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At 7.30 yesterday morning, my boyfriend and I hovered over our new Montana friend Greg as he took this Middle East geography test in our kitchen. We’d remembered it while speaking with him about the arbitrary nature of political borders and hooting about the 50 elk we saw yesterday in the field. He fared better with his country placement than we had originally. PLEASE take it yourself. It’s fun, I promise.
What surprises/shocks you about your knowledge as you try to place each country?
http://www.rethinkingschools.org/just_fun/games/mapgame.html
**Thank you to Samantha Dabney for sending this map to me many moons ago. It continues to educate.
In Sherman Alexie’s novel The Absolutely True Diary of a Part-Time Indian, the lovable narrator, 14-year-old Arnold Spirit (based on Alexie himself), touches on an idea that’s been goading me for years. We spend most of our life running from or trying to get into a particular tribe. By tribe, I mean social group identity.
Being from nowhere once made me feel like I had no place and therefore no “people.” Of course, I have many tribes, probably three of four that resonate most with me. There is something poignant about Arnold’s quote below, with its wonderful teenage-hood ness and cultural context. In 2009, how relevant is the fact that we are being asked to step away from the one or two tribes we clutch to in order to breed some tolerance in this world? Very, I think.
But how does one do this without watering down an identity?
I realized that I might be a lonely Indian boy, but I was not alone in my loneliness. There were millions of other Americans who had left their birthplaces in search of a dream.
I realized that, sure, I was a Spokane Indian. I belonged to that tribe. But I also belonged to the tribe of American immigrants. And to the tribe of basketball players. And to the tribe of bookworms.
And the tribe of cartoonists.
And the tribe of chronic masturbators.
And the tribe of teenage boys.
And the tribe of small-town kids.
When my mother turned 50, I sent her a card that declared joyfully “Congratulations, you are now officially a crone!” like she’d been reaching for that moment her entire life. She was horrified. She felt as if I’d labeled each one of her wrinkles with a proper name; but I, on the other hand, believed the word crone to be the most flattering thing to call a woman. As a child, I couldn’t wait to escape ingénue-hood for when oh when could I be that crone, an old woman who oozed grace and insight from having lived a life, a real gritty passionate life. I once dramatically confessed to my friend Maria, “I can’t wait to be old,” to which she responded in 7-year-old solidarity, “I can’t wait to wear lipstick.” She didn’t understand that “old” for me meant wise.
In pursuit of wisdom, I grew up trying to define it. I assumed that it looked serious–a solemn face furrowed in Deep Meaningful Smart Thought and often staring into the grassy distance. When I spotted people like this, I gazed upon them like a dutiful servant, terribly impressed by what they might know about the world, but never particularly soothed.
As I step into my 30’s (and therefore become supposedly wiser, though I’d trust a toddler’s insight over anyone’s my age), wisdom is begging for a new wardrobe. Be-gg-ing for it.
What I’ve noticed is that the people I respect the most do one thing consistently… Read more…
I have an addiction. I admitted this yesterday while staring at the ancient lady–her bright-red, hair-sprayed beehive and two-tone glasses–at the New York Public Library. She is practically a fixture, and has been here forever, or at least during the three years I lived here, and even now when I stroll the marble halls as a visitor. She looks the same. She is still perfectly coiffed. I like that she’s still here. But my brain says, Ugh, how boring. I don’t want to be her, or someone who, at any point in time, is still anything. And therein lies my addiction. I am addicted to that shameful, self-conscious, liberal, privileged concept–new experiences in new places. It feels as strong and confusing as a drug.
“Go a mile wide, not deep” has always been my family’s mantra. I lived in five different countries before the age of 11 and my parents instilled in me the importance of a particular mindset–global, open and evolving. As an adult, I have translated that vision into two principles: the need to continually change environments in job and place (not so hard) and to seek out, in our “like-attracts-like” world, a good proportion of friends who don’t think, look, act, or feel like me (harder than it sounds).
But, knowing that the flip side can be sweet, I also have a thing for the word local and the idea of being deeply connected to a community and a landscape. The instant I start to slip into reverie about such a life, my wandering self barks, “But you must always push beyond your comfort zone! DO NOT get stuck in your comfort zone.” So I live my life wondering, Which way is better?
Three years ago, at dusk on September 10th, my boyfriend and I spun our bikes down the entire west flank of Manhattan, what feels, in effect (because of the scenery change) like distance. In reality, it is 13.4 short miles. Fresh to New York City, we vowed with the open-heart of newcomers to explore the cracks. This bike ride was the start. As spotted London Plane trees gave way to the behemoths of midtown and eventually to the hip of downtown, we pedalled by completely unaware of what everyone else on the island was aware of. Because though we are Americans, the physical history of two crumbling towers was not imbedded in us. We didn’t know this space when the World Trade Centers existed. We only knew the aftermath. New Yorkers felt the empty space. As interlopers, we were disconnected.
As we neared what we could not yet recognize as ground zero, we noticed droves of people moving inland, police officers cordoning off streets, a solemn collective buzz–the tell-tale signs of a gathering. We shrugged at each other and chalked it up to the wild ways of New York. “Must be some crazy event!” I laughed out loud, letting the wind whisk my voice out to the Hudson River.
It’s embarrassing now how oblivious we were to the date or the occasion. Later we learned that at the exact moment we coasted by on our bikes, on the eve of September 11th, President Bush stood at ground zero to address the world, the nation and New Yorkers. Hence, the crowds.
If I had paid detailed attention… Read more…
High school economics was not my forté. Only one concept stuck: supply and demand. But recently, I’ve had market shifts on the brain. This September, the press has emblazoned talk of solar panels everywhere, from Nat Geo to the good old stand by NYTimes. Apparently China, noting a future demand, has jumped on it, creating more factories to produce the panels and polysilicion, the substance needed to make them. The US has done nothing of the sort. Prices have gone down, as happens with most things made in China. (that’s a whole other conversation)
Imagine the moment one human hands-on witnesses the amorphous market beast suddenly shift.
Has this happened to you? Here is my story:
Central Otago, New Zealand 2005
With the afternoon light softening, I place a clump of cherries into my 18th bucket of the day. I have been picking cherries on this orchard for two months now. My workmates are men from China, Malaysia, India and New Zealand–we’ve gotten mean at each other and all adoring. Like siblings. So it goes in the field. Most of these big juicy purple cherries, called Lapins, will be sold to Japan and some to North America, or at least that’s what our gang-boss Nigel says. As we sweat and move quickly (getting paid for how much pick), I keep wondering: How long does it take these cherries to get to the mouths of consumers? Who loads them on an airplane, a truck, the grocery store palette? What if those consumers knew that Bob, Remy, Hydah, Nigel, John and Molly had hand-picked these cherries in a small town on an island in the southern hemisphere? Do they think about it?
Perched on my ladder, I look over the leafy canopy towards… Read more…
Someone I revere and respect recently explained to me (paraphrased):
“No one has read those nature writers you read. They aren’t mainstream. No one knows who they are. They were published because they’re weird.”
Based on some on-the-ground market research I’ve done (i.e. living in a city where everyone doesn’t think exactly like me), it’s come up true. All of the liberal, earth-loving, smart people I went to college with can spout off names beyond Thoreau because our professors in rural Vermont (of course) assigned nature writing with urgency and conviction. Anyone else I’ve ever met has never heard of them or that thing called “nature writing.” I have two reactions to that:
#1 Really?
#2 Well, that makes sense because environmentalists are famous for marginalizing themselves. Preaching to the choir might feel good, but it’s ultimately only as useful as the energy the choir has to go mingle with, let’s say, Republicans, if your choir is Democratic.
For all the pushing against it I did while living in New York, I am now re-reading Wendell Berry’s agrarian essays, ‘The Art of the Commonplace,” which I’m guessing most of you reading this blog haven’t read or heard of. Taking stock of the hour and the day, 3pm Mountain Time, United States of America, August 21, 2009, Berry’s words could not be more apt. Sure, some of the language is outdated, he uses words like household; some might be jargony, not witty, too idealistic. But many of his ideas are radical and would appropriately offend people. Usually, he is wise, sharp, humble and moral, a word not highly-prized these days, even by me (I think “oh, moral, how boring, how 1950’s).
But in an era where knowledge of elders is underused, I wish… Read more…
In exactly three hours, President Obama will be hosting a town hall meeting on healthcare reform. The town is the small Montana town I now live in. He’s here; he’s here; he’s here seems to be the refrain echoing in this valley. Last night at a dinner party, a friend told about how the preparation for the event had touched him. Working on a job up at the ski mountain, he heard a deep rumbling in the sky and waited for it to approach. He looked up as dark green helicopters skimmed towards him along the tops of lodge pole pine trees. Both helicopters were emblazoned with “United States of America” in blue. This man, a gentle horse-loving man, waved. One of the uniformed men in the helicopter waved back. “They were checking it out,” he explained, making sure no ill-doers were hanging in the woods nearby the mysterious lodge slated for the President and his family. I smiled at the visual. I also sighed with the relief of a common person. I am not the President or a famous person who, by sheer role, needs hundreds of people (and thousands of dollars) to scour a place before I go ahead and land.
But it did remind me of the time I met President Bush in my brother’s hospital room. No one patted me down. No one looked inside my purse. Perhaps, without my knowing, they did a background check on my name. The only physical check was a haunting one. A secret service man shook my hand and said, “You are about to meet the President. You will address him as Mr. President.” As the standard words slipped from his mouth, he burrowed his eyes into mine. It was a mental strip down. Any lie I’ve ever told rose to the surface. He knew everything. Did he catch my profound irritation and near hate for the important man I was about to meet? Uh oh. He could see, though, that this young woman had no desire to tackle Mr. President. Secret service people are trained to read the intricate movements of eyes, to look for something suspicious. Imagine if we all knew how to read the landscape and intention of each other’s eyes. Is it an animal instinct we once had? What a powerful and terrifying tool.
How many children do you have or want to have? Oregon State University just released a study that having a child dramatically increases your carbon footprint.
“The average long-term carbon impact of a child born in the U.S. – along with all of its descendants – is more than 160 times the impact of a child born in Bangladesh.”
My response: Obviously. Your response:
Does that mean none of us should have children? It’s a touchy subject. One that grates sufficiently on me. I understand the reality of dwindling resources. Oil. Water. Food. Someone somewhere is going to lose out; and it’s likely that most people who live in my country won’t be the ones picking at scraps.
But my bone is with the field of science, one I respect and value for being a critical workhorse, one I also find heart-numbing in the way it undercuts a round picture of “humanity.” Because science with a capital S depends on numbers. Science rarely charts the emotional human quotient. What about the capacity of an individual to profoundly affect their orbit, whether that orbit is one of high-powered government officials or the small-town residents at the one grocer who need that smile to get them through the day?
My bias: I assume that each individual is born to offer a unique love, perspective and learning in his/her community. One we can all learn from. But…. Read more…
My first night sleeping in New York City I was convinced crazy people were crawling up my fire escape to rob and brutalize me.
But no, it was the clank and clatter of a city.
My first night sleeping in Montana, I was sure an angry bear was breaking down the screen door to eat me.
But no, it was a persistent wind.
Adjusting to the ways of a new place takes a while.
After three weeks living on 100-acres where large potentially aggressive animals do roam, I’m trying to be composed about it and not lambast myself for being scared or cautious. Right when I thought I was slipping into a Zen place about solo exploring through huckleberries, we met our neighbor, a woman who has lived here for 25 years.
“Oh yeah, there’s a resident mountain lion, she explained, “But she knows the rules.”
“Does that scare you?” I asked, trying to seem aloof about it… Read more…
I’ve been thinking about how people actively connect to place. Not everyone is active in this process; many let it happen to them; many do not notice. But my cousin Lauren is always in an active phase. She strolls through cities with her point-n-shoot in her pocket–looking for street art. I even had the privilege of her showing me around NYC, the city I lived in, and indoctrinating me into who painted what, who pasted up what, how, why. It is a knowledge she has cultivated. And done best in her own hometown of Chicago for the past three years. For example, her photo to the right is a “tip toe heart in hands paste-up, chicago.”
“It’s the reason walking these streets I’ve walked for 25 years stays interesting. My eyes are always darting around. Down alleys and around corners.”
She likes observing how a community represents itself in its own space. Now she sees every city she goes to in the context of street art. It’s like being a cyclist who notices the detailed cracks or fissures of any road. It’s a lens–perhaps a way of claiming place. Even Chicago Public Radio has discovered her flickr site and showcased her photos.
WHERE DO YOUR EYES GO IN YOUR LANDSCAPE?
Below is a story straight from Lauren’s email to me: (three of her photos here are #1 choke and goons paste ups, chicago, #2 miss van ice cream girl, toulousse, #3 C215 stencil on the pompidou, paris)
Has this hard economic time tempted you to hightail it to the ashram?
The New York Times says that people are going in droves.
After a “hard time” living in a provocative desert that threw my body off-kilter, I thought sitting still would do me good. I didn’t want to (nor could I afford) “going to the ashram,” which I’d read about somewhere. At the ashram, Hollywood-esque folks paid an exorbitant price to be forced to eat only kale, hike and sweat it out, and lose 20 pounds to fit into a dress for next month’s party. I wanted something authentic, which to 23-year-old me meant Hindu monks in saffron robes teaching us the intricacies of the Bhagavad Gita.
I found the exact place in the Catskill Mountains and laid down a precious, hard-earned $2,000, the most monumental straight-cash purchase of my young life. We sat crossed-legged for hours–chanting, meditating and doing yoga asanas for 30 days in a row. My inflexible hips opened too quickly, a mistake I am reminded of every time they crack and click. We read ancient texts. We even wore white uniforms. I was one of the four people who camped on the soggy lawn. It was a wet September. Everyone else slept in the housing barn. We ate brown rice and vegetables; our one taste of sweet manifested as shriveled dates. I eyed these delicacies and when the communal breakfast platter made its way across the room to me, I had to steady myself from snatching my one date, from snarfing it up like a pig. On the last day my new friend, an Irish woman recovering from cocaine addiction, admitted that every night Read more…
As my friend Eric puts the final touches on an electric fence for his six lambs, a ratty old blue Honda bumbles down the dirt road. It’s Eric’s neighbor, the woman he calls “crazy Jane.” We’re in Barnet, Vermont. She’s a New Yorker who moved here two decades ago. She’s approaching 70 years old. She has shaggy gray hair. She’s a writer. She’s a Buddhist. She is eyeing me, surely thinking, Who is this new person visiting our tiny community? What’s her deal? I tell her where I’m going, what I’m up to.
“Are you going to make violins?”
“What?”
“There’s a violin making school in Montana.”
She quickly loops into a long lament about an ongoing feud she has with another neighbor.
“She’s a displaced person,” she explains, “I’m sure you know many of those.”
“Hmm,” I reply, not really eager to launch into a long conversation. It’s starting to rain. The fence isn’t done. I can sense Eric’s need to finish this job so the sheep can munch on grass. They are starving.
“What a strange thing it is to be human,” she replies, winks and waves goodbye, skidding out to meet a flock of young 24 year old women who have apparently dropped from heaven they are so smart.
A displaced person? She didn’t mean geographically. She meant mentally. She meant scattered in some way. I found this curious and wondered if I was displaced, if any of my friends were and what exactly that means.
Have you ever looked under the lip of the ocean? I hadn’t. But last week in the Virgin Islands, I floated on the surface as the entire back of my body crisped red under the sun. An interloper. I snorkeled three times a day and marveled at the world beneath me. If only I could feel half as acclimated to my environment as these fish and sea creatures seemed to be. With each wave gust, they moved gracefully–never bumping into one another, never losing orientation, assured of place, part of a greater flow. The immediacy of this collective reaction is something I’ve rarely seen on land. These under water inhabitants seemed to have mastered a Taoist bending principle that I hadn’t (and haven’t).
Items to note. Underwater bubbles sound like crackling. Being in the water with a nurse shark is not as scary as I anticipated. Angel fish hide by sliding their flat colorful bodies in between rocks. Trumpet fish skim the surface like a troupe of swords. Barracuda stare right into your eyes. Squid travel in families and line up in perfect formation, like jet fighters. Sea turtles coast along like mellow dudes and dudettes of the ocean. Black spiny sea urchins dance about with their 12-inch long spines. You part through long wide schools of glimmering bait fish, creating an illusion of closeness. Somehow when you swim down deep and look up, bait fish shine like raindrops.
Extract the blue and this landscape is desert-like. A similar starkness punctuated by bright colors–a place of canyons and flats, grays, mustard yellows and deep reds. It is what I imagine the moon to be. I loved being part of two worlds at once. Face down to the peaceful hum of the ocean. Face up to thrashing waves, squawking seagulls and pelicans diving in for bait fish. And then, … the human element. Read more…
I am moving.
“Whoa. Montana,” said the verizon wireless dude 10 minutes ago, “So you’re like gonna be living in, like, farmland.”
“And mountains,” I responded.
“No cabs anymore, no people,” he said shaking his head, “I think you’ll miss New York.”
My apartment is empty, save the old white rug, two lawn chairs, an industrial size fan and the blow-up mattress that so many of my friends passing-through have slept on. And of course, my computer. These inconsequential items somehow remind a person that three years have passed, that life has been lived here.
I am sweaty with today’s up and down five floors–lugging, carrying heavy things–…hence the minimal effort in posting today.
Now off to lie on my back in Central Park, to breathe during my last weekend as a resident of this city I love.
Yesterday afternoon, I streamed President Obama’s much-anticipated speech in Cairo addressing Muslim communities of the world. Curled up at my tiny desk with computer and alocasia polly plant, I listened via the echo of my iPod buds. Why? Because my boyfriend’s brother, Mike, was hunched over his computer about 10 feet away (so it goes in this city apartment) focusing on an important email about his Fulbright placement in Turkey. I didn’t want to disturb him.
As the President’s speech unfolded, time stopped and some part of me zoomed-out. Mike is about to spend a year in a very Muslim part of a Muslim country; President Obama is asking us all to lay down our fear; it is 2009 and life is rich. In an unprecedented tone for an American President, he lauded the rich contributions of Islam in founding the modern world, spoke of the thriving American Muslim community and quoted the Koran, the Talmud and the Bible. The clear message: Fear gets you nowhere. (He’s choosing love over fear! I kept thinking, in reference to my friends who speak that way).
What started with the humility of “words alone will not meet the needs of our people”lead to “violence is a dead-end, not a sign of courage or power” and we must “chose progress over a self-defeating focus on the past” and that a “woman denied education is a woman denied equality” and finally telling young people that we have the chance to “re-imagine the world.”
All of this positive speak was buoyed by the President’s acknowledgment of the hard sustainable work necessary to undo centuries of tension. While shifting the model of leadership, President Obama called out to the citizens of the world to step it up. After the 57 minutes speech, I recounted the particulars to Mike…. Read more…
Two headlines this week:
Excess Cola Can Cause Super-sized Muscle Trouble
Texting May Be Taking a Toll [on health]
Did anyone ever think that drinking Coke or texting incessantly were going to be good for us? C’mon people.
Recently, a friend who’s my father’s age shared frustration with blogs and things like Twitter. He cannot keep up with the flow of information. It’s a complaint many people of a pre-computer generation have. This phrase of his stuck: The onslaught of information invades “a quiet space.”
I cut my texting plan in an attempt to cut costs. When my little brother visited me last month, he expressed his profound shock and irritation at not being able to text me: “Who are you? What do you mean you can’t text? That’s impossible.” So, I told him to email me, since I have a blackberry leftover from my former job. One evil swapped for another… or, just trying to stay on the wave. I’ve never like the idea of doing what everyone else is doing, but in this case, at my tender age of 29, unless I plan to divorce myself from society, I should probably be onboard with email (which I am) and cellphones (which I am) and maybe even texting (which I’m not at this point). Why? Read more…
When amphibians start to die-off, it’s a sign of a degrading environment. They literally absorb the environment. These sensitive creatures sound the alarm bells. I learned this from a zoologist friend in New Zealand, as we padded around a remote island looking for endangered frogs. I was reminded of it in Elizabeth Kolbert’s New Yorker article, “The Sixth Extinction?” She writes:
“Though it’s difficult to put a precise figure on the losses, it is estimated that, if current trends continue, by the end of this century as many as half of earth’s species will be gone.”
Here’s my reaction, thoughts in order of appearance.
1. Whoa.
2. That’s so upsetting. Half? Really?
3. Ugh.
4. Okay, end of century, (quick mental calculation). Phew, I’ll be dead by then.
Much to my shock, that last thought actually happened–fired itself through my brain and some part of my heart. It’s an embarrassing and horrifying thing to admit. I’m an environmentalist. I live simply. I believe in working hard to preserve the future of humanity. I mean, I believe this in the marrow of my bones, in my very core.
Not only did I privately think this thought, I later admitted it out loud to two friends, who… Read more…
This week the Belgian city of Ghent will be going meat-free for one day every week. No city has ever done so. Their goal: to cut the city’s carbon footprint, battle obesity and recognize the impact of livestock on the environment. Who’s participating? Civil servants, elected councilors, and anyone else who’s inspired.
I have it easy. I am a vegetarian by birth. The taste of meat is gross to me; and the thought of eating something pumped with hormones is even grosser. But, when I force myself to eat wild salmon or fresh deer meat, I feel a true-blue unfogging of my brain. I think it would be good for me to eat more meat. I don’t think being vegetarian is right for everyone. That said, it’s hard to look at the facts without feeling a need to become mindful of meat consumption. As Jennifer pointed out earlier this week, what we do in our tiny square meter is important.
These quotes come from The Economist. (Thanks to my friend Sam) Check it out:
“It takes 2,000 litres (530 gallons) of water to grow a kilo of vegetables but 15,000 litres to produce a kilo of beef.”
“Agriculture uses three-quarters of the world’s water (urban use is trivial: most people drink two or three litres a day, on average, but 2,000 – 5,000 litres are used to make the food they eat). Because water is usually free, thirsty crops like alfalfa are grown in arid California. Wheat in India and Brazil uses twice as much water as wheat in America and China. Dry countries like Pakistan export textiles though a 1kg bolt of cloth requires 11,000 litres of water.”
** Also, according to the UN, livestock in responsible for nearly 1/5 of global greenhouse gas emissions. Water is the stuff of life. What do you think about it all?
dis·place·ment n
1. the moving or movement of something from its usual or correct place
I have been consumed with the Swat Valley story. Even calling it a “story” shows the distance I have from it–sitting in the library, typing on a computer, going outside to eat my avocado sandwich in a park. According to the United Nations, approximately one million people have fled northwest Pakistan since August. Right this minute, as the Pakistani government attempts to fight (or in the words of Prime Minister Gilani, “eliminate”) Taliban militants, Pakistani families are walking or busing towards refugee camps, where they hope to find food, space, toilets. “Massive displacement,” is the phrase emblazoned across newspapers. Real people uprooted from homes, routines, community, and forced to migrate to safety, if there is safety.
I wonder what this would look like in New York City, Read more…
