Heavy Lifting in Tomorrow Land

 

        You can understand if they, anyone under 30, want to toss us over. We have certainly handicapped their future. 

    You can understand why we might want to toss over some of us. We, collectively humankind, have blown it, in more ways than we care to enumerate. 

    Some of us began with concern and then warnings. Some of us heard the siren and began fumbling toward correction. Some of us nailed down the science and heightened the alarm. Some of us got more serious, more ardent, more engaged and it is precisely there, on this front line between knowledge and action where "we" became frayed and then  undone. We became a DMZ between foresight and negligence, between us and them,  though we are all players in the dirty deal. 

    The planet had science, and then big money bought some of it. When scientists told an oil company decades ago fossil fuels were killing the planet and that meant ocean levels were rising, they decided to raise the level of their drilling platforms and keep the dark secret as a gift for their descendants. 

    The UN Red Warning for Planet Earth confirms what we had been told, tells us it is worse than we knew, and it is an indictment for all of us. We are all guilty of this crime; those of us who worried about the science and tried to make changes, those of us who knew the science and kept on doing business as normal, those of us who "knew in our hearts" we were doing a slow motion dance with death but still relied on legal and political means to make change, and those of us who put wealth and profit above all else! The power was in the big money and they bought lobbyists and congressmen and senators and wrote laws that were phony and ineffective.

        Edward Abbey, like all of us, was flawed, but he spoke truths and is a godfather of a strain of environmental awareness also known as Eco-Warriors. 

        He said, "sentiment without action is the ruin of the soul."

        There's been a lot of that. 

        

        We have done an accounting and learn we value money and material over the sanctity of life; ours, nature, the planet and the future. By thousands of actions we have all plundered the kid's future, a murder by a multitude of blows.

         All of that board room business and "economic cost" blather and all of the political mumbo jumbo got us to where we are. Humankind has been hoodwinked, seduced and is being undone by our greed. 

        As someone who has studied non-violence I am conflicted now, wondering if political guerrilla war fare might not have forced a better outcome, and drawn more attention to the selling of our soul. 

     Abbey wrote, "Better a cruel truth than comfortable delusion." 

      If there had been serious "monkey wrenching" we might have had more sway, more impact in protecting the future. My late brother John was a radical, a street fighter, while also an effective psychological clinician. I think now of some of our long and deep conversations. I might have better served my grand children if I would have stepped out of the neutrality of journalism and joined a fight. 

       As did others, I spent years reporting the story, even investigating environmental crimes. Our work informed, but being right and even being righteous doesn't guarantee success.

        As worthy as it might be to batch grind all of us of a certain age into dog food, I would urge the inheritors of tomorrow land to forget about old scores and instead go to work immediately in applying all knowledge and science to making adjustments, modifications, and new ways of living. Where and how you live, raise food, get water, cooperate, and even multiply will and should change. Yes, we need to stop doing damage, but you will have to make profound changes just to survive.

    Screw the profit motive. Find a way to value the totality of all human life. Nation's divide and create barriers including to solutions. The planet makes you all kindred, regardless of old power structures. Bridge and then diminish them. Be exhaustingly careful where you put your trust. Don't let money pimp science. Put cooperation and communitarian objectives into problem solving. Depose political and royal kings, queens, potentates, war lords, strongmen and those who rule or possess power because money bought it or made it happen. If money rules, life loses. Classism will only complicate the enormous challenges you will face.

     We fly computers into the heavens, rich men ride rockets for fun, but we can't house, feed or medicate people and we continue to poison our home. You in tomorrow land need to find better ways. 

       A few years ago some of us thought we could fix and make better. We failed, especially on the big matters.

        

        For those of us who will not venture deep into tomorrow land, let's get out of the way and for once begin to act in something other than our own selfish interests. Let's behave as though there is a future that has a value that exceeds our materialistic cult and age. Let's pray for the well being of future generations.    

        For those of you who will inhabit tomorrow land, respect the science, respect life, respect each other and do good, for the sake of everything.

        See you down the trail. 

  

Respect

orientation

     It is a difficult challenge that confronts all of us. In a time of intemperance, anger and hyperbole how can we remain civil?

     How do you disapprove, disagree and dislike attitudes and beliefs of friends and associates but not disrespect them?

     The old adage about avoiding religion, politics and sex never took with me. We have brains and spirit, passion and thoughts and we'd never fully engage our humanity if we did not exercise, fully exercise, our intellect and freely explore thought and especially those boundaries between us.

     The challenge, it seems, is to probe those lines of demarcation, so as to understand and learn, but do so in a way that does not threaten. And perhaps that is a flash point, threatening. It is difficult to watch and listen to an attitude or policy that seems anathema to those ideas and values one holds most dear. But, how to respond? I suspect this will be a growing challenge.

     

whither

into storms?

or

into light?

    My father Karl was also my best friend. I was particularly blessed that way. 

    A WWII combat veteran, political activist, competitive athlete, church officer, humanitarian, believer in human dignity and full human rights, he reared my brothers and me with the toughness of the drill instructor he had been but also with love and a liberal dosage of wisdom. A quote I grew up with was "I disapprove of what you say, but will defend to the death your right to say it."

    Nothing was off limits in our dinner table conversations and they were lively. My parents often had guests in the home who held different views and politics. There were disagreements, but they were civil and often my dad would inject that quote. 

     By the way dad would frequently say "... as attributed to Voltaire..." I asked him once why he said that. He said it was what Voltaire thought but there was a question about whether he said it in those words specifically.  On later research it appears it was a summary of Voltaire's thinking and written as such by historian Evelyn Beatrice Hall in her book The Friends of Voltaire. She also wrote The Life of Voltaire. The wisdom and capacity of the philosophy is none-the-less a fundamental principal of a civil society.

      In the last analysis it's all a matter of where we stand as to how we see things.

  green extension  

   The magic green carpet of California's Central Coast extends into wine country as well.

     See you down the trail.

THE NEW BLACK? REMEMBERING A GHOST TREE

CHOOSING THE NEW COLOR

       So it seems orange is the new "in" color of the season.
What do I know about fashion and color? Trips to France sensitized me to shifting color preferences. Friends wanted to know what the new fashion season revealed as the color we'd be seeing more of so I made a point of paying attention. 
         This year I saw a lot of orange in Palm Springs and environs, among some of the lovely patrons of the Indian Wells Tennis tournament, in shops and I see it is showing up elsewhere. I certainly have no pedigree from Ralph Lauren University, so I could be entirely wrong. And as a further qualifier, my idea of good color is blue and grey.  

        Anyway, California's central coast is painted by nature. It's a seasonal switch that cranks up the swatch palette. 

A FINAL STAND

   Aside from humans and elephants, trees get my vote for favorite life form on this blue planet. Old trees get  maximum respect. They don't travel of course but they observe the years, even centuries and leave a record. Talk about zen mellow!
    Seeing a stump serves an encouragement. Old roots remain in mother earth and the space above is reserved for the memory of a sentry or watcher.

  See you down the trail.

RESPECTING NATURE'S ELDERS

THEY DESERVE MORE RESPECT

I am, literally, a tree hugger.  Years ago I learned 

 a native practice for young men. Sorry to report I can't recall which tribal nation.

  It requires standing in the spring with your spine aligned  with a tree that is of your relative age. You put your arms behind you, encircle the tree and clasp your hands.  

This is done at a time of year when the sun and damp earth create an awakening and budding in the tree.

The idea is to sense or feel the energy flow along your spine

and to be "one" with the tree. In the practice, the

young brave stood for hours.  I've been a piker by

comparison but it is something I try to do each spring,

though young is no longer an apt description.

I think of trees as a kind of planetary elder.

I am in awe and marvel at the age and size

of redwoods and sequoias.

I've been to this point before.

A story through-line and subtext of my

second book, THE SANIBEL CAYMAN DISC,

deals with development vs. nature

and how civilization interacts with the environment.

Those under pin the surface story, the black market

in chemical and biological weapons.

I tell you this so you know my bias when

I say old trees deserve respect.

These are scenes of a recent cutting of

eucalyptus trees in Cambria.  I understand

 eucalyptus trees are fire hazards. But when a tree, still healthy, gets to this age, what is gained from felling it?  This cutting occurred on public land,

near to a trail and at a great distance from power lines. 

Smaller trees nearby were left standing.  In fact

there are many in the area that should be

pruned.  Thinning also makes sense.  I am not averse

to sound forest management practices and indeed

there are areas of the Central Coast where work needs to be done.  I am left wondering though, why an ancient tree, posing no threat needs to be felled.

I'm sure there is an official rationale.

 I've heard such explanations before and 

often they are narrow minded and usually involve

funding. 

Maybe I'm wrong headed, and overly sentimental

on the value of a tree.  But how many people do you 

know who survive to 150, 300 or even 2,500 years?

See you down the trail.