Holes

This is right in my parents' back yard. These are the lands I romped in and explored as a free-range child in the summers when the farm was my grandparents'. These are the lands that fostered my imagination and made me who I am today. What's happening there really hurts.

Media late to the party again: Governments' Dirty Tricks

The title of this video reads:

How Fossil Fuel Giants RIG International Law To Ensure Their Profits Are Protected

Pretty cute. It should read How Industry Uses the Federal Governments They Own to Establish International Law Which Protects Their Profits.

Industry does not create law on their own, and governments are not "Scrambling to not get sued..." as this reporter suggests. Governments created this situation intentionally through so called "trade deals" which they pushed through as undemocratically and secretly as they possibly could so as to support government sugar daddies while pretending to be on humanity's side. 

I used to protest these conspiratorial "trade agreements" whenever their creation was leaked and we had just barely enough voices to get them knocked down for awhile but I never thought the governments (both righties and lefties) would give up and of course they didn't and of course they were ultimately successful.

The migrations continue. Governments gradually shed transparency and saddle us with it while stripping our privacy and taking it for themselves. 

Keep up the great work, voters.

WALK AWAY FROM THIS POST

If you know me in real life this post is not for you. Be a mature adult, take my warning and just go away and forget about it.

For those who don’t know me, it’s W-Day:

Weary, withering, wasted…

The wonderful, worldly, we-oriented, World Citizen has whisked these words along from the west coast:

Wake up! 

And it is magically, hilariously, precisely relevant. I am absolutely one atom away from being asleep right now. My brain is a wreck. Just coming up with the above alliteration has drained me for the day. After an almost-week of mildly less then normal sleep performance I have spent a couple days doing almost nothing but sleeping, and yet in the few-hour segments in between epic naps I remain dead tired.

I will catch up on the V column one fine day when I can almost-function again. For now I take this critical W assignment and give it a quick hatchet job as best I can. Ready?

Environmentally you could say there are two kinds of people in the world; those who are apparently ignorant or uncaring with regards to the “planet” and the future of humanity, and those who appear to care but are deluded as to the reality of the situation.

Many of the nicest people I know are online getting all romantic about the environment and how it is getting a much needed break from us. And some jump to the absurd notion that we are starting to wake up! (and smell the coffee environmentally)

It is the death of all hope if the people we count on to lead us to salvation have no idea what they’re doing.

For countless reasons, over and over through decades, thousands have said "People are finally waking up!" No we are not. At best, precious minorities of people have woken from deeply deluded dreams into slightly less deluded dreams. In general we are more asleep than ever and falling into impossible traps to escape from. The very best and very worst case scenarios for Covid-19 are the same scenario: That the human population, beautiful, pitiable and perfectly insane, will be drastically alarmingly reduced.

Have I lost the last reader now? Good. ‘Cause no one will want to read this:

These messages I hear about how great it is that mother nature is getting a well deserved rest is precisely this:

A Nazi shoots a machine gun into a crowd of prisoners as they gradually tumble to their deaths. But then he throws the machine gun to the ground, pulls out a hand gun and begins killing them one bullet at a time. And one well-meaning stander-by says “Ah, how great they’re getting a well-deserved rest.”

I can’t seem to find another human being who actually understands how causality works (they all think they do) or another human being who understands the complex components, system and fragile configurations of the biosphere, which humans, even at this moment, are systematically dismantling it at an utterly unfathomable speed by any realistic cosmic context.

Am I going to do anything about it? Of course not. But I’m also not going to hide from the truth. And I’m not going to hide from the truth because I have a relationship with truth which no other human I know appears to have. (Tolle does, by the way). As for the biosphere’s plight; I am useless. Group one above is also useless as is group two.

Am I angry about this? No. But sometimes I am frustrated because communication with other people about the core dramas of our reality is fucking impossible and there is a kind of loneliness there which sometimes frustrates me. A lot of that frustration is aimed back at myself: for why have I failed to teach anyone anything despite all the research I do?

Here’s a great bit of comedy: Michael Moore has released a film Planet of the Humans. I haven’t watched it yet even though, as my brother noted in an email about it, it’s right up my apparently-narrow alley.

It may be vain and foolish to assume the film will only reveal the epic load of crap I already know, such as the preposterousness of practically every mainstream green organization and the utter fallacy of “industrial green clean energy.” All industry is a bullet to the head of the biosphere, including windmill and solar panel industries. There is no escaping this reality. But I can’t help instinctively making that assumption and I don’t feel quite in the mood just yet for going down a dark ugly rabbit hole that I already know like the back of my hand. (I promise to report back once I actually view the film.)

A part of the problem is that I assume that Moore (knowing how he rolls) will get caught up in the facade and guilt of things which I don’t really care to get wrapped up in. I don’t want to point fingers. Global human insanity starts at the core of the illusion; the gap between real instinctive mind and our outrageously flawed stuttering early evolution of consciousness. And we’re all in this together.

For a long long time as I say little about this matter, sensing no will around me to hear it, I have held a vain hope that some genius would come along and tell me why I’m wrong about the simple reality of biosphere and industry and just the other night I managed to get in on a webinar regarding green economy (what a wonderful fantasy) with none other than Noam Chomsky the special guest.

This could be my big chance! To get this question to him?

But the question panel grew fast and immediately and I realized I had no chance. But half way up I found a very similar question, framed around the claims of Moore’s The Planet of Humans. I discovered that one could comment on a question though it was rarely done. So I did: “I pray this question gets up-voted. It is critical!”

Lo and behold the comment, regardless of its content, visually drew attention. And immediately people were hitting the vote button and the question gradually rose to the top and was addressed. The host completely bungled it. It was not worded perfectly and the host made it worse. Chomsky gave an awkward 3-or-4 word dismissive response.

Thanks host. Thanks humans. Thank you for being so reliably; so tirelessly useless.

But did Chomsky fully misunderstand the question? I don’t really think he could have. Why did he not try to address it better?

Could he still be in the dark, environmentally? Brainy as he is? Perhaps?

Or is it this?

Does he see the same dilemma which concerns me?

Does he feel that to communicate every truth to the masses, were it accepted, result in complete despair and disorder; chaos?

Even if climate change is largely a red herring (not for being untrue but for being ultimately irrelevant), is it a placebo in effect which might keep cold-hearted humans acting responsible because there appears to be hope?

There is another reality here, perhaps most important of all. Nothing is immortal in this universe. Not humans, not Earth. Not the sun. But our living experiences are immortal because we experience no beginning or end. We are not aware of our own birth and death. That makes for A LOT to think about.

The end is inevitable even if sadly coming way sooner than necessary (except perhaps for the lucky grandchildren of the ultimately criminal super-duper-pooper rich who have been stealing from us all and will afford trillion dollar seats on Elon’s Mars rockets maybe?) well so what?

Why not exist at or near the inevitable end? Why take it as tragedy? There is still opportunity to evolve our minds and to love and to seek survival within whatever like-minded community we arrange ourselves. And if necessary to go out not with a bang but gracefully; respectfully; lovingly.

Have I been at all coherent? I don’t know why I write this. I don’t want to stomp on people I love who have been writing so hopefully and romantically and with flawed logic. They are good people. But I do get deeply, unwisely, lonesomely frustrated sometimes. I am far from the top of my spiritual game…

Stuff to think about.  

Bill 66 update: Good news

“Thanks to public outcry” Ford has apparently yanked Schedule 10 from the bill. That’s the specific legislation which was to allow corporations to shit all over the Green Belt and Clean Water acts in the events these spectacularly rare tidbits of sanity threatened profits, which, granted, is only about 101% likely at any given moment,

So if you acted, congrats on your victory!

Of course if this is anything like every other similar event in the recent history of slimy Canadian politics, they’ll just slip the same atrocious corporate concessions into some other bill and work harder to keep it a secret and they’ll do this again and again until it squeaks through, while the people of Canada, some of the dearest hopeless impotent little darlings on the globe, bend over and take it!

Yeah I’m having a really rough morning. Sorry…

The Hilariously Non-Honourable Premier Ford’s Hilarious Bill 66

To Mr. Michael Helfinger (and others),

Bill 66 is an assault on the biosphere and a firm confirmation of war against humanity. You have no mandate from your electorate to pursue such a demonic agenda. How infinitesimally little sanity exists in this morbid circus you call government that I would have need to point out something so ridiculously obvious?

With all possible disgust,

etc.

You too can eek a scrap of democracy out of our otherwise-fake democracy! Just go to the Government of Ontario’s Feedback on Bill 66 Collection Hoo-Haw and cough up your own message of revulsion - or perhaps of praise if you maybe know nothing at all about the world; your choice! It all goes into the same digital hopper where it might actually get read by a human being?

Maybe?

Sorry, did I say human being?

My bad. I meant politician.

Departing

Well, this piece got away from me… as some do. Oh well. I post it intact:

The Liaison’s funeral was not a big one. His influence manifested mostly through the wires to many locales beyond Scooterville. But I think that both his family and co-workers may have been surprised by the extent of outreach from the writing community. More than a hundred writers sent words of comfort or even flowers (and we accounted for a good third of the attendance). I was proud of sick boy’s moving speech at the event which helped to crystallize this for everyone.

His boss was a very sweet man who spoke very kindly of him. I was grateful for this brief insight into the other side of the Liaison’s life and said so later to the fellow, on the lawn, as we shook hands, both failing to hold back tears entirely. We’re likely to meet for a drink at some point.

The brother also spoke, of their childhood struggles for one thing, and it was very sincere and moving.

Then the final speaker was a soulless troglodyte named Pastor F.U. or thereabouts, who had never met the Liaison once in his life but who felt empowered to condescend to us with the usual outrageous doublethink concerning atheism versus faith and the inane ass-backwards idea that belief provides meaning in life.

I tried not to walk out. I reminded myself that I was here for the prime purpose of supporting the Liaison’s family. I thought carefully; realized I could not in any good conscience give permission to this hijacking, got up and walked out and waited in the parking lot to take my assigned passengers to the cemetery. I hoped very much that I had not caused a scene in any way; that I made no one other than the troglodyte uncomfortable. I did not want this event to be about me and my principles. Dog Whisperer, despite being an employee of a church, came to find me afterwards and issued firm support. She wanted to follow me out but her seating was trapped in essence. So that was a comfort to hear.

It can be immensely sad to reflect on the apparently-growing collective human insanity. It is not only the swiftly-deteriorating economic and environmental systems which point to impending disaster. It is the realization that almost nobody among the privileged societies which steer the world has any regard for truth, but only the addiction to the clinging to falsehoods derived from cherry-picked factoids, peddled by the world’s grotesquely-untrustworthy horde of priests, politicians and corporate-sponsored mouthpieces: whichever ones happen to peddle the particular bullshit which is most flattering, convenient or profitable to the ultimately self-serving and self-righteous listener.

We created a society wherein there is no requirement, regard or reward for truth (except in the field of science which cannot function without it - and look how the field of science is routinely maligned by the above perpetrators), a society riddled with problems which will not be solved because problems are not solved without truth.

But truth is so buried. The internet is surely 99% rubbish. And we’re so busy chasing our unfortunate addictions there is no time for the average person to unearth truth. We need specialists devoted to it. I am trying to do just that I suppose, but society does not include this in the ledger of currency nor afford a framework for accountability.

Where oh where are the people who can summon the courage to just want the truth no matter what it is? No matter how unflattering, how inconvenient, how unprofitable it might be? Are you out there? You’re certainly not in the youtube comment section; I know that.

And if you exist, where do you turn to for real news? for real authority? Where are the leaders or other powerful voices who only want to report truth without personal interest? Probably the Buddha, probably the real Jesus of Nazareth prior to being exploited and misquoted and misunderstood. Einstein of course. Likely Eckhart Tolle. Likely that dude who wrote the Four Hour Work Week! Read Tolle by the way, for goodness sake.

I’m not going to be falsely humble. I am a devoted adept of truth on my good days and frankly, even on my mediocre days. I was a self-identified Catholic who denied my tribe when I learned it untrue. I gave up my position as a climate-change denier when the truth became all-too apparent. I walked away from my sports tribes when I learned of their delusion. I have largely given up many instinctive tribal mind comforts having learned of their treachery. I even gave up my self-image as a good person, prepared to accept that I was an evil person if that was where the pursuit of truth led me - which it did - for a while. Somehow (through very fortunate circumstance) I was afforded a certain brand of courage that I can see almost nowhere else.

I wish I knew how to tell my story. I wish that people would know what I know: that the reward for this kind of courage is utterly freeing and joyful and transformative; transcending even, and that the fears which contain you will be revealed illusion! Where are the champions of truth to lead us? I appear not to have what it takes, nor where to find such a congregation.

Planet? What planet?

I really must urge the good and intelligent people of the world to stop using the word planet…

When we’re talking about the environment, I mean; when we say we’re killing the planet; we’re ruining the planet; we have to save the planet…

The planet is a great mass of material caught in our favorite star’s gravitational orbit. I don’t know of any power we currently have to interfere with that.

And the pinheads of the world sort of know that. The deniers of the world (who I happen to believe should be logged in a database by the way, so that if depopulation ever becomes the popular solution we’ll know exactly where to start), who obediently follow their feelings so much more than logic or education, have very trustworthy feelings that this great big planet is not going anywhere. And they’re right in the short term, regardless of climate change, but of course no world in the universe is permanent and in the long term the sun has big nasty explosive plans for us, regardless if there’s a tree, bee or human being left on this surface or not (in a couple billion years).

My point is: Climate change warnings sound ever so less relevant when talking about the planet than when you talk about the actual item of concern, which is of course the biosphere.

We need to talk about the biosphere, and not just to be accurate, but so that the unconvinced might pay a little more attention and that people everywhere might begin to take a bigger interest in what the biosphere really is: which is of course a fragile, limited portion of the planet which must exist in order to support life.

And It is not just air and trees. It is also (for all intents and purposes, if not precisely according to official terminology) soil, oceans, fresh water, wetlands, biodiversity, minerals and toxic filtration (I.e.: the oil in the ground which belongs there for a reason and that only lunatics would dig up and burn, thus destroying the system and - to boot - releasing all those toxins into the air where they least belong). All these components are completely interlinked and dependent on one another and vital to the biosphere and vital to the existence of life, and all of them are very seriously compromised and becoming more so every single day and with every single industrial activity we indulge in. There is in essence a measurable sum of biosphere capacity which is rapidly shrinking. Some of these components are more than half destroyed. Yes, that’s a fact, and most of them, in the case of individual failure, will take the whole biosphere down with it, baby, cradle and all.

Biosphere, folks. Biosphere. In a sane world it would be the most popular word of the day.

Not that I’m claiming to be especially sane these days. I’m just saying.

Cheers!

FWG   

Health

I think the reason most bloggers do not blog every day is generally because they don’t have enough to say. Or else they think they don’t have that much to say.

I have more than enough that I wish to say (whether appreciated or not). One of my April objectives is to defeat the barriers which keep me from posting. One of them is this: If it’s too simple and obvious then I’m reluctant to say it.

Because A-Z is so structured I feel like there is no room to go exploring on the page until something subtle and useful comes out and thus the subtle useful thing must in this case be part of the plan. And for letter H this year, there is no such plan. But here: let me hold my nose and swiftly get this over with.

April A-to-Z:  A Celebration of the Automobile! (If You’re the Devil)

H is for Health!

When I spent two months between vehicles; after the banana boat was grounded, I found myself in a very joyful position. I was often walking downtown (not downtown Scooterville but rather the village area of our particular burrough) in order to run small errands. I was also taking buses and walking to the stops. I was getting exercise and doing a small favour to the environment. My circumstance was physically healthier and mentally healthier.

Unfortunately the unreliable nature of bus company logistics convinced me that, given my current roster of commitments, I needed my own car again in order to be sufficiently reliable.

There is little doubt I think, that in this chronically obese society, we’d all be getting more exercise and subsequently healthier if it weren’t for our personal cars. The problems with making yourself an exception to this norm include the above instability, which is less a problem in heavy metro areas and a progressively greater problem the less urban you get, as less and less participants (and smaller budgets) leave public transport a flightier prospect; a less-robust system.

Another problem with being the exception in your community is that walking or biking for health/recreation is wonderful on the trails, but doing so out of logistical necessity means you’re sharing auto routes and sucking exhaust fumes the whole time. Not a boon to health.

And that’s about all I have to say on that topic. Short and sweet. And it frankly could have been a lot shorter. I think it’s great to be concise. And I know I’m generally a more concise (and appropriately, more subtle) writer than many. But I have to convince myself that it’s okay to post small pieces. In fact I should try to make it more the norm.

E-Tests

April A-to-Z:  A Celebration of the Automobile! (If You’re the Devil)

I left a prosperous I.T. career in order to embrace a simple, reflective, creative, charitable life. It was the best decision I’ve ever made. I work on a plethora of creative projects now; musical, literary and recreational. I do a lot of research and exploration, do some volunteer work and squeak by on a part-time low-income wage. I’ve never been happier.

Every four or so years I buy an old car for next to nothing and together we grow older.

And every other year the Ontario Drive Clean Program kicks the crap out of us.

Every twenty four months I must take my old car – not to the one garage where I trust the mechanic; a friend of a friend of my family – but to the licensed rapist of my choice; a government approved garage licensed for the Drive-Clean program. “Clean” meaning they take you to the cleaners.

Invariably my old car computer kicks out a trouble code or three; whether legitimately or because these strangers, alone with my car, out of my sight, have tinkered with something, I cannot possibly know for sure. What I do know is that I don’t trust these people who invariably deal with me with sharp no-nonsense voices and averted eyes.

Then the magical Drive Clean math kicks in and I end up spending precisely the $500.00 cap plus a little more in order to get a conditional pass (which allows me to renew my vehicle license), some $60 part I’ve never heard of and a baffling receipt detailing another $470.00 in taxes, fees, re-testing fees, labour for installing the mystery part, a perfectly-priced Eco-Check-up-and-Maintenance package(which means who-the-fudge knows what) and then some additional mystery labour for good measure.

I then get the car back with the same old throaty muffler I could have replaced had I not just been financially assaulted, and a mysterious new noise; a symptom of something new gone suddenly wrong with the car while it was behind enemy lines and which will necessitate another garage visit ASAP.

Let me be clear: I’m all for the environment. But every other year when this crap goes down, I could be doing a lot more for the environment with that $500.00 instead of spending it all on fees and taxes and imaginary services.

I get screwed. The environment gets screwed and the government and corporate-owned garages make a bundle of money for accomplishing nothing. In the name of the environment the poorest of us get hit the hardest while rich corporations continue to get away with murder, for instance: documenting their imagined worst-case-for-the-environment process scenarios and implementing their best-for-profit scenarios and claiming environmental reward money as if they’d done us a favour when they haven’t. The injustice always strikes me as deplorable and scandalous.

Carbon Dioxide

April A-to-Z:  A Celebration of the Automobile! (If You’re the Devil)

Heyo!

This should be an easy post to knock off quickly and we’ll let you get on with your day!

The average family passenger car or light truck (of the common combustion engine variety) in North America produces roughly 10,000 lbs (or 5000 kg) of carbon dioxide per year from burning gasoline. This is the most voluminous of my car’s exhaust pollutants which include carbon monoxide, mono-nitrogen oxides and hydrocarbons. Yay!

You probably already know that carbon dioxide (CO₂) is a naturally occurring trace gas in the atmosphere which we and other critters exhale and which plant life, inversely, absorbs before spitting back oxygen for us. Very convenient! Yay!

And you probably know that there is way way too much CO₂ around these days and that that is a problem because though it is not the most severe greenhouse gas, it is currently the most voluminous and by most accounting currently the most significant.

Greenhouse effects are awesome! Without a substantial one the Earth would be more like Mars and humans would either not exist or we would have evolved into something more like a sandworm …(*) However…! When a planetary greenhouse system over-evolves you end up like the planet Venus did, where it rains sulfur 24-7 and where an evening stroll on the planet’s surface would pressure-cook you to culinary perfection in a matter of seconds. Yum! At one time Earth would have been on pace for such an eventual state in millions of years from now, however that pace is now accelerating exponentially. Buckle up!

Meanwhile CO₂ emissions from automobiles (with a little help from cement production) is largely behind our smog problems – omnipresent in essence but most noticeable in Los Angeles and  New York for instance (the immense Chinese phenomena stems more from coal burning) and is credited for causing and worsening our most common respiratory diseases and boasts many thousands of human deaths annually and is a fairly obvious major contributor to a rare little-known disease called… cancer.

And then of course there’s all the carbon dioxide emissions which come from the extraction of oil and ore and all the manufacturing and refining that goes into building roads and cars and delivering them fuel. Oh well! It’s been a good day in Hell! Thanks for stopping by!

FWG/New Day Rising

* [Editor's note: the author has no clue under which conditions humans might have instead evolved into sandworms, nor what the heck a sandworm is.] 

Needs

It was perhaps ten years ago when I came to fully understand that I had only three needs.

1. Food to eat.

2. Protection from the elements.

3. Protection from predators.

The same needs as any mammal.

It seemed clear at that time that I would evermore be joyful as long as these three conditions were met. I have since succumbed to an instinctive need, illusory of course: the feeling of need toward that who I love most. Of course I must admit consciously that this (or rather a great component of it) is not actually much love from the universal perspective, even though it feels to me immense. I know that the universal love I once felt is the far more real. But enough of that for now.

I understand fully the truly recreational nature of the hundred and one needs most people think they have and which they pursue with the bulk of their energy, as I once sort-of did, though without typical vigor.

We think we need promotions, respect, wealth, safer accident-protective automobiles, handier cell-phones, someone to love and vice versa (and at times pretend to love and vice versa) at the exclusion of others, affordable hydro, job security, spiritual faith, the correct wardrobe, hope, etc…

And some might add purpose. Though purpose is a cinch. Anyone can design their own purpose. It’s not a need, but it’s pretty useful and there’s nothing to stop us from having it, other than lack of clarity; optimally an “outer purpose” (societal purpose) as Tolle would say, along with recognition of our innate inner purpose; which is to become conscious; fully human.

Here’s the terrible irony: all these illusory needs, which I realize a lot of people probably cannot easily conceive the falseness of -- both alone, and/or in combination with each other, manifest a short list of inevitable consequences in the realm of tribal disconnection, environmental devastation and social/economic erosion (which are all thoroughly related) which brings about this realization:

Pursuit of all these recreational and illusory needs is swiftly destroying:

1. Our food sources both animal and vegetable.

2. The manageability/survivability of the elements.

3. The suppression of inevitably- widespread human predators (preying on other humans).

The relentless pursuits of all the false needs are swiftly and precisely pushing all of our real needs out of reach.

Pipelines

Kinder Morgan

The Ponderer has been pondering the current crisis of North American oil pipeline projects and the chaos that surrounds them. She shared her latest thoughts; sensible ones, which I have responded to from a perspective of perhaps wider context:

The Ponderer:  Maybe the best way to stop the Pipelines is to stop creating a demand for the oil that it's transporting. But we can't do that can we? We have to have our cars and our vehicles and we have to heat our homes among other things. I think very few of us are willing to live without those things. It's easy to be all pro save the environment until it causes us discomfort or inconvenience. Perhaps the pipelines are the safest way to transport the oil, that we tell ourselves we so desperately need. Is there a safer way? Train? Ship? Trucks? I don't think so. Don't get me wrong I am not pro pipeline I just think the solution is a lot more complicated and I think our government made the best decision in a bad situation. And thank you to my friend Barb for giving me a different perspective.

New Day Rising:  Yes, we're very greedy, very spoiled. Life itself is not naturally easy. Life has been a very difficult thing for every species except for a small percentage of humans for a tiny blip of time. Us. But as bizarre and unholy as our circumstance is, it is our normal. It is natural for us to embrace the unnatural normal we are born into.

But it will not be our normal for long and we'd be really smart to get our stubborn heads around that and plan accordingly instead of so fully embracing this brief Disneyland with such entitlement. What we have not yet discovered about ourselves is that we do have the capacity for change and for embracing new normals. Oil will be gone in another tiny blip of time no matter how much extra destruction we wreak to get at it. And if we survive the disaster that is born of denial and inequality and our enmity against the biosphere then we'll do just fine with the next normal, as all the YA dystopia books so brightly suggest, but unfortunately the next normal's forecast grows worse and worse every day that we resist it. Every day that we refuse to cut a deal with mother nature, the less she will have to offer when we finally do, or else on the bleak day that there is no more leveraging available. The life-capacity of the biosphere is shrinking every day. We are trading it away for the gadgets and comforts which can not last, which we pay for with death. And if we never cut that deal then the Earth will have almost nothing left for us.

North Dakota

The new oil pipelines are an investment in the future. They are a commitment to expansion of death; a commitment to cut no deals. They are a migration in the wrong direction. I know its very hard not to be greedy but if I woke up tomorrow and every gas station was dry, I would be immensely delighted. Giving up my car would then be easy because we'd all be in the same situation together and we would survive just fine. We would adjust together. Where as giving up my car on my own tomorrow would seem disastrous because my society would not cooperate with me; would not bend to the changes I would require.

"Oka could happen again..."

The beauty in brevity

Earth Writer pointed me at an article which I found very engrossing, about a mature couple who are confirmed… collapseniks, you might say. They do a lot of canning. They run a personal rabbit farm – for practical reasons. Their meals are becoming more and more of a domestically sustainable nature. They are learning to live in a manner that is rich in spirit and texture and which can be maintained, if necessary (only a matter of when, they would say) come a time devoid of electricity, commerce or infrastructure. You might immediately comfort yourself by thinking them freaks who can’t possibly be right. And you’d be unwise. They’ve had dignified careers which have well prepared them for such forecasting. And the article demonstrates their enlightenment, and their noble approach; their aplomb. 

I want to share my response to Earth Writer, and then add something:

Wow. That's a great article. Honestly, none of the ideas there are new to me but it was put together so well, bringing so many relevant aspects together in a concise effective manner - and with much grace.

I've been thinking a lot lately about the young people I know, some as young as [Aqualad], who do not believe they have a future. It makes me cry. But I've been thinking about our impermanence - whether we maybe squeeze out a few more generations or not - or whether by great fortune some semblance of humanity survives for a couple billion years on Earth or even migrates beyond and survives long eons throughout the galaxy or universe - regardless - our kind will exist for a limited time, however long or short, and then be done. And sometimes I think, Well so what? The beauty in anything is magnified by its brevity. I learned that a long time ago; one of many lessons I sometimes forget. Planet Earth is still a paradise for now. It is still a heaven for now and now is what matters most. I'm grateful I can see it that way and would rather see it that way for a moment then to live forever and never have that sight.

My praise for the article was understated. It actually delivered a couple rather complex conclusions in such an elegant way as to make them more swiftly understood than in the more clunky ways that I have handled the same material. So I am grateful to have learned how to express myself a little differently on these topics going forward.

What I wanted to add to my response but chose to save for later discussion is this:

In a very real sense, life is eternal, for the simple reason that we do not remember our birth nor experience our death. We have no opportunity to reflect on our lost life. We are gone before we know it. To paraphrase Eckart Tolle, It is always the now, and the now is always experienced by the living. In that sense, we are eternal. 

I have long looked at the death of individuals in this light: Death is no tragedy. It is inevitable. We tend to treat it as a tragedy largely because a functioning assumption of personal immortality gives us a marvelous excuse to live without any urgency to accomplish anything real; to instead live with an absence of meaning or with only the asinine double-think "meaning" perpetrated by today’s sad withered remnants of religious guidance. Death is not the tragedy. Failure to live with presence is the tragedy. Death only documents that sad conclusion. For most people (around here anyway), the tragedy was their shallow living experience; not their death.

When I’ve cried at funerals it has not been for the demised but for empathy of those around me.

Am I digressing? The point is that all life is rare and short. Lately I have looked at it this way:

With the understanding that humanity is temporary, as are all things, its duration is not very relevant. All known life has been brief; so fleeting, and yet at the same time eternal.

As individuals, the universe, life, the human race: these things are not ours to control. At this stage of evolution we can’t even control our own individual minds! Our minds are prisoners of external causality. No, we are primarily here as a witness. That is the power of our beautiful and tragic consciousness. And as a witness, consider this:

If we had had some pre-birth awareness and choice; if we had been told, “You shall be born a human being on planet Minerva!* In what time period of the human experience would you like to exist?” One might look at the chart, and note the beginning, the middle and the end, and say, “I would like to be born here, near the end. That is what I think would be interesting to experience. That is where times might be tough. That is where I might have much opportunity to be useful to my fellow humans.”

That the human experience should end is no tragedy. That we might perhaps be living near that end-time is no tragedy.

That is not to say that we should invite destruction. That is not to say that we should not be wise and seek survival and harmony by seeking wisdom and to embrace change.

There just need not be despair. 

*(Earth)

Hello Goodbye

Part One: Hello

In one sense I’ve preferred the news not come.

Because no matter to what degree one is an environmentalist – and make no mistake: every one of us is an environmentalist to some widely varying degree; some number between one per cent and a hundred (as if it could be so easily quantified) where only the truest aboriginals might claim the number 100 and maybe Derrick Jensen the singular white guy to hit ninety nine? – anyway, unless you’re pretty badly out to lunch you can’t deny that a seven and a half billion human population is a major factor in the long equation which underlies the environmental catastrophe which guarantees to radically change – if not end – the human experience on this dear old half-wrecked planet. Every avenue of human-related harm has been multiplied by population.

So one of the very few pieces of advice I ardently profess is: think twice about having kids... for quite a few solid reasons related to the above.

But in another sense…

I have eagerly anticipated such news since my brother’s marriage to my very excellent sister-in-law (what a horrible title – sister in law – for someone I am so delighted to include in my perception of family!)

It seems it was the four years volunteering with the reading and writing kids which so surprisingly unveiled these paternal instincts, and surely a niece or nephew would provide an obvious outlet for them. I have wondered at times to what degree said instincts have enhanced, versus hindered, the close relationships I maintain with certain young people in my life.

I’d started to suspect that Bro and wife were not planning to have kids after all.

And then at a family gathering , one of our parents' regular roster reports of the sick, dead and dying among their friends and associates was interrupted mid-sentence  by the Bro as follows:

“Couldn’t we talk about something more pleasant? Such as the fact that Catharine is pregnant?”

I honestly had thought that I would shed tears if such an announcement ever came (yes, of joy) but this was not the case.

Whenever I checked up on them, Mom seemed to be doing well and not complaining (though I am sure that pregnancy must be wildly uncomfortable most – or all – of the time).

I got the call two months ago. It was a boy. And with respect to his paternal lineage (a John Paul, a Jean Paul and a Jean Marc) he was named: Jean Benoit. Ben for short.

I gave them some time to attend their own needs and then joined them at Sprawlville’s regal new mega-hospital. The folks would arrive on my tail. I entered quietly to find her in bed and Bro on his feet. He gestured toward a corner, and there I saw him sleeping in his baby bucket. Such a little guy, in his little rapper toque and blanket bundle. He became a little blurry. Something wrong with my eyes perhaps.

Eventually I hugged the parents goodbye and thanked them for bringing this joy into our lives.

Strolling down the long corridor of what felt more like an airport than a hospital, I said to Mom; the new grandma, “Six of us now. We’ve come a long way from just the two of us.”

“Yes we have.” 

The science guy

Perhaps some people like sharing bad news. Secretly or unknowingly or otherwise. It makes sense that the ego would dig it.

But I know that I don’t; not at this point in my life. And I feel sober driving home from work where I just finished laying such a bleak comment on the likebook post of a senior woman; a friend of a friend, who only wished to share a message of hope: a video of Bill Nye, the science guy telling us all that fixing global warming is easy. We just have to vote for whatever party most champions renewable energy!

I have loved so many Science shows.

But this is such an absurdity. Such a completely false hope, and such a distraction from the critical realities.

So here I am: just a little impatient; just a little frustrated; feeling a sense of duty to punch a hole through the darkness and liberate just a few rays of light. I responded and pointed out the nonsense in such a brief way that I expect any reader will easily sidestep it, in accordance with whatever force is in their mental driver seat at this particular leg of the trip.

Was it useful for me to post this?

Years ago, prominent fundamental changes to my behavior were manifested by a completely overhauled system of understandings. A system infinitely more honest and accurate. I know that these changes were very evident to some people, virtually unnoticed by others, deeply respected by some, and received with suspicion by others.

One major change that is very unlikely detected by others is this: I became far less interested in impressing people; far less concerned with my reputation or garnering respect. This evolution has not been perfect but a very significant change has been steady: I generally no longer jump into conversations the moment I have something to say which eclipses what is already being said. I have no eagerness to show off what I know. My organic reaction has reversed. When I hear ideas being shared which lack specific wisdom which I am strong in; I don’t automatically rush in. There is almost always a buffer period where I consider such things as: Is my insight going to be useful here? Is this person likely to understand it or be willing to learn? Frankly, might they be intelligent enough for it? Or potentially free enough of the relevant illusions to be open to the this idea? Is this audience likely to respect me enough to give this serious consideration? Am I actually prepared to put this complex set of understandings into words?” It sounds cumbersome but on the ground it happens quickly, organically and imperfectly. It takes only a moment.

In essence there are several classes of people among my associates: There are dull people I am forced to associate with, such as in workplaces. There are old friends who are hopelessly tragically locked into the matrix who now fear me but who were so close at one time that we have not been able to sever our relationship. It is with them that I constantly play dumb. I constantly listen and nod to their insanity and happily let them assume I am as deep into La-La land as they are. I realize there is a terrible condescending going on here but how can I help it? I don’t think about this sad state when I am with them (less and less often as time goes on). I sort of turn off my capacity to judge. I sort of unplug my bullshit detector.

There are the many new friends I have made who perceive me as the more gentle, loving person who I have become and who are interested in my ideas.

But then there is a certain sector of associates: often older friends from a while back, but not always, who do not often fit the mold of my current kin: not the writers, musicians, artists, misfits, criminals, the deeply-wounded, the outsiders… often they are straight-shooting career-and-family people who do a good job assembling wealth and reputation but who are intelligent for real; not just clever, who I sense have a capacity for wisdom, who have a capacity for authentic kindness and generosity. And it is with these special people who I am least patient around! It is with them where I am more instinctively eager to jump in on a conversation.

I think it is because with them I am always seeing their potential; always expecting them to break out of the matrix, or running on the assumption that perhaps they already have. I am wanting to feel that they are as tuned in as I in specific terms of… spirituality?

With them I do not condescend. With them, if I sense something unenlightened is being said, I am quick to interrupt it, I think because I want to deny that something lame, something instinct-driven would come from them. It’s partly a charade I suppose. It is unenlightened of me to play such a game (if that indeed is what is going on). In this scenario I am hardly present, am I?

So what happens is: I forget myself and jump in with a poorly-thought-out statement, probably sounding like any other jack-ass who just likes to be right, and then immediately realize what I have done; that I am not being mindful, and then shut down. And I do not further explain what I have just said. And then I come to peace with it and generally then remain silent for a while.

What has just happened then? Perhaps my statement will serve as a nudge in a useful direction; perhaps not.

Now in the case of this mature woman whose little facebook garden of hope I just trampled… what the hell did that accomplish?

I should not have been eager to jump in, for that is what I did, and for no noble reason at all. I should have been patient. I should have devised the most useful nudge and been gentle.

FWG: This is not remotely how to stop climate change. This is baloney. Industrial renewable energy is a fantasy. It is a way for companies to take buckets of money from the public for development of systems which still require massive industrialization/extraction to build and maintain and will go on killing a planet that is half destroyed already. The only way to reverse global warming and related catastrophes is to drastically reduce birth-rates and give up car culture and a lot of other absurd luxuries that we all take for granted and which the earth simply cannot provide without mortgaging the future. Our lives are a complete fantasy. Completely unsustainable and pretty much nobody has both the brains and the guts to look at the truth. When we came here and destroyed native culture we sealed our demise. Only native/aboriginal cultures have lived in partnership with the earth. Only they have considered the future in their actions. There is no other way (barring continued expansion and destruction outward to asteroids, other planets, other systems, etc)