence the ‘publishable essay” crap. Multiple times over the quarter I’ve become exhausted at how fixed the whole thing was becoming. You know? Like maybe how someone writes songs their whole life, makes it big, someone wants to give them lots of time and money to work on something, and suddenly they get this crippling writer’s block. That’s me kind of. I wanted this to be more than just these little green steps I wanted to take in my life. There is an underlining struggle of doing these things in the first place, and living a meaningful life in spite of the massive distraction that is society you know. I’m not saying that I don’t like that distraction either. That is the hard part. I really struggle with that on a deep level. I like eating meat. And I like driving the 1970 f-250 pick up truck my dad gave me. But these things aren’t practicable and they’re fucking up the planet, and despite how much I love these things, I can’t live by them, and that is the struggle. How to stay sane while living in this split reality. That is what the contract is about. It’s not about doing all of these little things, adding them up in the end, and winning a prize. Although the fear of losing credits makes it seem like that sometime. But I’m smart enough to know, especially in light of the state of the economy and the depreciating value of an undergrad education, that if I’m going to do this, I have to do it for myself, and I have to make it count.

6. I could see how worrying about all this stuff would be exhausting.

Yes, I mean, here come the self health portion of the whole thing. Here I am getting all this stuff off my chest, ranting like a crazy person. Really what I aim for is to be a more grounded person, and do what’s right. There is a lot of growing up in this process. What influences life’s direction changes, and that process is scary because it’s very revealing. But in the end, who emerges is a person who values more than just the well being of myself. I’m worried about other people, and I’m worried about the world that I live in.

7. On that note, how has this school year, including your more personal work this quarter, changed how you view the value of your undergrad education?

There have been a wave of articles in the Seattle Times and New York Times about the “recession generation” not being able to find jobs, and having to move back in with the family and all of that jazz, and all of this has made me kind of scared and reassess what my goals are in school. Now, it's both a deterrent and a blessing to be finishing the race quite a bit later than all of comrades. Now I know what is waiting for me at the finish line, so now I can slow down, and ask myself, "what are you really doing this for? What do you truly value, and what can you really get out of this?" Since, I won't win the race, I have more time to think about these things, and just enjoy the process, not the end result. I remember when I took my grandparents to Evergreen last summer, I can't remember if I've talked about this, but in the end, after my grandpa, (who spent a life working as a manufacturer for the airforce) visited the school, after he made jokes about the NO WAR IN IRAN signs posted in professors windows, he said to me honestly, "Gav, the most important part about school, is that you're learning to become a critical thinker." So then I'm like, okay. he appreciates this and he's right. The game plan has changed. It's my choice about how I'm going to make something out of this. The atmosphere of the occupy movement has also influenced me. Not the camping, we're not going to work, and we're going to ruin public property portion, but the attitude, really the whole DIY spirit of the whole thing. This energy for me fused together with the new stuff I found out about the Citizenship schools and the Highlander school, the stuff I learned Winter Quarter. Now it's like, "Okay. What can you do to help strengthen your community and do things that are good for other people," you know?

Some people have told you, you should be a teacher, have you ever considered being a teacher?

The idea is romantic, but being a teacher is a lot of hard work, and while I'm open to the idea, it kind of scares me. If you watch the good professors at Evergreen, and the ones I can remember liking in public school, they genuinely care about the well being and personal growth of their students. Cultivating this selflessness takes a lot of patience and lifetime wisdom, especially if you're working with younger, at risk youth, who may be harder to reach. Plus, I don't know if I would want to work in the public school system, or end of teaching geography, not that this is a bad thing. It would be rad to teach kids about things that are really important, like how to treat people kindly and common sense things like, living modestly and within our means.   

Well, always remember to just have a good time, and as long as you're being kind to people, and doing your part to help, engage in some rec. every once in awhile. Like your buddy Jason says, "life is too dumb and short." And I think he's taking a mild absurdest point of view. Life may not literally be dumb, but holding too great of stock in things, may be dumb considering how ephemeral the whole thing is. Death touched his life too early, and because of that he knows the value of life. If you relax and just enjoy the process, you'll retain more information, and you may live longer.

Wow. Yeah that is a great way to look at things. I need to be reminded to have fun every once in awhile.

Making a Difference, Future Tense

 Over the last ten weeks I’ve been given the unique opportunity to nurture body and mind and in the process practice some sustainability type stuff that I have been spieling about to family and friends since winter quarter. The question(s) now are: What have I learned, and, granted I’ve actually learned something!, what will I do with what I’ve learned?

            Here, there has been no profound, life-shifting change, but very subtle, slow moving alterations. A lot of lessons in life come like this, like slow moving snails, and part of the lesson is learning that some things take large tracts of time to process and to create a lasting affect on the way that we live. One must cultivate patience. There you go. There is one thing among many. Nobody is perfect. I’m sure that Rachel Carson wasn’t. Even David Sazuki, the prominent Canadian Environmentalist, who I’ve come to idealize in this green renaissance in my life, admits that, “there are many things I live with that keep me from being environmentally pure.” He reminds us that guilt is “draining and oppressive.” When the weight of the world is created collectively, it’s suicide to try and carry the burden on your shoulders alone, or alter the habits of life you’ve been building for years just cold turkey. When there is so much at stake, it’s hard to not want to jump into things with full force, but we have to be very careful. We have to take care of ourselves. Here family and friends and collective skill building prove invaluable. The individual can’t do it alone. The work is too much, and too hard           

            Not everybody is going to be a Rachel Carson, or a David Sazuki, or a Frances Moore Lappe. I realize this now. The world is going to move forward good or bad and people are going to pursue their goals. People will become lawyers, artists, mothers, car salesman, and politicians. The hope is that the gap between the environmental movement and the ordinary person will be bridged, or more so fused, and there will be no environmentalist, because everyone will be an environmentalist.

            For me, the least I can hope is that in my future life, even when I put down the environmental literature, even when I’m not fully immersed in a ten week project, I maintain these tiny steps as I call them. I pack my sustainable mess kit. I recycle. I ride my bike to get groceries instead of drive. I try in general, to eat less meat, because the reason why are many. And most importantly, I just maintain an awareness. If I slip back into unreality even for a bit, I have to make sure and remember the consequence and what is at stake here.

            Lastly, there is the question of whether or not individual actions amount to any sort of change in the end. I’ve heard the argument countless times before in class and in public discussion, “individual change won’t do a damn thing. We’re gonna have to attack the corporations and the people in charge.” To answer this I’m going to have to agree with Derek Jensen, in saying that we need people on all fronts. We need people working to change the system within the system and we also need people doing things in their ordinary lives.

For the love of Kale!

My initial interest in the world of real food was sparked by a wonderful, leafy green cabbage, that when baked and sprinkled with sesame seeds, sea salt, and nutritional yeast, provides a healthy and delicious alternative to popcorn! Kale is high in beta carotene, Vitamin K, Vitamin C, iron, and sulforaphane; a potent chemical that has the ability to fight cancer!

Kale, along with beets, braising greens, Brussels sprouts, other cabbages, carrots, leeks, mache, parsnips, and pears are in season during the winter months, so stocking up on this miracle vegetable is a great way to support seasonal agriculture in the Pacific Northwest

Hotttt Yoga

On this Friday afternoon on 4/20, when the door opens to the Hot Yoga room I think I can vaguely smell pot mixed with the usual pot puri of super heated body odor. The door to the Yoga room is the kind that has the thin glass window with the wire framing –usually the kind that you see in institutional type places so even if the glass is broken out there is a skeleton mesh wire frame. The window is covered with paper, and below reads a sign: PLEASE KEEP QUITE. YOGA SESSION IN PROGRESS. Inside is kind of a clusterfuck of anxious pre yoga people mingling in the tiny lobby area with post yoga people. Who is pre and who is the post is quite obvious. The post Hot Yoga people are flushed red and pirspiring and depending on their personal experience either collect themselves in an organized fashion, or spend some time doubled over on the benches complicating matters for the pre session people who are trying to sit down and take their shoes off after they sign in. But this is only a minor complication, for the most part the whole initial pre yoga spectacle is very exhilirating and simontanously anxious and calming. Your first introduction to your Yogi instructor is at the front counter. In my three week hot yoga career, I have had two intstructors. The first is an attractive, middle aged women with fogged over cat eye glasses who calls me boss when I am doing the Yoga pose wrong: “tuck in your elbows. That’s it boss.” I can’t really tell if she says this because she thinks I’m cool and attractive or if she’s saying boss like someone would call a little kid boss. These are things you do think of when you’re looking upside down at the frowning rolls in your sweating belly in a begginners hot yoga class. Tonight is not the cat eyed women but another fellow who I have had before, whose instruction method is encouraging but has a subtle antagonistic quality to it. I might just think this because our relationship is one of the slightly older but still young yogi master who teaches class in a black and orange speedo, showing off a flat stomach, clean skin, and brown nipples pulled tightly to his chest, to my slightly insecure, wobbly kneed self who can’t yet touch my fingers to my toes. Behind the front desk he seems slightly annoyed that a new person has forgotten her student number. She informs him that she never got one, and he says “What, you never got one?” in a slightly sarcastic tone holding out the inflection in the word what. I look at the women and notice that she is wearning a lot of foundation and face makeup and for whatever reason I am annoyed by this, not really understanding why she has put on so much makeup going into hot yoga, considering the chances that her whole exterior made up face is just going to melt off by the end of the session.

            The “lobby” is warm, maybe 80 degrees or so, but the severity of the situation doesn’t hit you until you enter the actual yoga room, which maintains an average temprature of 105 degrees, apparently made to replicate the conditions in which yogi masters practice yoga in India. The website informs you that although the temperate element may be shocking at first, inducing a state of heated panic, after a couple of sessions you get aclimated and almost enjoy it. I find this to be true, and on this sixth attempt at hot yoga I’m not fazed too much by the drastic change in temprature and atmosphere. The same cannot be said for my first attempt however. For the beginner, upon entering the heated dimly lit room you get the choking sensensation of being burnt very slowly over a long period of time. Maybe the room is like being wedged into the closed armpit of somebody who is running the mile. Instructors tell you, if you are feeling panicky at any moment in the session to just ligh down and relax, but they highly recommend staying in the room, so as to not disturb the experience for the rest of students, by getting up and leaving.

Sustainable Mess Kit

I know how you feel. You’re a person who is on the go. I real go getter you might say. You don’t always have time to cook at home with all the stresses of modern industrial living. You feel that it is ridiculous to put a half eaten spring roll in a Styrofoam to-go container. You love your double-shot soy latte but as you toss that coffee cup away you can no longer live with the illusion that the garbage you create magically disappears into some other dimension. You know the reality of it don’t you? Well guilt will eat you up inside. The practical* solution is to just pack one of these bad boys into your message bag, purse, or back pack. Its easy, I promise you.

This sustainable mess kit contains:

1. A fork and a spoon (just regular old silverware like ma and pa have).
2. A Kleen Kanteen
3. A Herkimer 8 oz. coffee mug
4. A polyester breathable produce bag
5. Rubbermaid glass Tupperware
6. Multiple canvas bags for groceries

*The practicability of humping around these extra items is still being tested in the field. While carrying all of the items listed above may prove to cumbersome with a laptop, utilizing any of the products over a long period of time provides a great way to reduce waste, feel good about yourself, and spark conversation when people ask you why you’re carrying around silverware. You just ask right back, “What universe are you living in bud! I’m thinkin’ with my brain, and thinkin’ for the generations to come!”

Making a Difference, Present Tense: My Project Spring Quarter

As it turns out taking care of yourself and performing simple steps towards living a more environmentally conscious life equals happiness and a sense of purpose! And who would have ever known that this simple equation is so easily attainable! That we don’t need hordes of junk or excess amounts of stimulation to be happy. That taking care of your body and rebuilding relationships with the land and your community are all you need! So here comes Spring Quarter, my little project. The idea is simple:

1.) Do things that promote a healthy state of mind, like exercising, eating nutritious food, and simple things, like working to rebuild relationships with those closest to us. Under section one falls a lot of various things that a lot of my writing and other informal and random events fall under. You can revisit all of these on this blog.

2.) Practice tiny steps towards living a more environmentally conscious life. Basically, the reduce, re-use, recycle mantra works well here. As David Sazuki says, “In the long run, sustainable living demands a fundamental shift in values. But Action invariably precedes a profound shift in values, so actually doing something is important. In the process, one learns and becomes committed.” When the question of how people affect the ability to push societal change, there is always the inevitable argument that individual change is not enough and that we need systemic change. While I agree with this, I believe there is potential in individual action. Action invariably precedes values. We have to understand personally why our lifestyle choices need to change and then find empowerment in the fact that we possess  the ability to change our own lives.

*Synergy!

I knew that, even before I started the actual project that the activities that comprise components 1 and 2 listed above could not, and would not, be contained within such a simple framework. Simply put, the activities in section two actually promote the mental health that I am to achieve in section one. For example: Riding a bike is a great and simple way to reduce your carbon output. In the process the exercise you get is good for your body and the sensory stimulation, just the act of getting fresh air, are good for your mind. Food is another great example. If you shop for locally grown, than not only are you supporting sound agricultural practices you are also eating real, nutritious, and delicious food that promotes a healthy body and a stable mind. And –if you get the experience of growing food in a community plot, or just in your backyard with room mates, food provides centrifuge for building stronger relationships with the people that you love!

Writer’s Block

Starting a writer’s group was something that my close friend Lucas and I have been talking about doing for years. The details for this quarter’s incarnation were hashed out over a road trip to Idaho, Specifically while driving through a wind farm in Eastern Washington. You can put all sorts of structure to a project, but in the end things will always end up in a different place then where you had intended. Initially the writer’s block portion of this project was designed to achieve a very straightforward goal: to become a better writer. As “class time” with Lucas progressed over the quarter, writers block came to represent something more than just becoming a better writer. The lines of class time overlap with the seasons and who we are becoming as people, releasing the full  benefits of a writer’s group, even if it was just a party of two. The experience was organic to say the least. You see, you can’t separate writing from life, and this quarter my life was this contract. Given the fact that Lucas isn’t getting any credit from this project, he has been a very good sport, sticking with me through all of the ups and downs, the moments of staring blankly at the page, experiencing the mind numbing frustration of having an epic life story ruminate in your brain, but struggling with the ability to connect thoughts to paper. Or the tiny moments of illumination that often sprout up, completely unscripted, over dinner, when the official class time was over and Lucas and I were just hanging out.

            Even when we’d ride our bikes to Volunteer Park, and struggle between a tough time of stagnancy, not knowing what to write about, or what to even talk about, we were surrounded by the immense beauty and spectacle of spring time. The evolving season it seems stimulated the creative process. The writer’s block came to mimic the explosive growth of the nature around us. If nothing came to mind when we forced it to, then something sure came up during the gloaming period of these spring nights when we’d walk through volunteer park or look at Grave stones in The Civil War Cemetery.

Hot Yoga!

Initially, I wanted to take a yoga class to help me with stress and anxiety. I never planned on it being hot yoga, but I don’t think I would have been able to put up with plain yoga, once I did yoga in a room that was heated to 105 degrees! Over the quarter I had to take a break because of some bad neck pains that may or may not be yoga related, but I’m starting to get back into it again. When I am doing hot yoga regularly, the experience is hard to explain in words. Lets just say sweat, lots of sweat, a great body and mind workout. And when yoga is done, I actually have an appetite to eat food, and at the end of the time I am exhausted, and I can fall asleep without an artificial remedies.

Transportation

Luckily, in the middle of April my van bit the dust, and even when I borrowed my uncles truck for a bit while my van was being worked on, the truck burst into flames one night while I was driving it in Downtown Seattle. No, I wasn’t hurt, but the truck was completely totaled. I took this as the best opportunity to commit to alternative transportation and reduce my carbon footprint by not being so dependent on vehicles that rely on fossil fuel. I fixed up my bike, and rode to places where I usually drive to, like work and the various cafes that I study at. Riding a bike provides a great opportunity to get fresh air, a strenuous cardiovascular workout, and even spend time with friends. Seattle, the city I call home, has a very healthy and diverse bike community. Going on a bike trip is as simple as calling up some friends, and choosing one of the many exquisite destinations nestled between the cascades and Mt. Rainier. People from out of town often say, “I couldn’t imagine riding a bike in Seattle. How do you get around all of those hills?” The answer is you just do it and take joy knowing that while you’re providing an excellent workout for your body you’re also doing your part to reduce your carbon footprint on the planet.

            When the rain was too much (I am a wimp compared to the bike messengers in downtown Seattle and the hardcore commuters who take to the dangerous rainy downtown streets for their work commute) I bought an Orca card and took a bus. What a blessing it is, in our busy lives, to just slow down and match rhythm with a lurching king county Metro bus. I can read my book, fall asleep, and take joy, knowing that I don’t have to find a place to park, or that honking at moronic drivers and shooting invisible rage missiles, is left to the noble and selfless King County Bus Driver, who gets me to home and work safe.

 Reduce, Re-use, Recycle

This mantra never gets old and never risks becoming a green cliché because what it implies is so universal and simple. For all of my preaching about the wastefulness of Americans, I realized that I am the biggest offender. My busy schedule doesn’t leave much time for cooking or grocery shopping. I often times eat out, and I would be disturbed if all of the plastic forks, spoons, and containers suddenly manifested themselves in front of me, in an ominous mass of wastefulness. Like most Pacific Northwesterners, I rely on copious amounts of coffee to get me through the rainy seasons, and accumulate a disgusting amount of coffee cups. At work, along with reusable water jugs, the water guy drops off packages of shrink wrapped plastic water bottles. Instead of just getting water from the reusable water jug, I more often than not, just crack open a plastic water bottle.

            The solution is simple really, just stop giving in and proliferating the illusions that our consumer culture create. Hell, reduce, re-use, recycle is such age old, common sense wisdom, it seems crazy that plastic bags or bottled water exist in the first place. Personally, I have devised what I call a portable sustainable mess kit! comprised of reusable containers and utensils. Nothing fancy, all I do is carry around in my messenger bag a fork and spoon, a couple of canvas bags for groceries, a glass Tupperware for leftovers, a Kleen Kanteen and a 8 oz coffee mug. This way, even if I know I can’t be at home cooking food, when I’m on the go I am taking easy steps towards living more sustainably.

Shop for locally grown food

Initially, I wanted to focus this project entirely on food systems and my detachment with the food that I put into my body. This focus changed over time, by a combination of personal choice and the contracts strange ability to morph itself organically and take on a new, and unexpected direction. Food nevertheless took precedent in the contract, although I have to say, if I was to grade my project, the eating healthy, locally grown food portion would receive a D. And I have to be okay with that. I remind myself that a quarter’s work isn’t going to be perfect, and that I am working to change habits of the mind that I’ve been developing well over twenty years. The first, and most important part is just becoming aware of how I affect systems with my actions or inactions. I also learn more from the mistakes that I make, than pretending that I’ve done everything right.

            With that being said, I did have time to visit and shop at the co-op where I live, and the various farmer’s markets that happen during the weekend in just about every neighborhood in the city. Through the literature that I’ve read in the past, and for this quarter, I also know how important the values that I push are, and even at times, when I give into the fast-food allure of easy food, I will do so with a sense of responsibility, and understanding of the food systems that I help to support and the life that I help to destroy, just to get a quick fix.

 Just Educate yourself!

There are countless things that I can change in my daily routine that the span of a quarter couldn’t do justice to. The idea of taking tiny steps are to first understand what kind of privilege I have in the society that I live in. A great example is water. What I know about water: very little. I know that it comes out of a faucet and I drink it. I know that long, hot showers reduce the amount of stress I have at the end of the day. But at what cost? I have to ask myself. One of the downsides of living in a communal house is holding people accountable for the their water and electricity usage. How is the price of water equally divided among people if one person takes frequent longer showers, or another room mate washes laundry more often than others? Of course, these are first world problems. In the chapter The Ocean Flowing Through Us, in his book, The Sacred Balance David Sazuki points out that much more water is used in rich countries than in poor countries. A person in an industrialized country uses between 350 and 1000 liters of water daily, compared to a person living in rural Kenya who uses 2 to 5 liters. (pg. 107, The Sacred Balance) And for the caffeinated aromatic lifeblood that sustains us Pacific Northwesterners through the long and rainy winters, it takes about 20,000 liters of water to produce one kilogram of coffee.

The Interconnectedness of All Things

Pictured above are wood ants. Thousands of them. but the picture doesn’t do much justice. If you stand close enough to their hive, close your eyes and get real silent you can hear the earth around you crawl. Even if you’re two feet away from the hive scout ants will find you and crawl all over your shoes and up your legs. If you put your hand down they’ll bite and send chemical signals that will bounce all the way back to the hive, sounding the alarm to send reinforcements to take you down because you’re a threat. If these were leaf-cutter ants and you were sprawled out on the jungle floor you may be eaten alive. But most likely they eat other insects or harvest honey secretions that they get from the aphids that they farm. Ants are really really cool.

            I’ve had what I will call a second renaissance in my life. The first renaissance was a period between the ages of 7 and 14, when I spent a good portion of my time away from any electronics, instead, in the field, in nature, out in the dirt, getting scraped up, running until my lungs burst into flames and then falling to the cool ground and breathing in fresh and earthly air. The second renaissance is now, Subtle at first, like every other revelation in this contract, but slowly budding through all the pointlessness of modern industrial living. Sounds like a hyperbole but I know that it is true. What a relief to know that the complexity of nature trumps all of the rigid cages we build to lock ourselves in. This second renaissance is due in large part to Johnson’s big, forest leveling concept of The one thing, but the concept grows more complex when you include the ecological factor. We are participating in something larger than ourselves, but this one thing is something that we share with the whole planet. David Sazuki calls this “the interconnectedness of all living things.” Building off of the social interconnectedness that Johnson reminds of us, Sazuki helps to remind us that we share a very special relationship with the natural world, and that overtime we have forgotten this relationship, at our own peril:

In a human-made environment, surrounded by animals and plants of our choice, we feel ourselves to have escaped the limits of nature. Weather and climate impinge on our lives with far less immediacy. Food is often highly processed and comes in packages, revealing little of it’s origins in the soil or telltale signs of blemishes, blood, feathers or scales. We forget the source of our water and energy, the destination of our garbage and our sewage. We forget that as biological beings we are as dependent on clean air and water, uncontaminated soil and biodiversity as any other creature. Cut of our way of life, we imagine a world under our control and will risk or sacrifice almost anything to make sure our way of life continues.  (Sazuki, The Sacred Balance, pg.47)

            Moving from an anthropocentric view of the world, back into a communal relationship with it, is something that will take time. But alas, the power of observation is there to help me out. I am developing the ability to slow down and appreciate the little things of life. Things that exist outside of the mental jam of work and school. The rat race of cultural success. These little things come in little packages. Ant trails leading to the piece of pizza that I left out all night. We’ve grown up thinking that we need to keep nature out with bottles of raid, but now I feel great to share my house with this writhing, growing super organism.

Interview Questions (April 4, Beginning of Quarter)

The point of this exercise is to show what I was thinking going into this thing and how my thinking has changed or evolved over the course of the quarter.

1. What is with the name Making a Difference, Present and Future Tense?

This spring quarter contract is an unofficial continuation of the work I was doing fall and winter quarter in Making a Difference. Adding Present and Future Tense is just kind of an affirmation to practice what I’ve learned in the present and the future.

2. What is the significance of getting credit for “self-care” type of stuff? Can’t you just do that stuff on your own free time and spend more time on academics or reading  and writing?

A reasonable question. I can do this stuff on my own, outside of school, but since the last time I’ve started school and have had to commute and balance academics with a job, I noticed that I had no time to partake in these simple self care type things, and I think that taking care of your body and mind are just as important as being a critical thinker. There is a synergic relationship between the self-care component of this contract that benefits all other parts. If I have a healthy body and mind I’m more likely to make good decisions in life that you know, help to make the world a better place.

3. “Making a difference” is kind of a vague statement and you risk biting off more work than you can chew or just being way to ambiguous to make any sense with what you’re trying to achieve this quarter. Can you elaborate, or more so, specify what exactly you mean by making a difference and what that looks like?

It’s very challenging to sum up in so many words or explain what I know in my head. Sometimes I forget that other people don’t understand something unless you explain it to them in a reasonable, coherent fashion. Simply put: what I’ve learned and discovered about myself over the last two quarters has changed how I view education and has changed how I view the world and my place in it. Sociologist Allan Johnson tells us, “We are always participating in something larger than ourselves, and if we want to understand social life and what happens to people in it, we have to understand what it is that we’re participating in and how we participate in it.” You can apply Johnson’s words here to just about anything. The really big idea is to develop the ability to see outside of ourselves our own immediate needs, and to understand that every little action we take effects others and the environment that we all live in.

            Understanding this signaled a profound shift in my goals and what I want to do in my life. For me, it’s not just about getting a diploma or a making a lot of money or being esteemed. All of these things are fleeting. What matters most to me is doing my part to understand how my actions affect other people and the natural world and what I can do to change my actions if my actions are adversely affecting the system of things. I’m not a religious person. I don’t believe in heaven. When I die though, I want to know that I was more than just a consumer, going about life without any concept of consequence or community. Even if we are playing “garbage men” cleaning up the environmental and sociological problems of a century under industrialization, then we are still doing profound work, and that personally gives me a reason to be alive and gives me hope for the future.

            Specifically, I am focusing on how our day-to-day actions and consummation of things have grave environmental consequences. This applies to all sorts of things from what and how we eat, to what we shop for and where it is made. I’m not interested in coming to any major revelation, and I’m not doing the hard work that scientists do in the field or the hard work that sociologists do in communities. What I am interested in however, are practical ways that ordinary people can live more environmentally conscious lives, and make more sustainable decisions to how we consume things, without disrupting our pre-existing life narratives. Some environmentalists and those in the academic field will argue that these tiny individual actions aren’t enough to change our path and that we need profound systemic change. I agree. But with systemic change we also have the decision to take individual actions together and feel empowered and not apathetic in the face of environmental problems. I think that everyone should and can be an environmentalist without having to quit their day job. Continuing analytic work and investigating practical ways that ordinary people can live sustainably, (i.e. making a difference) is where the work comes in Spring Quarter.

4. This is your first I.L.C, are you taking this route so you can live in Seattle and not have to commute to Evergreen?

While this is an exciting perk after commuting weekly for almost two years, I assure you that I aim to get the most out of it and not just fall into typical, unfortunate Evergreen stereotypes. This is a new to me, so I expect to gain a lot of experience over ten weeks through a process of trial and error. Should be fun!

Warm weather is surely just around the quarter, how are we to know that your evening writer’s session on Monday nights wont lead to Frisbee playing and day dreaming in Discovery Park?

Along the same lines of the previous question, I am slightly intimated by the independence I have, but because of this independence, and the fact that I want my education to mean something, me staying goal orientated and organized is the only option. Lucas and I have also agreed that as long as we dedicate ourselves to a good chunk of time weekly, and genuinely try to help each other out, then this whole experiment (one that we have actually talked about doing for a year) will be fun and provide ample growth for the both of us, not just as writers, but as people.

On that note, the books that we choose focus more on integrative, synergetic creative processes and avoid the typical, self serving “WRITE YOUR NOVEL NOW AND GET PUBLISHED AND MAKE MONEY DOING SO” kind of crap.

What are your personal goals as a writer? Do you want your writing to do something or is all just a self-serving process to get famous? How does your writing tie into the contract theme of “making a difference” that you have been working with all school year?

Writer is an art form and the process should be fun and if you have fun then the people reading it will have fun. Being an “environmentalist” has always seemed like such an intense, truly alternative kind of role. Derek Jensen and Frances Moore Lappe probably wouldn’t garner crazy ratings on primetime television if they had their own show. They both are incredibly popular, but I often times wonder why people sending such an incredibly important message don’t receive mainstream attention and what that even says about the mainstream right? My real inspiration is writing entertaining essays packed full of nuggets of wisdom and important truths. David Foster Wallace and David Sedaris do this, and you wouldn’t necessarily find their essays or work under “self help” or doomsday predictions or something. I like the idea of making sustainability fun and self reflective, but a little less Captain Planet kind of deal, or junk food that is secretly packed with vitamins. Does that make sense? There is a fine balance between being entertained and getting real. Naomi Klein’s The Shock Doctrine wouldn’t have the same sense of immediacy if it was full of witty gags. I do think that humor and humbleness in writing is an affective tool that can make serious issues more accessible for regular people, like my mom for instance, or anyone else who on an intrinsic level cares deeply about the environment, but doesn’t know what to do about it. Why do you think pop documentaries are so popular? They are entertaining and evoke empathy in us. Would anyone in the mainstream move to action as fast if they hadn’t seen The Cove or An Inconvenient Truth? I guess in writing I am trying to balance that out.

Malia's Garden: Peas holding hands

 "Look! The peas are holding hands," Malia exclaims. I feel kind of intrusive and embarrassed for myself for my uncomfortableness in the intimate moment. Simultaneously, amazed at the spectacle of seemingly inert objections clinging on to each other for life. But this is my mistake to view the world in such a way. I've seen the time-sped videos of plants dancing with the sun in the sky. I know this is my own anthropocentric view of a static world that I walk around on, that exists very far from the truth of things.

Think of that plant wrapping it's tendrils around the others. My somber house plant that sits on my dresser next to my bed, looking for the sun.

The Breath of All Green Things

                                             On the 1-90 somewhere in Eastern Washington.

"From our first cry announcing our arrival on Earth to our very last sight at the moment of death, our need for air is absolute. Every breath is a sacrament, an essential ritual. As we imbibe this sacred element, we are physically linked to all of our present biological relatives, countless generations that have preceded us and those that will follow....Once we have restored the breath of life to its rightful primacy -the first above all other human rights and responsibilities, the reference point from which all decisions flow -we can start to work in the long term to revive an ancient equilibrium. Using nature as our touchstone, we can play our part once more in life's long collaboration with air."
                                                                                                                                        -David Sazuki

Rare Occurence: A Healthy meal.

I have to admit that eating healthy food, shopped for at a co-op or somewhere that practices sustainable ethics, has been much more challenging than I initially thought it would be. However, I have had days over the course of the ten week quarter, when I've prepared my bike, and trekked to the Madison Market Central Co-op to buy produce and peruse a plethora of other interesting food options that the co-op has.

Since my cooking skills are minimal, I stick with food that I know is real. I mean veggies and things that grow in the earth and are minimally processed and good for me. Here is a picture of what I call a lazy man's stir fry to put in a burrito wrap: Sweet potatoes, garlic, onion, broccoli, and not pictured is the miracle vegetable Kale, which is stewing in a pot out of the picture. Later in the night though I had a crippling stomach ache, and suspect it was because all of the fiber I put into these vegan burritos. Oh well. You live and you learn and give your self a stomach ache. At least I'm trying right!