Category Archives: Politics

I want a leader who…

06 Saturday Feb 2016

Posted by in Politics, Uncategorized

≈ 7 Comments

Tags

, , ,

I want a leader that will inspire without anger.

I want to live in a world where disagreements are sparks for explorative conversations, where every side is willing to listen fully before formulating a retort, where there is space between words.

People are complicated.  Politics makes people more complicated.

I want the space for complication to be okay.  I want the space for the changing of minds, for the willingness to converse and to discuss and to examine the ways in which we have changed and the ways we haven’t.

I want a leader who knows her or his heart and who knows how to hear another’s heart.  I want a leader who understands that hearts are wider than religion or race or gender, and also understands that experience is shaped by religion and race and gender.

I’m thinking in terms of government, but I don’t know that this type of leader can be found in government.

I hope it can, though it feels unsafe to question deeply in public forums.  The anger is so much that the risk of posing a question begins to feel too great, and I see how questioning is met with condemnation by those who have made up their minds.  We have grown so far apart that the meeting of “other” threatens our very existence.  We have grown so far apart that “other” becomes anyone with a  different soundbite.

I want to go beyond the soundbite.  I want to sit and look at each other and hear each other and feel the way our words fumble like ice cubes in our mouths even as fire ignites in our bellies and screams up the narrow tunnels of our throats.

I want you to know that you are allowed this.  This fire and ice.  This knowing and questioning.  This anger and love.

I want you to know that everyone is allowed this.

Anger has its place.  Anger can trigger us to wake up.  Its spark can create an opening to another way.  If anger is the only way to shake your eyes open, then let them open, but know that what we do when we wake up matters.  Wake up and root back in love.

I want a leader who will root themselves in love.  The expansive, forgiving, rolling kind of love.  The kind of love like air, like a breeze, like a gust of wind: willing to let us breathe, and willing to tug at our shirts when something needs to shift, and willing to blow our hats off when our haze becomes too thick, before calming into stillness again to let us be with ourselves and each other, stopped after the hurricane to meet the hearts of our neighbors.

I want a leader who knows that we all have this power of air and wind.  That we all breathe every moment.  That we all have this power to wake each other up.

Mostly, I want us all to know we have this power, and I want us to know we can use it with tenderness and care and deep, deep love.

 

A New Story

02 Saturday Jan 2016

Posted by in Farming, Politics, Writing

≈ 4 Comments

Tags

, , ,

photo by Katie Spring

I’ve been thinking about stories lately, about the larger story of our society that plays out over and over again, and about the undercurrents of alternative stories that whisper through the static.

At a Hanukkah celebration a few weeks ago, our host stood to give his yearly toast, and he said, “I’m having a hard time celebrating the myth of Hanukkah this year.”  He went on to tell the story of Hannah and her seven sons, all slayed in front of her as they refused to denounce their faith to the invading army.  Eventually the Jews won, and the story told was one of martyrdom and the birth of Hanukkah, and so we celebrate the victim overcoming the enemy.

And this is where the tiredness came into Harlan’s voice.  He spoke of the terrorist attacks in Paris and San Bernadino.  He spoke of the whole of written history with all its beheadings and wars and conquering of one group over another.

“It’s always the same story of victim and martyr.  It’s not getting us anywhere.  We need a new story, and I don’t know what it is.”

I was quiet as a discussion ensued.  His emotion swirled around inside of me as I herd his plea and understood the depth of yearning for change, for peace, for a future that will hold our children safely after we have gone.  In the weeks since, that one statement has gone through me over and over as I try to answer it: we need a new story.

As his words resound in my head, others come in to answer.  I think of my friends who run Earthwise Farm and Forest, and how Carl said, “Our lives are not a rehearsal.  We advocate for the life we want by living it.”

I look at their lives and see another story: one of resilience, of interdependence with their land and community, of activism balanced with the steady building of a home and family and farm.  I look at their lives and see how true their words are, how they are living the story they want to bring forth into the world.

I think of Harlan and the weariness in his voice as he said I don’t know what it is.

While I may not have the complete answer, either, I do know that while the world is bigger than any individual, change is not.  Sometimes we all feel small, and that is okay.  Sometimes we all feel defeated and frustrated, but still it is important to witness.  It is important to feel.  The only true defeat is in thinking we are too small to matter.  You are not too small to matter.

Every beginning, every story, starts out as a seed.  Some of us are the seed sowers.  Some of us are pollinators.  Some of us are the wind and birds that scatter the seeds wildly across the land.  Some of us are seed savers that carefully and tenderly carry the story into the next generation.

You do not have to play every part.  Only your part.  You do not have to be recognized with a Nobel Prize or a plaque or anything at all.  Just discover your heart.  Discover what makes you feel light and do more of that.  Share it.  Most of the time you will have no idea how many lives you are touching by simply living in a way that brings you more alive.

This is what brings me alive: touching soil, planting a field of vegetables, growing flowers, feeding others, writing.  In my personal story, I’m a seed sower, but in the larger story of the world I think of myself more as a pollinator, helping a new story bear fruit and flower.

Think of pollinators: insects, bees, butterflies, birds.  They are so small.  And we need them.

Don’t wait until you have more money or a better car or more time.  Create the life you want by living it.

That’s the only way a new story will take root.

 

 

History, Herstory, Ourstory

22 Friday May 2015

Posted by in Politics

≈ 1 Comment

Tags

, , , , , ,

All over the news are stories like this, and this, of sexual assault.  Some stories end with a woman raising her voice, some end with a woman losing her life.

This American Life recently aired an episode in which college boys talk about how they learned about sex and what women like (from other boys and porn, not from actually listening to women).

All over the news are stories of drilling, fracturing, contaminating, spilling, plowing, spraying, of people doing what we will to the earth in the name of economics and power.

The way we treat the land and the way we treat women and their bodies are inextricably connected.

Society’s history is built on stories of men in power, of women and land as property.

There are other histories to be re-learned.  As my eighth-grade history teacher taught us, there are herstories and ourstories, too.

It’s time to reconcile the record.

Your Voice

06 Friday Apr 2012

Posted by in Politics

≈ Leave a comment

Tags

, , , , , , ,

Today I heard a news reporter say that the Democratic and Republican parties are fighting for the “crucial women’s vote.”  With so much happening politically with women’s health care and rights issues, we do indeed have a crucial role to play in the upcoming election.  The popular slogan “Your Vote is Your Voice” is true, but I believe your voice becomes even more powerful when spoken aloud and written down.  It is the job of politicians to listen to people, and though corporations may have more money, there is a tipping point when the number of people speaking up becomes more powerful than the number of dollars silently trading hands.

I invite you to speak, so your voice can be heard.

I urge you to write, so your words can be read.

There are many issues to be concerned with, and at times it can feel overwhelming, but identify what is most important to you, focus on that and be active.  For me, it is food.  I support many other causes with my signature on petitions and my vote on ballots, but I focus my political energy on food because everything comes back to it: we all need to eat, and how we eat directly affects the food industry, which affects the chemical industry, which affects the health care industry, all of which is linked to social justice issues and climate change.  You see, it is all connected, and we are all part of it.  To separate ourselves is to ignore the inextricable ties we have to all life, and though we face struggle, we also face beauty.  Let us work toward that beauty.  Let us listen to each other; let us speak and be heard.  I am here, and I am writing, and I want to read as well.  Share with me your voice, and I will share mine, for each connection made creates a stronger whole.

Message From A Stop Sign

12 Saturday Feb 2011

Posted by in Love, Politics, Writing

≈ 1 Comment

Tags

, , , , , ,

There is a stop sign that makes me smile.  I pass it every day as I drive to work.  The first time I noticed its message I caught my breath and stopped for an extra moment, looking at it with wonder.  Two words have been spray-painted on the sign, transforming it from a street signal to a simple command that people seem to so easily forget:

NEVER STOP LOVING

In my hometown there are other spray-painted stop signs.  In high school I’d feel strangely justified when I’d pass the ones that read STOP BUSH.  Now that he is out of office, I’ve seen another sign that says STOP OBAMA, and I felt perplexed and a little sad.  It seems that whoever is President, someone wants to stop them.  There are those who put all there energy toward the things they do not want in this world, but I have found this practice only magnifies the problems at hand.

Edward Abbey, a great environmental writer, said in an interview with Mother Earth News that “No one should be a full-time crusader for anything.  I’ve found that it’s best to be a half-time crusader, a part-time fanatic, and to save the rest of the time to try to maintain my sense of humor and my emotional balance.”  He believed in enjoying what it is you are fighting for–if you want to save the wilderness, don’t forget to go out and enjoy it while you can; if you want to change the policies of the US, take time to enjoy the pieces that you love right now.  If nothing else, you will find a peace that comes with joy and the celebration of a thing you love.

This stop sign message is simpler than that, though.  It does not tell what to love, or how much to love, but just to continue to love.  It is the most powerful thing one person can do.

Losing and Finding Compassion

14 Friday Jan 2011

Posted by in Love, Politics, Writing

≈ 1 Comment

Tags

, , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , ,

My political consciousness began to develop at age 13, when my middle school held a mock presidential election during the campaigns of George W. Bush and Al Gore.  Though it was a close race, if it had been up to the eighth graders at Barre Town Elementary and Middle School, Gore would have won.  The next fall, as I worried about braces, boys and being cool, two planes flew into the World Trade Center and began a cycle of fear that has fought to control the US political climate since.

Now, at 23, I am still learning the repercussions of 9/11, still trying to understand the massive shift it caused, still trying to comprehend the fear, hatred, and loss that has ensued as a result.  Because of both this act of terror and my country’s reactions, which have caused more terror, I have grown up in a time of fragmentation that would have us believe that conversation and compromise are for the weak, and the “other side” (whether it be republican or democrat or any religion that we are not) is inherently wrong or evil or both.

My personal experience holds a different truth.  Despite my encounters with division, more often I have found connection.

In the fall of 2006, when the newspapers were filled with threats of North Korea and battles in Iraq, I found peace in the Adirondack State Park’s Massawepie Lake and forest trails lined with red and white pine, tamarack, hemlock, maple, birch and spruce.  As a few people prepared for war in one place, a few more people prepared for ecology lessons in another.  When the weight of the media began to push me down with sorrow, I’d paddle into the middle of the lake and sit quietly, listening to the chickadees, squirrels, osprey and insects.  In these moments, there was no doubt that this part of the world was in harmony and kept alive by the interconnections of species.

Who is to say that war outweighs ecology?  Who is to say that violence and division trumps happiness and harmony?  Why must the news of our world be filled with the negative extreme?

Looking back at all the moments in my life that held confusion, anger and sadness, I see that the places I escaped to are what brought me back to peace.  I wonder how this world might be different if everyone had a place of wildness to retreat to with enough space to breathe clean air and hear the rhythms of nature.

When I was in Hobart, Tasmania last December, I saw the Dalai Lama speak.  The University of Tasmania hosted him, but the Chinese government prohibited the University from bestowing an honorary degree to the Dalai Lama, and since such a large population of its students are Chinese, the University complied.  When His Holiness sat in his chair on stage, he smiled and laughed, and to a group of 2,000 people this joyful being who lives in exile from his country said, “It is a very serious danger to lose compassion.”  What happens when we lose it ?  Hate, anger, and all those emotions that arise out of fear take hold and build walls to keep out any voice that may offer something different.

The news this week showed us what happens when one has lost compassion.  The shooting of Congresswoman Gabrielle Giffords, her staff, and bystanders is a consequence of extreme fear.  A commentator on the BBC World News Report on NPR said that this act of violence differs from those of the 1960s, a time of multiple political assassinations and violent riots, because the American people do not have a promise of hope to balance it out, like the promises of equality or money or jobs that the 1960s held.  This comment may weigh us down more.  I see hope.  I see hope for Giffords, for the families of the victims to heal, for the political climate to shift towards communication and bi-partisanship, for finding space to grieve and forgive, and for transforming fragmentation into connection.

In her book Finding Beauty In A Broken World, Terry Tempest Williams writes, “Social change depends on love.”  Let us look for love as we heal.  Let us change not with blame or fear, but with love and consideration.  This event offers us the chance to reunite our country as a community—not necessarily one that agrees on every bill passed by congress, but one that is willing to truly listen and communicate openly.  As the healing process begins, I offer this:

Standing quietly by ourselves may help us remember the sanctity of silence, the power of unity, and the strength of compassion in the midst of an ever-changing world.

School Gardens and Social Change

27 Sunday Jun 2010

Posted by in Alaska, Politics, Sustainable Agriculture

≈ 3 Comments

Tags

, , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , ,

Earlier this spring when I was doing outreach for the EATinG program, I found myself annoyed and disappointed with the language used to encourage students to volunteer.  In each classroom I visited, the main motivation used was the fact that volunteering can be used as a resume booster and a way to put you above others in the competitive world of college and job applications.  It seems as though it isn’t enough to say you can help your community, and as a result volunteering becomes an act only to propel oneself onto something better, rather than an act to better one’s community and environment.

On one hand I wonder, is it so bad to do a good thing for personal gain?  After all, creating a stronger, healthier community does have positive affects on the individual, and perhaps one will go on to enjoy volunteering for reasons other than resume building.  On the other hand I wonder, what it is that creates a society that so often views acts done without the motivation of personal gain as unusual or as something to be put off for when we have more time, which we never seem to have.

As I was growing up, my parents took my brother and I to nursing homes to pass out Christmas presents, involved us in “Green Up Day” every spring, and enrolled us in a school with classes that emphasized community service.  I learned through doing that interacting with my community in a positive way is fun, and a desire to help grew in me because of that.  Now I want to teach my students the importance of serving one’s community and environment, and the value of giving without the expectation of receiving.

On Monday I held a discussion with my student gardeners called “Charity versus Change,” a workshop from the Food Project’s Growing Together, by Greg Gale.  I wrote the words “charity” and “social change” on the blackboard and asked the students to call out words that come to mind for each category.  They had no problem with charity, shouting out things like helping, donating, sharing and giving.  When we switched to social change, they fell silent, with one girl throwing out the word donating again.  I helped them along by explaining how charity is an act done by a person of greater wealth for a person of lesser wealth, and is often a singular event that must be repeated in order to have a lasting effect, whereas social change is altering policies and laws in order to create a community that operates on equality, inclusion, and diversity.  It’s like the saying “give a person a fish and he/she will eat for one day, teach a person to fish and he/she will eat forever.”  Giving a fish is charity, and teaching to fish is change.

I knew this could be a difficult workshop for them—one girl is going into eighth grade while the other four are going into seventh, and I didn’t know what kind of community service experience they have had—but I wanted to challenge them to think about and understand the broad affects of this school garden and their work in it.  Since the garden started in 2009, vandalism at Hunter Elementary has sharply dropped.  Last summer there was only one instance of suspected vandalism, which turned out to be kids catching ladybugs in the garden late at night, and this summer there has been none.  As a result, the sense of community pride has soared.  Everyday passersby stop to compliment the garden, ask what’s growing, or just say hello, and our Thursday farm stand had people lining up before we opened for business this week.  Most importantly, though, this school garden has increased access to local, fresh food while teaching students the values and skills of organic growing, selling produce, and making community connections.

After we defined charity and social change, I asked each student write down their talents and passions and then identify ways they could use these things to create positive change.  As we went around the circle, the girls talked about using the internet to connect with others; drawing flyers to post around neighborhoods to create awareness about an event or issue; writing speeches, stories, or articles; teaching others how to rock climb and learn to interact with the environment in new ways, thus increasing an appreciation for the natural world.

We ended the discussion with a quote from Martin Luther King, Jr.: “Everybody can be great.  Because everybody can serve.  You don’t have to have a college degree to serve.  You don’t have to make your subject and your verb agree to serve.  You don’t have to know about Plato and Aristotle to serve.  You don’t have to know Einstein’s theory of relativity to serve.  You don’t have to know the second theory of thermodynamics in physics to serve.  You only need a heart full of grace.  A soul generated by love.”

I told the students, “This garden is an incredible thing to have in the community, and you are making it grow.  You could be doing anything this summer, and maybe this is just a way for you to make some money, but despite the reason you chose to be a student gardener, the fact that you are working here is making a difference, and you can feel great about that.”

Maybe they will go on to volunteer later in the summer, after their four weeks of work are up.  Maybe they won’t.  But at least they have heard it from me: their work matters, the food they grow and eat and sell matters, and this small piece of land in Fairbanks has transformed from an unused lot to a place of learning and growing because of them and all the teachers, community members, and Calypso farmers who support it.

Opening Up

22 Sunday Nov 2009

Posted by in Farming, New Zealand, Politics, Travel

≈ Leave a comment

Tags

, , , , , , ,

I have been thinking more about patriotism.  After my last blog post, my cousin Amy asked me “what if you could never care about what a single person thought about you or your country again?”  I immediately thought I could love more freely, more openly.  It is such a simple answer, yet my mind still swirls with the enormous ideas of citizenship, country, love, and identity.

The subject of patriotism is a complicated one for me.  It seems  that to be a patriot one must close part of oneself off to the people and land that stretches out past the borders and thus attain an attitude that one’s own country is the supreme power.  This mindset requires defence and offence, but it has little use for neutrality or a deep questioning of actions.  While exploring the subject of patriotism in her essay “Jabberwocky”, Barbara Kingsolver criticizes the Smithsonian for cancelling an exhibit on the atomic bomb in Hiroshima and Nagasaki, and placing emotions over analysis.  “I’m offended by the presumption that my honor as a citizen will crumple unless I’m protected from the knowledge of my country’s mistakes,” Kingsolver writes.  She goes on to ask, “What kind of love is patriotism if it evaporates in the face of uncomfortable truths?  What kind of honor sits quietly by while a nation’s conscience flies south for a long, long winter?”  This question challenges the blindness that I often associate with patriotism, at least the form of it that has risen in the US since 9/11 and the fear tactics employed by the Bush administration.  Given the choice between a sweet dream and a hard truth, however, I’ll take the truth.

According to the Collins New Zealand English Dictionary, the definition of patriot is “one that loves his country and maintains its interests,” and patriotism is “inspired by love of one’s country.”  How can love maintain wars?  How can I hold the love I have for my home next to the violence that the US commits on the environment, in Iraq and Afghanistan?

My friend Sam once described to me how he learned to let go of something without losing the parts of it he cherished.  Holding a penny in a closed fist, he then turned the back of his hand toward the ground and, stretching his fingers out, revealed the penny in his open palm.  I understood then that it is not about clasping to love in order to defend it, but rather it is learning to hold it freely so it can be shared.  By letting go I risk the chance of losing, but I cannot let that deter me because I know the tremendous possibility of growth appears to the things and people who are not constrained.

What is patriotism but a way to express love?  There are many things about Karamea that remind me of the North Country: chopping wood, cows in pasture, the community that working the land fosters.  These things make me feel close to home even though I’m far away, and I’ve found that what matters most are not the borders I stand behind, but  what I love and how I express that love.

At the end of her essay, Kingsolver concludes, “A country can be flawed as a marriage or a family or a person is flawed, but ‘Love it or Leave it’ is a coward’s slogan.  There’s more honor in ‘Love it and get it right.’  Love it. Love it.  Love it and never shut up.”  So I will love the US and the world, and hold that love in an open palm.  I will continue to look further than immediate presumptions (including mine) and extend peace to all I interact with.  It may not always be easy, but I do not imagine that it is easy for the seed to spring its first stem through the soil.  When it does, though, the sun is waiting, already extending its warmth to the first tiny leaves.

Discovering Patriotism

16 Monday Nov 2009

Posted by in New Zealand, Politics, Travel

≈ 2 Comments

Tags

, , , , ,

What does it mean to be an American abroad?

When Obama became President I thought oh good, the world will like us again, but I wasn’t completely right.  Since I’ve been in New Zealand, I ‘ve had several reactions to the phrase “I’m from the States,” one of them being “Oh, I’m sorry!”

When I first arrived I was quick to concede to America’s failures and faults.  I found myself describing Vermont’s location by its proximity to Canada and joking (sort of) about the desires of some Vermonters to secede and become a part of Canada.  It was difficult for me to defend a country that re-elected Bush; a country with politicians that ignore separation of church and state and spend more energy trying to make abortion illegal than they do making sure schools have enough funding for an arts department, let alone a sex ed. program; a country that consumes, wastes and pollutes at a fantastic rate.  While looking at the US from afar has allowed me to understand the tremendous impact the country has on the rest of the world, the longer I am here the slower I am to concede to the negativities without balancing the score between good and evil.  As Erin points out, there are 300 million of us, and just as not all Kiwis are friendly and environmentally conscious, not all Americans are money-driven, corrupt media-drones.

The first day Erin and I worked with Gary, our WWOOF host, we were in the middle of a conversation about agriculture, the States, and environmental problems when he said to us, “some people say the world would be better off if we just killed all [Americans],” and if the US disappeared.  Hitler thought the same thing about the Jews.  How can more violence make anything better, though?  If the United States were to disappear what would happen to the countries receiving aid, or who have trade agreements with us, or who depend on Peace Corps volunteers?

Since this conversation we have had many more about Americans and our problems, and Gary does admit that he’s met some great Americans (Erin and I included).  How many “good” citizens does it take to outshine the “bad” ones, though?

When we were in Wellington, we met a Canadian girl named Caroline who said to me, “When I look at you I see a kind, loving, informed person–not a typical American.”  What is a “typical” American?  When I look at my community I see passionate, motivated, caring, intelligent people.  Yes I grew up blessed with a supportive family, with parents who could afford to send my brother and me to private universities and still put organic food on the table, but I do not take for granted the comforts and advantages I enjoy.  I want Caroline, and all the people I meet, to look at me and not see and ugly red-white-and-blue stain on my shirt, but to recognise that I am who I am in large part because of where I grew up.

I will not defend big business, environmental ruin, or war tactics, but I will point out grassroots movements, sustainable initiatives, peace-workers and vast tracts of wilderness.  This trip has opened up a way for me to look at the US with pride again, and looking home I see the countless American communities of people who live with respect, care and love.  For the first time in my life, I say this without flinching or feeling cheesy: I am proud to be an American.

Freedom?

17 Thursday Sep 2009

Posted by in Politics, Writing

≈ 1 Comment

Tags

,

In the summer of 2005, my brother Jeff and I stood in front of a vending machine, staring.  We were drawn over to it after cleaning out the car, which our father had threatened to take away if we brought it home dirty.  After throwing out food wrappers, shot-gunned beer cans and empty bottles of Jack Daniel’s, the taurus (or “raging bull” as Jeff dubbed it) still smelled of stale alcohol.  The vending machine held the key to our problem: air fresheners.

Our eyes moved over the individually wrapped cardboard trees.  Never in my life had I seen so many different kinds of air fresheners, and as we scanned the flavors my eyes landed on one with a bald eagle head on it.  “I wonder what freedom smells like?”  I said to Jeff.  He burst out laughing and we agreed, we had to buy it.

What does freedom smell like, and why are Americans so concerned with it that a company would make an air freshener of it?  If we truly are free, shouldn’t it smell like everything?  Why must we constrain it to one scent?

When one is in love, in the midst of passion and the comfort of reciprocated desire, one does not have to search for answers to find out what love is–what it smells like, feels like–because everything is love.  The same goes for freedom.  It is not until these things are threatened that we desperately grasp on, scrambling to define them so as not to forget what they were after they are gone.

When Jeff and I unwrapped the air freshener, we discovered what so many other Americans must have already known.  Freedom, it turns out, smells like a bowling alley.  More specifically, it smells like the sanitizing spray for the shoes.  We both wondered if GWB likes bowling.

The car ended up passing my father’s inspection, but looking back on all of it, how much freedom can a car give me?  After all, I will always have to stay on the road, always have to pull over for gas, always have to worry about break-downs and repair costs.  On the up-side, the only bowling alley in town is pretty much only accessible by car.  And we all know what bowling alleys smell like.

What is freedom to me, though?  It is running barefoot: calloused feet, hair like ribbons flying, arms pumping and legs exposed.  It is diving naked into deep water, coolness sliding across my skin, taking a deep gulp of air as I emerge up on the surface.  It is breathing in pine trees and maple leaves as they fall down and turn crunchy in autumn, or fresh mud and melting snow in spring.  It is the sound of geese returning after winter, the stillness of crystalized snow, the solitude of a cold, cloudless winter night.  Freedom is loving the world with no expectations or apologies.  It is dancing in the circle of seasons and embracing the security of constant change, which of course brings death and also rebirth.