wallace stegner

If you have not already been introduced to this poet activist, look him up as soon as you can. He is literary, wise, historical, and political all bound up in poetic passion that makes you read slowly and hesitate to turn too many pages lest you get to the end too quickly.

He was born in early years of the 20th century and carried the yoke of early environmentalism when that was a lonely burden to bear.

He reminds us of the great swath of land that made us, that inspired us just by being there. West was more than a direction for Americans - it was the frontier, the place of opportunity, escape, freedom, chance, choice that we had safe in the bank whether we ever needed it and used it or not. It was a calling. And we all hear it still.

There was a carelessness we thought we could afford here, for there was always an out-there waiting for us, by our right.

And while we still act that way, and that sense of possibilities still fires the American spirit, we have long passed the time when the land can afford all the misuse, disregard and hope that we put on it.

Stegner speaks of all this in ways that do not fail to move us - there are times it is like reading psalms, and the psalmist's paeans to nature, only in the landscape we know as America instead of the sacred land of Israel. But how better to remind us of all the earth's sacredness?

telling time

I did not take my watch to the beach house this winter break. Indeed, I have stopped wearing watches altogether - not because I ignore or disdain or otherwise seek to surmount time. Not at all. But because I could spend my entire discretionary budget on watches - finding them fascinating as I do. I could build an entire wardrobe of watches - with small faces and large faces; simple faces and intricate faces; leather bands, artsy bands, beaded bands. Black bands, red bands, silver bands. I would never know which one to wear when. And then, of course, is the maintenance. They break and cost as much to fix as to purchase. So I leave them, lying there. They stare at me blankly, looking up from my jewelry drawer. Carcasses, bored and stuck. Instruments of movement and eternity frozen in time. How can I not feel slightly guilty?

Anyway, I don't need watches because everywhere I go tells me the time. Everything in the house has a built in LED digital clock display. The cordless phones, the computer I am working on, my cell phone; never mind the decorative clock on my desk. And when I am out of the house, I can read the time on my car radio; my cell phone; office clocks; desk clocks and other people's watches. Truth be told, it is hard not to be aware of the time in most of the places I live my life.

So I did not take a watch to the beach. There used to be two wall clocks at this house, one in the dining room and one in the living room. There was an LED display on the microwave, and several radio clocks in the various bedrooms. As far as moden houses go, this house was clock-poor. Yet, it was sufficient for casual purposes.

But the clock in the dining room stopped working years ago. The Orioles clock in the living room had disappeared. And the LED display on the microwave was broken. I did not have access to the bedrooms that may have had radio clocks; and the one I slept in had none.

I did not have access to my computer. The phones in this house were too old to have time displays (or any displays for that matter). And besides, it was shabbes so I was not going to use the phone.

Bottom line: I had no way to tell time.

Okay, I knew when the sun set, and when it got dark. But after that, all bets were off. Nighttime, especially after sleeping for a while, becomes a jungle of time. How far have I traveled; how far yet to go? Am I rested or still tired? Did I sleep enough or just a little? Is it six hours to sunrise, or one? Am I hungry or do I just want to eat?

We like maps for the same reason we like knowing the time: knowing one's place in the universe is soothing, orienting, offering a semblance of control and knowledge. I was surprised, even so, at how unsettling it was not to know what time it was.

Daybreak offered little respite. It was already light when I woke up in the morning. Was it an hour after sunrise? two? three? It was overcast and raining. I have been coming to this house for over 20 years and I have a good sense of direction - so if I could see the sun, even in the winter months, I could roughly gauge the time of day. No luck here.

At this point, I was getting desperate, a mild case of an addict seeking a fix. Need to know the time. Need to know the time. I felt like tearing apart the house looking for a clock. True, my husband had his watch, but I think he was wearing it. And the room was dark.

And as the anxiety rose, it occurred to me that maybe I should just sit down and take a moment (without knowing which one it was!) and savor this. Perhaps I should sit down, and figure out what this desperation means, and what I can learn from it.

Here I was, on Shabbat, on vacation, in a beach community that was almost deserted. With nothing to do, no obligations, no demands, no work, no nothing. Why couldn't I just sit, or walk, or read or enjoy without knowing what time it was?

Clearly, for better or worse, deliberately and consciously or not, I plan my days according to the time it is now and the time I have left. I measure and weigh: do I do this or that? do I need to rush or take my time? can I allow myself to be distracted or not? Time is less to be experienced than to be filled. Until it runs out.

I cannot say if this is good or bad. I simply offer it as the way it is for me. And either way, it is enlightening for me to know. I think it is instructive for each of us to know how we respond to a timeless day. See if you can set aside a day beginning at evening, not just because that is the way that Jews count time, but because it gives you a whole nighttime to be without clocks (save the passage of the moon, on a clear night).

I plan to try again sometime to go a day without knowing the time. Even if it is in the middle of the night and I don't know if i get up to read whether I will have enough time to go back to sleep or not.

But I am not so certain when that day will be.

shore thing

I went to a beach house over the winter break. Relaxing and pleasant, and very quiet. I (re)learned a lesson of the shore.

To most of us, the beach and ocean are seasonal commodities, like lemonade and warm sunshine. We "use" them in the summer months and pack them away when the weather gets cold. The place was empty, almost deserted. Hotels were boarded up, saying things like: thanks for a great summer. reopening mid-April. Many were shuttered tight, with their No Vacancy light on. Of course, that was not true. There were lots of vacancies, but no one was around to let you in. The town shut down; hibernated from November through April. Half a year, all this real estate, built-up environment, infrastructure, lies fallow.

True, not all beach communities fold up by Thanksgiving; and more and more of them try to create a year-round atmosphere of dining, entertainment and relax-zzzzation. And reasonably so. They want to make the most of their investment.

And I can't blame those towns that happily wave goodbye to the seasonal invaders, heaving a sigh of relief. After all the fuss and bother of the summer months, the town deserves a good rest, and even more, needs a facelift. Maintenance, painting, fixing all get done in the off-season.

So, I am not complaining about the way the towns handle their cyclical lifestyles. But I am saddened that we, the visitors, hardly give the seas and beaches, and the towns that are built mostly for our use, a second thought once the days get short.

Is it wise, especially as built space becomes tighter and land more precious, to let such resources lay fallow, wasted, half the year? Can we creatively imagine how to use these places to the benefit of all? What if we moved the increasing homeless population whom we are struggling unsuccessfully to house (not the families with children who need to go to school but the adults who otherwise have no family or obligations to tie them to a community) during these bitter months to these places, house them at reasonable prices and put them to work cleaning and tending and mending these seaside communities? This may redeem both structures and souls, and help transition many of these folk back into lifestyles that can support jobs and homes.

Are there schools? retreats? other seasonal uses we can imagine utilizing these places so that we needn't build more places elsewhere, and so that we can reintroduce people to the wonders of nature "out of season?"

Appreciating the wilds all year round. Utilizing wisely, all year round, what we create. Perhaps these two goals can be blended to yield something greater than we can now imagine. Surely clever entrepreneurs and social activists can come up with something.

two for one

Sharing a home is good for the environment. So say the researchers at Michigan State University. In a study that could be nominated for the Oh Really Awards, we learn that two people living together (in this case, also married), use far fewer resources than two people living apart. Chalk one more up to the benefits of living together. How good it is to have someone to come home, to warm up your bed, to share home-made soup with, to finish off the portion that is too big for you, to vent your frustrations to. People in our homes (as long as they are not threatening or hostile) extend our lives, care for us when we are sick, give us someone besides ourselves to worry and fuss over.

Living together is good for the soul, good for the pocketbook, good for the environment, good to banish loneliness, good for a laugh. Then why, since 2005, are half of American households made up of one person? In the 1950's, according to an editorial in today's Sun paper, 3/4 of all households were headed by married couples. Okay, even I - old-fashioned though I be - am less interested in arguing for the married part than I am rooting for the couple or shared living space part. Being alone is hard for most of us. And even though it has it pleasures of solitude and quiet and freedom in the short term, these can grow heavy in their abundance and relentlessness of living alone.

So why are we such private, alone people? Why do we so cherish or protect our privacy and yet yearn for the hubbub of third places and seek comfort in the company of the vast hordes of cyberspace? Do we not trust each other enough? Are we too self-indulgent? Too demanding? Too unsure?

I, for one, do not know. But I do hope that those who are planning our future pay attention. I hope that future architects and builders and city planners and community activists explore ways to build housing that can both bring people together, and give them their privacy; in ways that enrich their personal lives, and limit their footprint on this grand world of ours. Surely that is not too much to ask.

LEDs

While exploring the Terrapass carbon offset site, I discovered that they had LEDs to sell. Not inexpensive: $30 for a light with the equivalent of a 40 watt bulb. But it is supposed to use about 1000th of the energy of incandescents and will most likely outlast me.

Curious, I bought two - one to put over my kitchen sink, which is our most-used indoor light. I figured I would feel less unhappy if that light that stayed on every night til the wee hours of the morning due to some late-owl meanderings if it was energy efficient. The second one is still in its box. Not sure where to put it.

One thing I noticed right away when I screwed in the LED - it does not play nicely with the incandescents in the other kitchen fixtures. (we are a hybrid house - the kitchen now has an LED, 9 CFLS, and three incandescents. don't ask.) It goes better with the CFLs, but it is a different breed of light.

It is strong, but not diffuse. It is white but not harsh. Soft - like a shower of bright fullmoon light. To stand in its orb is to feel oneself outdoors, mid-month, on a cloudless night - and to wash dishes in its light is to imagine that the water is a tangible rush of its light cool on your skin.

Still and all, not all members of my family like it. And it does not give off enough light for aging eyes to feel sated in brightness. There are times I would like to slide up the dimmer switch - but there is none to be had. The bulb is as high as it can go. It was the highest strength I could find.

So the industry must continue to work both on the quality and power of the light, and on the price.

But to know that not only is my house powered by 100% wind energy; but that our consumption of even that energy is low (the lower our per household consumption, the further wind energy will go and the more quickly we can be weaned from fossil fuels) feels good.

And to glance into the kitchen with all the other lights off and see this glow of cool, calming moonlight transforms the space into the place of fairytales.

humble pie

Sooner or later, in a just world, the bullied wake up, and realize that if they stick together, their oppressor can be contained. that is what happened in Bali. The Bush Administration, which had been standing obstinate, blocking all progress at the Bali conference, was booed at, pushed aside, and otherwise humiliated, with its own words being flung back at them. Ultimately, and suddenly, they backed down. And now we have something of an agreement that promises to do something good for the world. Of course, the White House quickly stepped back from even this iota of cooperation with the rest of the world and re-asserted its obstinacy a few hours later. But thank goodness most delegates had gone home by then.

here is the Grist reports it.

'Tis the Season to Be Bali
High drama leads to compromise at international climate meeting

After days of bitter fighting and an overtime stretch filled with twists, turns, and tears, world leaders on Saturday agreed on a broad plan for developing a new global climate treaty by 2009. The "Bali roadmap" calls for measurable and verifiable steps by developing nations as well as industrialized ones, and calls for developing nations to get credit for protecting their tropical forests. The European Union had pushed for industrialized countries to commit to cuts in greenhouse-gas emissions of 25 to 40 percent below 1990 levels by 2020, but the U.S., Canada, and Japan balked, so the final text just says that "deep cuts" in emissions are needed. The U.S. also announced that it could not support language committing rich nations to provide technological help to poorer ones; that move elicited boos, hisses, and an impassioned plea from a Papua New Guinea representative to the U.S.: "If you're not willing to lead, then get out of the way." Believe it or not, the U.S. then did get out of the way, changing its position and saying it would support the agreement. Still, just hours after the deal was finalized, the White House expressed "serious concerns" about it, just like it does whenever democracy gets in its way.


Let's keep the pressure on and see if we can truly make progress to save this planet.

change of heart and bamboo dishes

Inexplicably, but happily, the US withdrew its obstinacy at the 11th hour of the Bali conference, so now there is an agreement. While the reports are still coming in, and details are few, here is one report of America's change of heart:


"The United States initially did not agree to proposals to strongly require that rich nations help poorer nations access green technology to limit their emissions.

The U.S. stance caused delegates to boo the American delegation at the conference, and at one point a tired-looking Yvo de Boer, the UN's climate chief who hadn't slept in two days, broke down in tears over the deadlock.

Finally, U.S. negotiator Paula Dobriansky capitulated and declared she would accept the deal.

"We've listened very closely to many of our colleagues. We will go forward and join consensus," she said, as the room erupted in cheers."

How refreshing - a team player emanating from the Bush camp. Thank goodness this gathering was in Bali and not Washington.

now, the trick is not just to create solid benchmarks but assure that we meet them. That is where we, the people, come in.

On a different matter, for synagogues and homes who don't want to use disposables and can't afford to use fancy dishes, bamboo plates and utensils come to the rescue. They are lightweight, easy to clean and stack, won't break, and affordable, especially now.

Crate and Barrel is having a hefty sale - buy them for your synagogue's shabbat kiddush and your informal family gatherings.

The gift to give the person who has everything. And a way for your shul or institution to be green. And they don't weaken or leak!

Nobel Gore

Al Gore used the bully pulpit of the Nobel Peace Prize to remind the world we are running out of time. "Today," he said, "we dumped another 70 million tons of global-warming pollution into the thin shell of atmosphere surrounding our planet. And tomorrow, we will dump a slightly larger amount, with the cumulative concentrations now trapping more and more heat from the sun."


It is a stark reminder that this is a problem that grows with every passing moment. It does not stand still. Neither can we. While we work to change our laws, our technologies, our culture, we must work to change our personal behaviors as well. Conservation, while not the sole answer, is a beginning. Light bulbs can't save the world, but they can contribute mightily to reducing your waste. In addition to changing my most used lightbulbs to CFLs, I decided to try an LED in the light over my kitchen sink, without a doubt the light that stays on the most in the house.

True, it is expensive. $30 for a 40 watt bulb. But the bulb is attractive, the light is as radiant as the full moon, as soothing, peaceful and blue as a moonshadow. And it lasts up to 1000 times longer while drawing a fraction of the energy (I think I was told it drew .07 percent of the energy of an incandescent bulb of comparable size). My son assures me it will outlast me.

If I go somewhere within a mile's distance and the weather and my schedule permit, I often walk these days. I try to build in the time (15 minutes to walk vs 5 to drive). Not so hard after all. But assuredly not easy either.

Bottom line, there are some things we can do to save the earth that take almost no extra effort: recycling, turning off lights, changing light bulbs (which we need to do anyway, only with CFLs or LEDs a lot less often). But there are some things that will take more effort - organizing our lives so we drive less, consume less, forgo items with wasteful packaging, spend more for items that are not made in China. But our investment today will save us lives, comfort and even money in the not too distant future.

One more thing: Gore got the Nobel PEACE prize, not the science prize. Environmental health will avoid major conflicts based on growing scarcity, disappearing land masses, refugees, sickness, need.

What more do we need to motivate us to act?

long time away

Life and events have lifted over this glorious fall Thanksgiving weekend so I am once again able to set fingers to keys and think a bit.

The weather has released its bracing fall coolness into the world and the leaves graciously responded. Vibrant yellows and deep reds excite the air. On a stretch around my circle, a small orchard of maple trees line the street. The leaves they discard and scatter around their base form a thick sea-foam of brilliant yellow, not yet brittled or dried. It was like walking along a beach of leaves, with an ocean of grass beyond.

Thanksgiving itself was unseasonably warm in the morning, so that all the neighborhood pick-up football games - including my son's alumni high school game - was well-attended and thoroughly enjoyed by players and spectators alike.

The afternoon grew cooler and windier and threatened to rain (we should only have been so lucky).

The thanksgiving tradition in my home is to celebrate the night before, erev Thanksgiving, Wednesday night, with a large homemade meal, including a home-made tofurkey (or as my mother has come to call it, faux turkey). This year was the biggest and best ever. Family - old and new, and friends - old and new, came. The living room was filled with chatter and camaradarie and love. Inspired by the CSA, I baked squash bread (with yeast, so it tastes something like a rye or sour-dough bread, with a slight yellow-tinge). It was delicious. I made it into loaves, as well as rolls that we scooped out and served home-made vegetable soup in.

Stuffed acorn squash also made an appearance for the first time. Stuffed with tri-color cous cous sauteed with onion, raisins and dried cranberries. A little molasses for a deeper taste and eggs to hold it all together. Quite yummy. And quite satisfying, both gustatorially and spiritually.

But the day is past and the weekend is over and the frenzy of gift buying is upon us. Time is no doubt a scarce commodity for many, but wouldn't home-made presents, simple though they are, be greatly appreciated? and kept longer, placed in old trunks or suitcases, or stashed away in closets, to be remembered or bumped into weathered years from now?

The faces of shoppers who dragged themselves out to the stores at ungodly hours, all pumped up when the doors were unlocked, desperate to make a killing at the bargain tables, haunt me. Is this love? What are they doing? and why?

From Cosmos to Kitchen II

CSAs are Community Supported Agriculture - that is, a kind vegetable coop you buy set shares in. So every week, you get a set amount of vegetables (and some fruits) depending on the produce grown on the farm you associate with.

They are wonderful in many ways, but the biggest challenge, and the second most powerful lesson I learned from mine, is the burden of abundance. It is almost embarrassing, and certainly guilt-inducing, to even have to admit it.

But, after all, how much watermelon can one eat, some of our members uncomfortably mumbled? How many squash can you prepare before exhausting both your ideas, and your appetite?

After a while, your friends begin to run when they see you coming with a bulging canvas bag. You may be able to dump your excess on them once, but after that, they get wise to you.

I am particularly happy scheduling meetings at my home now - in part just so that I can entice my visitors to take some of the excess produce home!

I give some to the women who clean my house; to the guys who came to repair my oven. I'd give it to my mailman, if I ever saw him. I am thinking of leaving some outside for the oil man to find when he hangs the delivery receipt on the front door handle! Or maybe I'll just wrap them in bunting and leave them on my neighbors' doorsteps with a note pinned to them that says: Eat me!

Inevitably, we cannot eat all of it fast enough, and so sometimes some of it goes into the compost heap.

This brush with abundance, and the waste it causes, makes me appreciate the necessity of two elements of food 'technology':

-- the art of preserving food
-- the creation of a successful transportation and distribution system.

In days gone by, preserving, or "putting up" foods, was a time-honored tradition. It was an all-consuming household ritual that is all but lost to us today. Late in the season, households would prepare for the intense, concentrated cooking, jarring, baking, sealing that would go on possibly for days. All available hands were recruited. Water-hauling, pot-stirring, fuel-tending, who knows what else; the tasks were endless. But it was necessary if the "excess" harvest, the harvest that could not be eaten before it went bad, was not to be wasted. It was this food that would get the families through the winter.

In the face of such excess, I began to appreciate the physical and spiritual elements of preserving.

With almost a dozen squash - acorn and butternut and another one that looks like baby, striped footballs with flattened ends - I had to figure out how to use them all. There was just so much ratatouille and casseroles that I could make. And truth be told, they don't freeze particularly well.

I was lucky enough to find a squash yeast bread in The Enchanted Broccoli Forest - a trusted cookbook if ever there was one.

So while I had my doubts, I followed Molly Katzen's lead and discovered that I could use up three acorn squash making three loaves of delicious squash bread. And these freeze beautifully.

But the amount of time I devoted to mixing and kneading and waiting for the bread to rise reinforced in me a great appreciation for the work, wisdom, talents and dedication of our mothers, who were taught by their mothers how to take the 'excess' of the season and store it away for the lean days of winter.

And say what we will about the benefits of local foods, it is essential to create a distribution system that gets the local foods to the local mouths.

I know that ours is not the only household in our CSA that 'complains' about too much food. I know that ours is not the only household that has thrown away food on occasion. This waste - small though it be - reinforces the awareness that producer and consumer do not always live in close proximity, or in related orbits. Growing the food is the first challenge; getting it to the ones who need it is the second. Even as we laud eating locally, we still need to work on proper distribution.

So it makes me wonder if farms have excess food too that they are unable to sell and distribute - and does that food go to waste when nearby families go to bed hungry?

Is there a way our community can arrange to buy that excess food and distribute it, with accompanying cooking classes and recipes and potluck dinners, to those in need?

I heard a stunning comment on a report of fresh foods, or the lack thereof, in an inner city. A woman who just started a community garden said: It is easier to get guns and drugs in this neighorhood than to get a tomato.

CSAs are wonderful. I gained so much more than the healthy, local food I ate.

What do I now do with these insights, blessings and guilt?

From Cosmos to Kitchen I

On October 24, the Comet 17P/Holmes, an otherwise well-mannered, highly ignorable comet, erupted in light. While this didn't make the press, the stargazing world is abuzz with excitement. My son - the astronomer - called us at 11:30 at night to tell us to go out and look up and see this amazing phenomenon. Indeed, there where no star usually is seen, was a messy blob of light.

What follows is a quote from astronomy.org/starwatch website I found that explains this phenomenon.


" What happened to dinky Holmes, to transform it into a fuzz ball visible... in center city Allentown? It is thought that a sinkhole collapsed on the tiny one-to-two mile diameter nucleus which triggered an explosive amount of outgassing caused by the sun’s heat. The gasses pushed out huge quantities of dust which were sprayed like a turning garden hose as the nucleus rotated. The result has been a circular halo of debris now over one million miles in diameter, scattering sunlight back to us and creating the fluffy blob of light near the bright star Mirfak in Perseus the Hero. Why the media hasn’t picked up on this is anyone’s guess, but it is the top story if you’re an astronomer. Comet 17P/Holmes won’t be around forever. Its expanding coma will eventually get so huge that it will simply disappear against the sky background."

We live in an exciting neighborhood!

And while we are on the subject of the sky: the annual Leonid meteor shower is coming up.

Meteor showers - when you can possibly see a dozen or so shooting stars an hour! - occur throughout the year.



The Leonids are so called for they appear in the constellation of Leo.

This is what upcoming.yahoo.com tells us about this year's Leonids:

"Because Leo does not start coming fully into view until the after midnight hours, that would be the best time to concentrate on looking for the Leonid meteors.

The Leonid meteors are debris shed into space by the Tempel-Tuttle comet, which swings through the inner solar system at intervals of 33 years. With each visit the comet leaves behind a trail of dust in its wake."

That site also gives you a lot more stargazing information in user-friendly (non-technical) language.

http://stardate.org/nightsky/meteors is also a good popular and understandable site. This is their explanation of meteor showers:

What are meteor showers?

An increase in the number of meteors at a particular time of year is called a meteor shower.

Comets shed the debris that becomes most meteor showers. As comets orbit the Sun, they shed an icy, dusty debris stream along the comet's orbit. If Earth travels through this stream, we will see a meteor shower. Depending on where Earth and the stream meet, meteors appear to fall from a particular place in the sky, maybe within the neighborhood of a constellation.

Meteor showers are named by the constellation from which meteors appear to fall, a spot in the sky astronomers call the radiant. For instance, the radiant for the Leonid meteor shower is located in the constellation Leo. The Perseid meteor shower is so named because meteors appear to fall from a point in the constellation Perseus.

You can also find a full list of the eight major meteor showers and the best dates for viewing them at this site.

So much for the cosmos.

To the kitchen:

My foray into the CSA world (Community Supported Agriculture) has taught me many things. Two of which are this:

That we as modern privileged westerners generally tend to consume according to our desires. If we want a nectarine in February - no problem. Fresh strawberries in November - just run to the store. We may pay a bit more, but otherwise we generally don't think much about it.

Yet I can remember not so long ago a series of commercials that promoted something called "summer fruit." Pictures of luscious peaches and mounds of berries would be draped across the tv set, telling us these fruits that we have waited for are once again available. Because they were not available all year round back then - at least not at any prices that normal folk could afford. It is hard to imagine these days that something we craved to eat was beyond our reach simply because it was cold outside.

Our cheap fuel and impressive transportation and refrigeration systems have enabled us over the past 20 years to make it summertime all year round in our supermarkets. And while that is great for our appetites, it might not be so great for the planet.

For one thing, today, freighters and tankers that move cheap food and products around the world contribute more to greenhouse gas emissions than does the aviation industry. That is a relatively new development.

In addition, the fields that are cleared to feed our summertime desires in the midst of our winter, and the "cheap" products that are made (for example) in China are, in fact, quite costly. They take their toll on the earth and on the health of the workers (occupational safety as we know is not well regulated in China). Additionally, as you probably know, China has now surpassed the US in the amount of CO2 emissions it spews into the air largely from the coal-fired power plants it is building now (using outdated 1980's technology) that run the factories that give us our cheap merchandise.

It all begins with our appetites.

The CSA has taught me what I knew but did not yet feel: that the earth has its cycles and that we live within them. Even more, that there is a grace and humility and joy that comes with living within those cycles. Which is not to say that agriculture and manufacturing cannot be pushed to bring the earth to its fullest potential. Humanity is charged with bringing both ourselves and our earth to our greatest level of dignity and productivity. But not by sacrificing the long-term health of the workers, the land, the water or the air.

So bending my appetite to the cycles of the earth instead of bending the yield of the earth to my appetite is a lesson I take away as this CSA season ends.

I will talk about the response to (some would say oppression of) abundance in the next post.

what, me worry?

Inconceivable!

Nancy A. Nord is the acting chairwoman of the U.S. Consumer Product Safety Commission.

You would think with all the brouhaha over tainted children's toys, poisoned pet food, anti-freeze in toothpaste, e. coli in spinach and so much more, Ms Nord would be feeling overwhelmed and understaffed.

You would think that with a job that requires not only overseeing all domestic consumer products but those imported from all over the world, Ms Nord would be thrilled with the proposed legislation that would (1) increase her commission's authority, (2) make it easier to receive product reports, (3) increase her staff AND (4) double her budget.

But she is a member of the Bush administration. So, as counter-intuitive as it might seem, Ms. Nord, continuing the President's march to deregulation, has written to the Senate Commerce Committee arguing *against* this effort to strengthen her commission.

(see the article in The Sun, Tuesday, October 30, 2007, p. 3A)

Does *Homeland Security* - grandly conceived - not include the assumption that the toys we buy our children, the toothpaste we lay beside our bathroom sinks, and the food we feed our families are safe? How can we feel safe when we are afraid of being sabotaged by the very products that are meant to bring us joy, amusement and even health? How can we feel safe when the *enemy* can be lurking inside the stuff we bring into our homes? What is President Bush thinking?

POGO on the environment

My husband sent me this touching and telling tidbit of information:

The famous Pogo saying: "we have met the enemy and he is us" was created for the original Earth Day Pogo comic strip, bemoaning pollution, trash and the general disregard for the natural environment.

To see the strip, go to Wikipedia, search for Pogo, and click on entry number #4, "We have met the enemy..."

Words of wisdom from an irresistible and irrepressible possum.

Thank you, Walt Kelly.

Hans Jonas

Hans Jonas was a 20th century philosopher who - though little known in the popular American environmentalist movement - is a thinker we would do well to (re)discover.

One powerful quote by Jonas (a Jew, who also was a passionate philosopher who spent some time in Israel after fleeing Germany before WWII and ultimately settling in America) is:

"Act so that the effects of your actions are compatible with the permanence of genuine human life". This is the core of sustainability.

And another:

"It was once religion which threatened us with a last judgment at the end of days. It is now our tortured planet which predicts the arrival of such a day without any heavenly intervention. The late revelation... is the outcry of mute things themselves that we must pull together in curbing our powers over creation, lest we perish together on a wasteland of what was creation."


Haunting.

Some key works:

The Imperative of Responsibility: In Search of Ethics for the Technological Age (1979

The Phenomenon of Life: Toward a Philosophical Biology (1966)

"The Outcry of Mute Things" can be found in Mortality and Morality (1996) pp. 201-202

There is a new book out which traces Jonas' Jewish influences: The Life and Thought of Hans Jonas: Jewish dimensions, by Christian Wiese.

I hope to get the book tomorrow.

lessons of potlatch

Still raining, three days running. How lucky we are, even if the rain is intermittent. How good and comforting it is to hear the rain fall on the roof; white noise at night, without the aid of a machine!

I was reminded of the Northwest Indians potlatch ceremony today, during a conversation of the culture of gifts and gift-giving (more of that and its influence on our buying urges later).

To celebrate various lifecycle events, and to mark one's place and status in society, the American Northwest Coast Indians celebrated potlatch ceremonies. Grand amounts of people would be invited from neighboring and sometimes distant areas. Lasting often several days, the ceremony would be led by a host who would lavish food and gifts of blankets, baskets, copper and baubles of all sorts on the guests.

Some anthropologists suggest that these ceremonies served not only the purpose of aggrandizing the host and establishing relationships between grantor and recipient, but they also served to redistribute wealth that had accumulated in one person's domain. It seems that in that culture, undue accumulation of wealth was not smiled upon, and so a folk ritual was developed to serve as a practical corrective.

While the owner gave up (that is, reduced much of) his wealth at these ceremonies, he also gained standing and status. Indeed, it seems this may have been the only way his money truly served him. Evidently, possessing wealth did not promote standing. Giving it away did!

Imagine if our wealth and possessions had value only as a prelude to distribution and gifting - what would the world, our consumer patterns, the environment, and our community's social health look like today?

The High Price of Doing Nothing

I am sitting in my kitchen, with my favorite, toasty sweater on, a cup of warm tea, listening to the rain come steadily down.

Ordinarily, this is not remarkable for a mid-October day (except maybe for the fact that I am at home!). But this year has been anything but ordinary. As the fires rage in California, we have been experiencing 70 and 80 degree days here, our reservoirs dangerously low, our lawns dry as a bone. Blue skies, green leafy canopies, low humidity, short-sleeve comfort, evening cricket serenades and outdoor jogging weather should not be reasons to complain. But they are when they occur in mid-October. This time should be about vibrant foliage, damp piles of browned and oranged leaves, people cuddling in jackets and sweaters and maybe even scarves.

Whereas once we might have thought of this year as an anomaly, it is more likely we should name it the beginning of a new climate for the mid-Altantic states. Already the growing season is lengthening a bit, bird migration patterns are changing, ocean temperatures are warming.

Tomorrow is here.

Ten years or so ago, we might have been able to speak of averting climate change. Today, our rhetoric must change. We have two different goals:

1) limiting climate change, and
2) adapting to climate change.

Even as we continue to fight for lower CO2 emissions, simpler lifestyles, and less consumerism, we must also put our energies into planning for adapting to the changes we cannot stop.

The lesson to be learned is this: the more we act now, even with present-day costs and expenses, the less it will cost us overall. Let us build efficient buildings now - to make them viable, affordable and livable in the future. And let us begin to put a price tag on accommodating those displaced and disoriented due to climate change. As we respond, compassionately, let's do the math. Then we will see how unaffordable doing nothing really is.

the re-enchantment of nature

"We will not fight to save what we do not love." Stephen Jay Gould

In our efforts to educate and motivate people, we dare not overlook the power of aesthetics. We know that love is a greater motivator than fear. So even as we need to face and teach the truth about the degraded state of the earth today, we need to speak of the beauty and irresistable power of nature. Great nature writers are out there: in addition to the well-known, among them John Muir and Aldo Leopold, there are also lesser known ones (at least, those I am just discovering): Annie Dillard, "Teaching a Stone to Talk", and Richard Nelson, "The Island Within."

So along with knowing the amount of CO2 in the atmosphere and creating the top ten list of things we all can do to reduce our carbon footprint, we need to discover our favorite nature writers, and share them with others.

And more: we need - as a people - to re-discover and re-create Jewish nature narratives that move us today.

Surely we can find powerful proclamations about nature at the end of the book of Job; and in Psalm 104. We should mine those, for they have the ability to move us to awe. But we also need contemporary narratives, stories, of nature - both in Israel and around the world, from a Jewish pen and a Jewish perspective. And how wonderful if we could find hidden treasures of such narratives in the vast still-undiscovered writings from somewhere in our tradition.

Perhaps we can begin with what we have: the blessings we say about early blossoming trees and upon hearing thunder and seeing lightning, upon seeing unusual creations of all kinds, should be as familiar to Jewish children as is kiddush and ha-motzi. Maybe even more so.

We need to re-enchant nature - so that it will be loved, and people will fight for it.

the power of aesthetics

when our dreams come true

We are the first generation that is witnessing the fulfillment of the biblical blessing that earlier generations never dreamed could come true: "Be fruitful, and multiply and fill the earth."

Who could have imagined - even a century ago - that this earth would become so full of people, technology and stuff that God's grandest wish for us would be ours in our lifetime? But, it has not turned into the blessing it was meant to be.

We are filling the earth not just with our capacity, our goodness and our wisdom, but with our waste and our poisons. No place on earth is untouched by human 'achievements'. Whales and birds die of discarded plastic bags, bottle caps, and beach toys ingested thousands of miles off-shore. The air, water and soil are filled with refuse whose journey began hundreds of miles away, but that nonetheless sickens and weakens us downstream.

Here is the question: What do we do when our founding blessing has become a reality - and turned into a nightmare? Where else in Tanakh, our Bible, and our tradition can we turn for the wisdom, inspiration and guidance that can help us reclaim the purity of that earliest vision?

It is those texts, those teachings, those discoveries that I hope to explore over time on this blog. I am eager to hear your wisdom on this as well.

nobel prize

Many times, the Nobel Peace Prize serves to acknowledge and celebrate past achievements. This year's prize - given to Al Gore - does more. It both celebrates and PROMOTES the very cause that it is celebrating: motivating people to tend carefully and urgently to this precious world of ours.

May our work be bolstered by this worthy award.

A quote for the day from "Inspiring Progress: religions' contributions to sustainable development" by Gary T. Gardner:

"Suppose that every time a product designer, factory manager, or consumer uses an economic resource - when a car is designed, a batch of steel is ordered, or a paper towel is used - each of these economic actors gives a prayer of thanks for the resource bounty before them, and promises to use only as much as they really need." (p. 58)

It might change not just our attitude toward all sorts of consumption but our behavior as well. Which is precisely the power of the blessings we say before and after eating; when we see a tree in bloom; or wear something we have never worn before. Perhaps we can bolster our daily acts with even more spiritual disciplines. As we go through tomorrow, and the day after, and the day after, perhaps we can pause before everything we use and offer such a prayer of awareness and gratitude. And then at the end of the day, we can see how exhausted we are at the abundance of our expressions; whether we needed to use quite as much as we did. And what we must do to preserve the existence of such bounties, and such blessings.

the image of Gd

Over the holiday of Simhat Torah, I bumped into a simple but extraordinary insight offered by Aviva Zornberg, a textual scholar from Jerusalem who mines the language, images and narrative of the Bible in amazing ways.

She teaches the following about the story of creation:

Humans, she notes, are made in the image of Gd (Genesis 1:26). “At the heart of the word image, tzelem, is the word “tzel," shadow … There is the sense that the human being is a shadow that God casts in the world. One of the primary functions of shadows is to say something about the reality of what is casting a shadow."

Here is what I learn from that: We are the earthly reflection of the divine. Our presence and actions point to the source of our energy and being. And like a shadow, we can be a blessing or a detriment. Shade can serve to offer coolness, comfort, relief and protection; or it can serve to blot out, block out, deprive, steal the light and life from that which it covers.

As humans exercising the powers we possess as the shadows of Gd, which way shall be our legacy on this delicate earth, which we have so unwittingly, yet decisively, damaged?

a great bjen conference

Our BJEN conference on Sept 30, 2007 launched our first full year of operation!

From the plenary to the workshops to the hallway conversations, information, ideas and challenges were flowing. As always, the most powerful portions of the morning were the contacts and connections that were made. We are eager to hear the after-stories from you. Many of you, veterans as well as newcomers to the field, were kind enough to contact me and tell me how inspired you were, and what you plan to do about it!

Let's keep in touch.

For the truth is, we all need support as we do this sacred, satisfying but often frustrating work.

The conference was an opportunity to support each other - and it was a time to renew our vows. The midrash tells us:

"Upon creating Adam and Eve, God proudly took them around the Garden of Eden, showing them its marvels and gifts, uses and wonders.

And then God said to them: 'Look what I’ve made - see how beautiful it all is. Everything I’ve made, I’ve made for you. Take care, lest you spoil it and destroy my world, because if you do, there is no one after you to make it right again.'” (Kohelet Rabbah 7:13)

Upon receiving this mandate of stewardship for the world, we made a vow to care for it and tend to it. At our conference, we renewed that vow. As we must do - through our actions - every day.

Welcome

The Baltimore Jewish Environmental Network is powered by its members' wisdom, passions and synergy. I hope to share some of these on this blog. Join in!