Sustainability Blog

I've the strength of Lot's Wife, not Job.

2008-06-30T12:34:00.000-07:00

"I'm thinking of leaving the area, finding a different place to raise my kids."

My white neighbor and one of my housemates are talking, and I'm eavesdropping as I work.

"Oh? Why is that?" My housemate is looking at the man's daughter, playing sweetly with kids from our community.

"It's this neighborhood," he says. "I mean, you have it good, right here, you're sort of secluded. But we get the bad neighborhood boys all the time. And what are you going to do about it? So yeah, I'm looking for somewhere else to live."

I recall seeing this man encouraging his son to beat up another boy less than a month ago. I didn't hold my tongue then, but I make a choice to hold my tongue now, and I move on by, out of range of the conversation.

Here's what to do about it, sir: you take a stand for what is right and just. You engage with the youth in positive ways. Those "bad neighborhood boys" he whined about came to our party, and didn't break anything, joined in to the playtime, didn't cause an undo amount of strain and behaved pretty well. Yes, yes, I had to really lean on them somewhat a couple of times, to make sure they knew what sort of behavior I expected of them. But I sure didn't encourage anyone to beat up anyone else. I am not feeling powerless and feeling the neighborhood is filled with violence towards me and mine. Gah, look at me, lecturing off-line from the real world. My kids are familiar with this side of me. It is unpleasant, yes?

I found black boys from our street throwing rocks yesterday, at each other and sometimes towards cars and houses. Caitlan has experience with the ways different cultures handle behavior modification, but I don't. I went out and told the boys to stop throwing rocks. They ran, and hid, and denied they were doing anything. "I'm not asking you about what you did," I told them. "I'm telling you that throwing rocks at each other, and maybe breaking windows or damaging cars, isn't allowed. You are not going to do this. Now, take the rocks out of your pockets and put them back in to that yard."

They complied.

Just about then, one of the older black men walked by. "What are you rotten kids up to? Throwing rocks? You're bad kids! Not a good one in the bunch of you! You're all no-account! I'm going to tell your poppas, and you'll all get whupped! Bad, bad, rotten, no-good, good-for nothing rotten boys! You'll never be anything!"

Is this the message we send? Where is the wisdom of elders? Is this how we raise people in my neighborhood? Do we want to teach our youth that they are worthless? Then as they grow in age but not stature, and have children of their own, they will only know how to fight or flee.

Why can't my neighbor see that our "sort of secluded" area, where his daughter can play in comfort, is the result of our hard work? We made this oasis, this refuge. We've been welcoming him in over the last several months. He seems to believe that we "lucked" into something, and that it isn't available to him. He could put in some effort and have a part of this, too.

I watch him creating his reality of misery and hardship, and while my heart goes out to him, I'm not some Gandhi, some Ella Baker. I feel too weak and talentless to pierce his pride and inspire him to greater harmony.

Forgive me, Lord, I can see the need, hear the need, feel the need, but I'm so close to my own edge that I don't see how I can act to apply Your will here.

Hm. And so my own learning place confronts me and challenges me and is let slip by yet again.

Willow House Solstice Party

2008-06-23T19:02:00.000-07:00

How do we party at Willow House? Very, very well.

We mix rhythms, ritual, action, activity, friends, neighbors, paint, feathers, twigs, paper, music, plants, food, drink and dirt, to create a truly special experience.

Even in the hot humid day, the space under the willow was cool and refreshing. Our smallest guests played dress-up, and made magic wands and willow and flower circlets. My wife and I took advantage of everyone's attention being elsewhere to run errands, buying some hot-weather starts such as tomatoes and peppers, and replanting one raised bed. She also seeded a new bed, with our next crop of salad.

When I went to get the keg, the man helping me was in the worst mood. My good mood seemed to threaten him, but rather than drop into his expectation, I stood my ground. In fact, I even elevated it. I allowed beams of solstice goodness to flow, and by the end of our transaction 10 long minutes later he seemed to be in a much better state. And I was high enough that I didn't remember to buy ice until after I'd loaded the keg into the car.

Solstice goodness? What's that? One thing to celebrate is the completion of a work. One might also choose to acknowledge release from something: a negative habit, a limiting belief, or an expectation. We made firestarters with herbs, twigs, scrolls we'd written our intention upon, all dipped in wax melted in the solar oven.

Nick played for us on the new stage. Karl, Betsy, Jori, Nini and a few others worked hard to get it ready for the party. It looks great, and works great. This is what people did before television stole our souls: we entertained each other, we clapped for each other, we connected with each other.

Even when I had a full time job, even when paying the bills was easier, my life was impoverished. I've never really fit into the world of suburbia. I am so thankful to have become a part of this re-villaging we are undertaking. Am I ghetto? I'm helping to draw the best parts of several worlds together. It's like... like building and living in the Shire. Except without hobbits.

Even the view from the nosebleed section is wonderful. Christine sings French opera accompanied by Jen on the accordion.

Later, much later, after the sun finally set on the longest day of the year, the grown-ups busted out their dance moves. I got to initiate the catwalk as a dance platform. I danced out all my negative energy, pouring myself into movement. I thought I must be horrifying people because (I am unselfconscious or a huge, big goof) they all stopped dancing. They got off the stage. They stared up at me. I thought maybe I'd killed the party. But as the song ended, they all burst into applause. I guess I'd only commandeered the party briefly for my own catharsis.

"That willow tree will never be the same, after the way you just danced with it," said one woman.

"Yeah, I get that response from my dance partners a lot," I told her.

Liz, on the other hand, got everybody dancing and kept them going. She did such a good job that I completely forgive her for her repeated acts of musicus interruptus.

"Liz won the party," said Karl.

2008-06-16T17:19:00.000-07:00

There's a problem with this blog, one which renders it slightly unsustainable for a man such as myself: not enough pictures of me on it! So let me go back through and see if I can find some images of me to post.

Ah yes, that triumphant feeling after finding a safe water crossing so we could pitch camp our first night in Utah's canyonlands. Notice the explosion of gear all over the ground. There's a reason we have closets and shelves at home.

On the same trip, clearly feeling like lord and master.

And finally, at NASA Ames' Yuri's Night, mimicking the position of the wings on a hydrofoil, the world's fastest sailboat. See, I really am a boat! Not.

Apparently, you'd better be ready to snap the picture before I notice you've pointed the camera at me or else I will pose for you.

Uproot the piles and "plant" intentional space

2008-06-09T13:05:00.000-07:00

Before the fence came down, there was a constant pile of yard debris leaning against it. Our neighbor Linton got especially crazy over it. He'd clear it out, and a few days later someone would trim up a tree, be wandering about the property, and apparently think to themselves, "Aha! here's a perfect, empty spot to pile yard waste!"

After the fence came down, the debris pile migrated to our side of the yard. It's out of the way, and I appreciate the biomatter accumulation. I'm weird that way.

However

A new pile developed in a different corner of the yard. Yep, piles breed piles. I had tried somewhat gently to get it gone and moved, but there were some bits of it that had some charge and I didn't have the oomph to deal with the charge and with the pile.

Long story short, we unmade the pile. Much of it wasn't ours. As I looked around the property, I came upon a baby pile. "Aha! A perfect spot to pile this stuff!" So I moved the broken, "Someday we could fix this and use it," stuff and helped the pile grow.

Knowing that piles have roots as deep and as hard to pull out as fennel, in the new empty spot we made in our yard, we put up a yurt. It's important to be proactive to keep the piles at bay.

Garden Committee Meeting

2008-06-09T12:49:00.000-07:00

"I could never 'do' co-housing," a friend of mine tells me. "All those meetings would make me crazy."

I can see that. Except, when I go to a meeting, it's with people I like, and so it's an excuse to spend a little time with them.

I tend to avoid the "business" meetings. I want to get stuff done. I love being on the Garden Committee. We get stuff done. For example:

"The chicken coop has to move before the Solstice Party."

"Do we have the authority to move it?"

"I say we give ourselves the authority."

"What about, we tentatively give ourselves authority to make changes in the yard that aren't permanent, and we report to the larger community the changes we make. For other things that could be seen as capital improvements, we come up with suggestions and then get the whole community's input and buy-in."

At this point the seat under my butt starts feeling like it's growing hedgehog quills, but the motion passes, and then we get up and carry the coop over to the other side of the yard.

Another Caitlan Post

2008-06-08T14:01:00.000-07:00

I forget who told me this, or maybe I read it somewhere, but it's a fun exercise: Imagine that you are retired, or have inherited money, or robots have taken on all of the labor in the world leaving people to follow their bliss- whatever seems most accessible. And then, spend one hour every day doing what you'd be doing in that scenario. ~4% of your time sounds like it's not enough, but I think most people don't even do that. For my things (I have kind of a lot of free time for a full time student with 2 jobs) I picked getting a tan, painting, and writing a book.

I sort of feel like books are a really good method of getting to know someone's life, and every person alive has the raw material, if not the inclination, to write something really intriguing. People downplay how interesting they are. Like, last night I stayed home, worked on homework, and watched the Pink Panther on DVD.

But to put it another way, I hid inside and brought my housemate's dog inside because my devil worshipping neighbor was doing a kind of ritual with a smoking chalice to curse my other neighbor's trailer, and someone called the police to make her stop. Then I worked on my painting of Keck observatory until I was so tired I spilled glazing medium on the dog and the floor, and then I fell asleep. But people kept phoning the trailer all night and leaving messages for my roommate. Every time it happened I checked the time before falling asleep, because my alarm sounds a lot like the phone. I went from "Don't they know it's rude to phone past 12?" to "Why is it 3 am? Why am I awake at 3 am? I am going to go put the phone in the bath." But instead I fell back asleep for half an hour, until the next call. The messages were such urgent things as "I was thinking about what you said about not having money to do certain things, but I think it's a matter of priorities."

So, what I mean is that life is quite interesting if you think about it. I am really struggling with the writing of a book, though. So far I have a stream of consciousness word document titled "Book!" that I have been working on since april and it is almost one page long.

So you, want to, go to the show?

2008-06-02T16:18:00.000-07:00

Life as we know it is changing forever as the pincers of Peak Oil and Global Climate Change close upon us. What to do?

Pay down your debt (you'll need the cash later)
Grow your own food
Get to know the neighbors (take down the fences, grow more food and borrow more tools)
Drive less
Have more parties
Learn to entertain without using fossil fuels

We've begun construction on Willow Stage, soon to be one of the premier backyard venues. Who knows what sorts of homegrown skits and nonsense we will get to watch? To act in? To direct? We will be inaugurating it during our all-night solstice party.

"The willow makes an amazing backdrop for the stage," says Betsy. "Like it already has curtains."

Yay! Gasoline is expensiver!

2008-06-02T16:00:00.000-07:00

No conspiracy theories, no collusion behind closed doors, simply self-interest at work: here's the real reason gasoline costs are up and will stay high at least through the Presidential election.

The United States no longer controls the world oil market.

Traditionally, US Big Oil lowers prices during elections to keep oil-friendly politicians in office. That won't happen this time because different players are in charge, and they are eager to usher in a new era in US politics.

The strong plus to this is that we US citizens might choose to take this opportunity to really assess how we consume, how we relate to each other, and what sort of world we want to leave to our descendants. Our #1 export is our attitude: when the whole world sees us over-consuming, they want to, too. Can we make living within our means, spending earth's resources' interest rather than the principle, sexy and inviting to the rest of the world?

Big, furry towel

2008-05-30T12:25:00.000-07:00

I love drying off after my low-flow 3/4 gallon per minute shower with a big, soft towel, fresh out of the closet.

Why is the towel shedding? This brown towel is shedding white fur.

Ah, clearly someone lovingly folded up the cat's bed and put it away. Now I am covered in cat hair. Shall I take another shower?

Red eyes and a runny nose. Because allergies and unclean towels.

House meeting agenda item

2008-05-16T15:52:00.000-07:00

"What's this agenda item about some bike-packers coming to visit?"

"Well, only if we want them to. I met them at Make Faire. They're a cute couple, Ryan and Mandy, who are traveling about, making a documentary about sustainability, community living, simpler choices, that sort of thing. I promised I'd ask all of you if they could come visit."

"Is there some issue?"

"I certainly don't think so. I love getting filmed and interviewed-"

"Me too!" "So do I!"

"-but since they'll be sharing the shower, at the very least, and probably the kitchen too, I felt like I better get all of our input."

"Do we have room for them? Our veggie-oil bus fills quite a bit of driveway."

"Oh, they're on bicycles-"

"Ha! HA! Let's keep inviting more and more people, as long as their transportation fits in the remaining space on the driveway!"

"If I don't feel like being filmed, I'll just hide in my room."

"I'm sure we can work out the shower arrangement."

"How long will they be here for?"

"Overnight? A day or two?"

"Oh, well, then of course they can come over!"

EBMUD intiates water rationing

2008-05-14T10:54:00.000-07:00

The news came down today that our municipal water agency, EBMUD, has initiated water rationing. At the same time, I see an article from a San Diego newsfeed that those officials aren't issuing any gray water system permits, in spite of a huge demand and tight water supplies there, too.

At our house, we just installed an outdoor sink. We'll use it for washing after working in the garden. The water and dirt drains in to a small wood chip field. There's really low possibility for spreading any contaminants because this isn't a bathroom sink. The water is going to soak in right at the roots of one of our raised beds, so we're getting two-for-one by recycling the water on site.

I was really distressed by the tone of the news from San Diego. City officials clearly have an agenda to centralize the resource. I suppose I have a fundamentally different view of what government is for. I want government that regulates infrastructure and preserves or encourages opportunities for growth and increased social equity. I do not want government that is in the role of delivering a product or commodity to me.

The primary learning that our civilization is faced with now is this: how much centralization/decentralization do we want? Centralization works really well for concentrating wealth and power into the hands of a very few. Guess what? Those very few are very much in power right now, and of course aren't at all interested in decentralization.

This issue is so poorly understood. Take for example, the "debate" about biofuels. The goal is to engage in relocalization and foster local economies, but instead the centralizing powers export biofuel production to the tropics where horrible choices get made: slashing old-growth rain forests, displacing women farmers, damming water sources for massive irrigation projects and so forth.

Try this as a guide, a measure, for discerning whether an idea is truly a solution, or if it adds to the coming woe: does it promote relocalization?

Hydrogen economy: Fail.
Biofuels: Perhaps.
NAFTA: Fail.
Global produce market: Fail.
Community gardens and agriculture: Pass.
Municipal toilet-to-tap water reclamation: Maybe.
Any form of protectionism: Fail.
Any form of open trade: Pass.
Permaculture: Pass! Great solution for promoting relocalization.

In less than a generation, our economies will be constrained to our respective bioregions, our watersheds. Clearly many of us will be making money selling ideas over whatever the internet evolves into, but many more will be making it or breaking it using whatever is available at hand. Get a jump on this. Earn and spend within your community. Demand fair prices for yourself, and for your neighbors. Don't let your dollars escape overseas, or even over the next ridge line.

Relocalization. It's here, it's the future, and it's how we can all keep feeding and sheltering ourselves as centralized control continues its collapse.

Gorgeous Greens

2008-05-06T14:19:00.000-07:00

"Bob, I'm not scared of you anymore," the four-year-old says in that fresh, open, non-sequitur way they have. Nearby, her mom photographs the poppies and represses a laugh, settling for a secret little smile.

"Oh? You were scared of me?" I think back, and decide perhaps she means she was shy of me.

"Yeah, when we first moved here. But I wanted to live where there were flowers," (giving a little twirl and inclusive hand wave), "and so here we are! It's so beautiful."

"I think so too. I'm glad you're here."

"Yeah."

We pick a few greens together from the raised bed. The plants continue to thrive. Three months on now, the arugula is bolting, so we're eating it as fast as we can so the softer leafed greens can get their turn in the sun.

"This kind is spicy to my mouth," she says. "I'm going to give it to the chickens."

The chickens, of course, gobble up greens like candy, and then bless us with delicious fresh eggs. She pokes stalks through the wire mesh sides of the chicken tractor, the hens cluck softly as they compete for the stems, and she goes inside leaving me alone to appreciate the sounds of green leaves quietly converting sunlight into tissue.

It's a good day, I think, as I munch on baby lettuce.

Art Cars and the Rising "Participation Age"

2008-05-05T17:12:00.000-07:00

Wandering the Maker Faire, I marveled at the radical self expression and DIY mash-up as these relate to anti-consumerism. Or rather, pro-participationsim. When, or where, did this movement start?

When did we leave behind doing for ourselves? The rise of industrialism brought with it mass-produced consumer goods. These things were, of necessity from their manufacturing process, identical. And marketers taught us this was a good thing. You could keep up with the Joneses. Television trained us to sit quietly and “consume” entertainment.

Along the way to that glowing suburban future, though, some felt disquiet in their deepest selves. Did they really want to fit into the mold? One of the most potent statements of self-recovery, available to anyone, would be to de-commodify their transportation—in short, make an art car.

Art cars have been part of the mobile art scene since at least the roaring 20s, but they really came into their own in the 80s. Part folk art, part something else, ranging from glued-on chotchkies to car bodies welded to each other, art cars and those who drive them are the instigators of this new culture of participatory public performance. The era of sitting quietly in a dark room and being “entertained,” of being a consumer of theater, art, music, or writing, is being replaced. The art car movement is especially inclusive; anyone with the courage to personalize their automobile is “in.” By making their car unique, they transform from mere consumers into participants.

Burning Man made participation one of the cornerstone principles of the event. People attending Burning Man know they aren’t going as spectators. They are co-creating the event. As people experience the power of participation at Burning Man, they become as dandelion seeds, scattering this trend out into larger and larger circles.

The shift is carrying forward into more and more venues, such as Yuri’s Night or Maker Faire. Maker Faire is as much a celebration of collaboration of the unlikely, from wool felting and LEDs to 3D printers and gray water, as it is a party being created in the moment. There are no passersby. Everyone will find their playful place, whether it’s riding a wooden bicycle, building a rocket, playing artist mini-golf, or daydreaming about what they could make for next year’s fair.

Computer-controlled, small-scale manufacturing is the “tool,” the manifested reality, born in response to our desire to do more than merely consume. We are designed to be creative. Those daring souls who converted cars into art are the progenitors of this era. Encouraging everyone to explore, to be a part-time performer, to say “no!” to adapting their souls to an inelastic conformity, ArtCar artists are the forebears of this re-birth of a participation culture.

I thank them (us!) for it.

Green Collar Jobs

2008-04-28T08:07:00.000-07:00

The opportunity before us is to create a new economy filled with Green Collar jobs. My friends at DIG Coop are early adopters; they can design and install a gray water system, for example, and they offer job training too.

Say what you will about the space programs of the US and Russia, but they have been responsible for the livelihood of legions of engineers, technicians and scientists. We are inspired by images the Hubble Space Telescope brings to us. The origin of these benefits, concrete and intangible, can be traced back to a group of German students studying to be civil engineers nearly 100 years ago. When they needed work, there was none in what they had trained to do, but Werner von Braun put their skills to use. He built rockets. The V-2 was a terrible weapon of war, true. Can we do better?

We have a similar labor pool now, here in the US; our vast number of underemployed, near-poverty workers. Our country has a shameful number of poor people for being a "developed" nation. Green Collar jobs cover a wide spectrum of skill, training and investment, from soil testing and ditch digging, to edible landscapes, to the design of energy systems for homes, businesses or municipalities. With cradle to cradle design, materials sciences, there are opportunities for highly skilled workers. In the service sector, Green Coaching has begun to help people re-invent their lives to be more sustainable as they live within a responsible ecologic footprint.

Let's be conscious of the deep yearning people have to do meaningful work, and together continue to find ways to develop Green Collar jobs.

Wouldn't you like to be, my neighbor?

2008-04-25T17:20:00.000-07:00

There's a neighboring duplex for sale. Just $440k asking price. Want to become part of the fun of living on our street? Come to common meal? Enjoy the fire pit and BBQ on a cooling summer evening, help care for bees or chickens? This building is a separated from mine by two other lots, so we won't be able to remove the fence and include the yard, but we will find other ways to include you in the community.

Nearly 1900 square feet total. Upstairs is a rent-paying elderly lady, the downstairs is 3 bedrooms and a bath. It looks pretty nice. I've heard that the downstairs got some rain in it, so if you buy it be sure to invite all your new cohousing neighbors over for work parties to help dig french drains and whatever else will be required.

Go to Daniel Winkler & Associates to see more.

Oh, and you don't have to believe in science or global warming or Al Gore or peak oil to be welcomed by us... but we would like you to be friendly, interested in people, active in some sort of social justice work, an artist, musician, performer, good with kids, and able to tolerate if not outright celebrate people wildly different than you.

Caitlan's Zone 1 (or Zero)

2008-04-25T13:29:00.000-07:00

In permaculture, Zones are numbered from 0 to 5, and can be thought of as a series of concentric rings moving out from a center point, where human activity and need for attention is most concentrated, to where there is no need for intervention at all. Zonation is a guide to for how much human input, or energy, is used within each tier. My friends and I have defined Zone 0 as care of self, so Zone 1 becomes your immediate environs.

Sectors are a way of considering a place's external energies: sun, wind, underlying geology, or in the case of urban permaculture, roads, neighborhoods, and municipal ordinances. These forces are mitigated or utilized, depending on what you're designing. By definition, you can't modify a sector (the sun is going to rise and set at a certain time each day no matter what), but you can modify the effects of sectors.

Caitlan's new home (zone 1) is in a mobile home park (small lot sector, HOA sector). The owner has made it one giant art project; the underlying geology of this fabricated home has been modified with hundreds and hundreds of mosaicked items, from bottle tops and hubcaps to broken tiles and cutlery and other artworks. "It's like living in an art car," she says.

Putting energy (time, materials, money) towards modifying the effects of sectors is a great way to improve the quality of life in your zone 1. Humans have been doing this for a long time. It's fun to see someone converting their dwelling into an art paradise. It's a great fit for Caitlan.

Yuri's Night NASA Ames 2008 (#1)

2008-04-18T13:28:00.000-07:00

I have a few fun pics about Yuri's Night. And after today's earlier, heavy post, some levity is in order. Here's the first of I hope many short posts: Caitlan is discovering the moon. The moon is certainly Zone 5.

We also looked at biofilms (and schooled the scientist a little bit about Utah's dry cyanobacteria!) and generally took in the scene. I really enjoyed spending time with Caity.

On Being "Right."

2008-04-18T12:00:00.000-07:00

Feudalism. Apartheid. Slavery. Eminent Domain. Crusade. Jihad. Concubines. Eye-for-an-eye. Flat Earth.

I'm fascinated that throughout history, ideas and actions that everyone agreed were "right," as in, ethical, moral, and valuable, have passed as humans grow in maturity and understanding. My recent post of a form letter for those with the courage and insight to realize that yet another idea has passed created a bunch of conversation off in a direction I wasn't fully prepared for. There is nothing abusive in that letter. It diminishes no one. It's full of positive, supportive language.

So why did it create a little tempest?

I think it's because I dared to challenge that belief in what is "right." I held up a mirror that apparently shines a light close to where people hold their religious fervor. I challenged people to look outside the controlled information outlet, and instead I got beliefs assigned back to me, extraneous data points, and strawman arguments (one of Rush Limbaugh's favorite techniques).

Harken to this: I work in the manipulation industry. Marketing is all about persuading people that they are inferior in some way, and then selling them a product to (temporarily) cure their inferiority. I am an expert in this. A large part of my affluenza recovery has been to re-learn how to use this power for good, not ill.

Because I am immune to this manipulation, I can see clearly the difference between critical analysis and persuasive discourse. Among the scientists of IPCC, NASA, NOAA, and other nations in the world, there is an overwhelming agreement that human beings are altering the climate in a way that negatively impacts our future. That's a fact: nearly all climate scientists agree we are heating up the planet.

Can you find other scientists who say it's bunk? Of course! Science isn't (or shouldn't be) dogmatic. One of the most prominent of these skeptics is a geologist (not an atmospheric scientist) with a career as an oil finder! So, is he biased? Maybe. Moreover, his own industry can't agree on whether oil is biogenic or primordial.

Bringing up 7000 ppm CO2, at a time of the planet's history that didn't include animal life, is manipulative. Can we at least constrain the conversation to the quest for keeping the planet habitable for people? Can we also not assume that I'm an Al Gore apostle? So maybe he was lucky enough to see the CO2 curve 50 years ago and clever enough to understand what it meant. But I absolutely detest his "let's shop our way out of this mess" policies, as well as his alarmist, manipulative messaging. Remember, I can see through this stuff. Assigning a point of view to me and then arguing against that is manipulative.

As for sticking to my noble efforts, where do you suppose I get the drive to keep doing these hard things? It's from the knowledge that the way we are living is unsustainable, and we are headed for a massive collapse. I sincerely believe that the questions I am asking, the tools I am uncovering, are key to ensuring the collapse is soft rather than hard. To do otherwise would be to be an accomplice to the injustices that are occurring around the world, and will occur with greater frequency as water shifts and oil becomes scarce. How can I sit in God's presence, think myself a Christian, if I'm not using every talent and skill God gave me to help build a future that is equitable for everyone? That has true, equal opportunity, regardless of race, class, gender, parentage, or nationality?

And finally, here is the big secret of global climate change: it's the greatest job opportunity in the history of human civilization. Whether it's real or not, whether rising sea levels will flood the Oval Office or not, is nearly immaterial! People spend money on what excites them, on what has a "charge," whether it has a benefit or not. The best example of this is the movie industry; what do they produce? Can you eat it? Shelter yourself with it? What we consume from them is diversion, "entertainment," yet we give them billions of dollars annually. How much more worthwhile is spending money on true security? On people's well being?

Don't try to tell me that human induced global climate change is bunk. It's the most exciting work project our species has ever faced. There's a ton of money to be made saving our behinds. God wants us to work together on this. So let's get to it.

Bicycle Permaculture Tour 2008

2008-04-14T16:54:00.001-07:00

Seven years ago I had a vision: to bring what I saw at SolFest into the urban environment, and to share it. I didn't know about permaculture at the time, there was no "sustainability" movement, and "green" meant a color of crayon (or the Green Party). The fact that I now live in a place that is part home and part demonstration space, is a testament to the power of life coaching (thank you, Nika Quirk!) and God's action in my life. On the one hand, it's been a long haul, and on the other, it's been a blink of an eye.

The day after we returned from Utah, Josh Shupack's Bicycle Permaculture Tour rolled through. Still high on vacation, I got to share Mariposa Grove and Willow House with a group of about 40 interested people. I recognized a few of them, but mostly it was new faces. They'd already been to a half-dozen projects, but there was still excitement (or perhaps that special, spiritual glow people get when they see that the future might not be so grim as the doomsayers want us to believe?) in their faces and questions.

Hank and I fielded questions at the start. I really like talking to people who have pierced the veil of our over-consumptive, pre-packaged society and are eager for the kinds of solutions that will become part of our lives within the next five to twenty years.

"Why are your raised beds different heights?" asks one person.

"Because one of the unnatural aspects of suburban design is that the developer comes through and levels the place and then plops boxes on top of that. Natural places are full of elevation change. Even Walt Disney knew this, and designed small rolling paths throughout DisneyLand. "

"It looks nice."

"Well, sure, because it's more natural and more familiar with the landscape cues embedded in our genes."

Questions came fast: "How well do you get along with your neighbors? Where are your bees? Is your gray water system hooked up? How does the rain catchment work? Is that an electric car? What's guild planting?"

Aaron, Jori and Caitlan pitched in and helped as everyone divided up into smaller groups. Jori scared a few people as he opened up the vegie-oil bus. I guess they weren't expecting him to pop out as they were peering in. Caitlan showed off the herbs garden planted all over the deck. Some people got to look at Aaron's vegie-oil settling system. Others toured the common house and asked questions about the differing economic models between the adjoining properties. I talked about physical systems and some of the integration among those, Hank talked about the social aspects. We touched on small, slow change, problem as the solution, and earth care. I suppose at the background of much of the discussion was people care and and fair share, but I don't think we got explicit about those. Several of the cyclists were clearly reluctant to leave, but they eventually all went on, some home, some to the next stop on the tour.

"Why do you think people were so interested in this?" I asked Hank, waving my hands to indicate our homes. To me, this looks like a barely begun patch of potential paradise, hardly warranting the joyful response we received.

"They'd seen a few places already, true, but I think they saw something unique, here," he said. "We have several people working on different parts of sustainability and community. I think that's the exciting part, for people who come here: they see something that's more diverse than any one person's vision can be."

That's something we certainly do have, here: a diversity of ideas and practices, of concerns and abilities. In all my years' worth of notes about building up a demonstration project, this is an aspect that I'd assigned to a far future project: having it be village-like. What a wonderful, unsuspected surprise for me, to have leapfrogged the singleton effort and landed in community.

Zone 5: Utah's Escalante

2008-04-10T18:47:00.000-07:00

Zone 5 is where a permaculturist doesn't make any changes to nature, but rather is inspired by Her ways. The slot canyons of southern Utah are a great spot to get inspired, and specifically for me, I recalled much of the water vortex work done by Viktor Schauberger.

Carrying 40 to 50 pound packs, with water shoes, through snow-melt streams filled with submerged rocks and holes we might step into up past our waists was as much adventure as I could handle. Note the backpacking shoes getting a free ride!

Our last day, we did a quick hike through a dry canyon. I took a little time here. I tried to slow down enough that I could "hear" the rock, like I do when I stand on a granite dome in the Sierras. I really couldn't do it. I did sense, though, echoes of the water that flows here.

This is a short post; I'm still working on re-integrating with the hectic lifestyle we live here in zones 1 through 3. I have so much to write about, and hopefully you can wait a bit!

Won't be updating anytime soon...

2008-04-02T00:24:00.000-07:00

(I found that online the other day and it looks exactly like Dad to me, but Nick and dad thought otherwise. "That guy has facial hair!" is what Nick said. IMO if you can only tell two people apart by their beard, they are close enough to be interesting.)

I'm sorry for posting this past midnight as it kind of ruins it, but I am somewhat getting evicted, so I was packing all evening.

Ritual, not routine

2008-03-27T19:13:00.000-07:00

I'm taking a week to get my head a bit more together, but here's a couple of pics to tide you over. Above, we colored eggs together. Below, I helped Xena install a wood floor in one of the rooms we're pretty sure isn't going to flood anymore.

We got the floor second-hand from Urban Ore. Shopping at places like that seems a good compromise between Al Gore's message of "Shop your way into environmental responsibility" and sitting in a dark corner trying not to breathe too much oxygen.

Building with urbanite

2008-03-25T13:27:00.000-07:00

The elevation change between the two yards, all of about a foot, used to be held in place with a great chunk of concrete. The willow has broken it into chunks weighing from 500 pounds to well over 1800 pounds. We used 5 men to move the first, smallest piece about 8 feet.

This piece we used two men and my wife, Xena. Aaron provided excellent supervisory support. This block was heavier, and we moved it about three times further. It is now a nice little sitting bench at the end of one of the raised beds.

"The difference," said Karl, "Is this time I knew we could do it."

Yeh.

The difference is this time there was a girl on the team.

(She's camera shy, so in the photos she's the one behind the camera. Karl and I are just posing. We really can't move that 600 pound chunk of urbanite on our own, even with the rollers made from the plum tree trunk)

Form Letter for the Global Change Hold-outs

2008-03-25T11:16:00.000-07:00

So you've finally realized you were wrong about global climate change and peak oil? Want to get back into the good graces of your friends and family who were right? Here's a nice little letter you could send them:

To my progressive, intelligent, resourceful, clear-thinking and compassionate [brother/mother/father/sister/best friend],

I just saw the pictures taken by satellite of the collapse of that ice shelf in Antarctica. I've now seen that my gullibility and belief that God will save us from ourselves played into the hands of the right-wing, reactionary, make-up-your-mind-first-and-twist-all-data politicos and my beliefs about human-activity induced global climate change and peak oil were just that: beliefs. Once it was believed the world was flat. Learning the truth eventually led to satellites taking pictures of collapsing ice shelves. I hoped it was true that I wouldn't suffer because of the choices I made, that my parents made, and that we allowed corporate profiteers to make for us. I know better now.

I am sorry. I really appreciate that you stuck to your principles and more so, modelled for me support of the thorough application of the scientific method, so that I can now replace wishful thinking with thoughtful action.

This awareness is new and sometimes difficult for me, but you've been part of the truth for long enough that I would really appreciate it if you let me know the top two or three things I could do, right now, to help mitigate this problem and make the world a better place for human civilization.

Warmest, (and warmer?)

[your name]

Old-growth Forests and Atmospheric CO2

2008-03-20T15:09:00.001-07:00

Steve and I are in a punctuated discussion. Not long ago, he posted this comment:

"Developers use an awful lot of lumber, all sustainable. In fact, if you believe Al Gore's tripe about carbon footprints, (I don't) wasting lumber is a great way to pull CO2 out of the atmosphere and lock it up in solid form."

I'm less interested in sustainability and more interested in permaculture. Sustainability seems to have been co-opted by the reductionist viewpoint: "How much money can be made from this resource without losing the ability to make future money?" Permaculture seeks to mimic nature's methods so that we end up in a spiral of increasing abundance.

I read a fascinating article by Sharon Levy about trees and CO2 over at onearth.org. Beverly Law, a professor of global forest science at Oregon State University, is using new techniques to study the interaction of forests and the atmosphere:

"Global warming has forced foresters to address the impact of logging on the flow of carbon between forests and the atmosphere, and many in the industry have insisted that stands of young, fast-growing trees capture carbon more efficiently than do older forests. Using a recently developed technology called the eddy covariance method-more commonly known as eddy flux measurement-Bev Law and her colleagues are showing that those assumptions are wrong."

When Steve writes that all lumber is sustainable, I suppose that could be true, in a really well managed forest. One of the difficulties in discussing this is that humans have short memories; the fact that London had to pass a moratorium on new buildings because England was burning up all its trees for firewood (before they discovered they could burn coal) is a fact known only to those who have studied the rise and fall of energy economies. Is a lumber industry sustainable? Trees do, in fact, grow back. Ecosystems, however, take much longer to recover (if they ever do). A lumber industry following permaculture principles would be more than sustainable; it might also reap rewards in improved water quality, better camping/sightseeing, sale of under-canopy food products (such as "wild" grapes, strawberries, currants) in addition to participating in the carbon-offset market.