Earth Hour Tonight, March 29th: make a statement

Tonight, March 29, 2008 join millions of Earth residents in making a statement about climate change by turning off your lights for Earth Hour, an event created by the World Wildlife Fund Climate change project.

Earth Hour was created by WWF in Sydney, Australia in 2007, and in one year has grown from an event in one city to a global movement. In 2008, millions of people, businesses, governments and civic organizations in nearly 200 cities around the globe will turn out for Earth Hour. More than 100 cities across North America will participate, including the US flagships–Atlanta, Chicago, Phoenix and San Francisco and Ottawa, Montreal, Toronto and Vancouver.

Today, at 8:00pm your local time, please switch off the lights in an effort to make a statement about climate change.

Better yet, turn off all non-essential electricity in your home of workplace for at least that one hour. Experience the quiet of no-electricity!

Along with many other corporations supporting Earth hour, Google is darkening their search page to promote Earth Hour. Darkening the search page (making it a black background) daves absolutely no energy, nor does it change anything at Google headquarters. They are doing this to raise awareness among the millions of people who search Google everyday -- hopefully, just having this unusual black google page will make people wonder what it's about, and hopefully they'll take the time to learn about Earth Hour.

Solstice: Celebrate Winter in Montana

I wish all of my blog readers happiness and clarity of heart in the coming year -- may you each have the blessing of Good Luck in your lives.

To celebrate winter, to honor Mother Earth, and to welcome the light coming back to us from the darkest, longest night of the year ... I would like to share with you a selection of winter images from my Montana albums.


Click on a thumbnail to view the image larger. To see the original (much larger) photo, click LINK below the photo on the right. Enjoy!

Pre Earth Day Amusement

Grist Environmental News and Commentary published their List of Grist Superlatives ... they missed a few, but there is a place to add what you think should be on the list ... a few of my favorites from their much longer list from Tree Hugger:

• Best car of 2006: your bike
• Most hackneyed phrase: "Green is the new black"
• Best place to look for ways to reduce ecological impact: mirror
• Worst way to deal with climate change: nuclear energy
• Easiest way to create appearance of eco-benignity: green tags
• Government leader whose big talk on climate is most likely to be muffled by Bush's bum affixed to his lips: Tony Blair
• Most overlooked source of energy: efficiency
• Sneakiest way for big ag to make a buck: corn-based ethanol
• Most popular environmental oxymoron: "clean coal"
• Second most popular oxymoron: "safe, clean nuclear power"

April Calendar: Earth Day is this Month

Here's the April 2007 Calendar ... a little late. Please enjoy this and my other monthly calendars for your personal use -- you can download these calendars to your computer by clicking on the image, left, then right-click to download.

Wandering: a Meditation on Life, Art, Trees, Creativity

Whoever has learned how to listen to trees no longer wants to be a tree. He wants to be nothing except what he is. That is home. That is happiness. -- from Wandering

Wandering, Hermann Hesse's collection of succinct prose, poetry and sketches, was on my bookshelf as a young college student. I don't know where it is now -- it's the kind of book you want to keep around to read over and over again, yet at the same time, a book that begs to be passed around from friend to friend ... Hesse's writing is simple, profound, mystical (in a Earth-mystic sense) poetic, inspiring. This is one of my favorite books ever.

I originally put together this post for Tim's woodworking site, ShopTalk. Inspired by the Festival of Trees, I decided to illustrate my favorite passage from Hesse (on listening to trees) with some of my photos and share it with my readers on Raven's Nest.

Sit down anywhere you like, on a wall, a stone, a tree stump, on the grass or the earth: everywhere they surround you, a painting and a poem, everywhere the world resonates beautifully and happily around you. -- from Wandering

... For me, trees have always been the most penetrating preachers. I revere them when they live in tribes and families, in forests and groves. And even more I revere them when they stand alone. They are like lonely persons. Not like hermits who have stolen away out of some weakness, but like great, solitary men, like Beethoven and Nietzsche.

... Nothing is holier, nothing is more exemplary than a beautiful, strong tree. When a tree is cut down and reveals its naked death-wound to the sun, one can read its whole history in the luminous, inscribed disk of its trunk: in the rings of its years, its scars, all the struggle, all the suffering, all the sickness, all the happiness and prosperity stand truly written, the narrow years and the luxurious years, the attacks withstood, the storms endured. And every young farmboy knows that the hardest and noblest wood has the narrowest rings, that high on the mountains and in continuing danger the most indestructible, the strongest trees grow.

Trees are sanctuaries. Whoever knows how to speak to them, whoever knows how to listen to them, can learn the truth. They do not preach learning and precepts, they preach, undeterred by particulars, the ancient law of life.

A tree says: A kernel is hidden in me, a spark, a thought, I am life from eternal life. The attempt and the risk that the eternal mother took with me is unique, unique the form and veins of my skin, unique the smallest play of leaves in my branches and the smallest scar on my bark. I was made to form and reveal the eternal in my smallest special detail.

A tree says: My strength is trust. I know nothing about my fathers, I know nothing about the thousand children that every year spring out of me. I live out the secret of my seed to the very end ... I trust that God is in me. I trust that my labor is holy. Out of this trust I live.

When we are stricken and cannot bear our lives any longer, then a tree has something to say to us: Be still! Be still! Look at me! ... Let God speak within you, and your thoughts will grow silent. You are anxious because your path leads away from mother and home. But every step and every day lead you back again to the Mother. Home is neither here nor there. Home is within you, or home is nowhere at all.

A longing to wander tears my heart when I hear trees rustling in the wind at evening. If one listens to them silently for a long time, this longing reveals its kernel, its meaning. It is not so much a matter of escaping from one's suffering, though it may seem to be so. It is a longing for home, for a memory of the Mother, for new metaphors for life. It leads home. Every path leads homeward, every step is birth, every step is death, every grave is Mother.

So the tree rustles in the evening, when we stand uneasy before our own thoughts. Trees have long thoughts, long-breathing and restful, just as they have longer lives that ours. They are wiser than we are, as long as we do not listen to them ...

Whoever has learned how to listen to trees no longer wants to be a tree. He wants to be nothing except what he is. That is home. That is happiness.

-- excerpt from Hermann Hesse: Wandering translated by James Wright, © 1974

If the Earth were one small village ...

If you store your food in a refrigerator, your clothes in a closet ... if you have a bed to sleep in sleep in and a roof over your head,


Miniature Earth: If we could turn the population of the earth into a small village of 100 people, keeping the same proportions we have today, it would something like this.



The following images are excerpted screen captures from the Miniature Earth Video. Please watch the entire video on the Miniature Earth website (just click on any of the images here) - it's totally worth the few minutes of silent open contemplation you will need to let it's message into your heart.

Appreciate what you have ... and do your best for a better world

Poetry Thursday: Love the Place You're With

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Last night, just moments before the sun went behind the ridge, I stopped along Prickly Pear Creek just a little south of East Helena. There, the creek runs between two ridges and has been used and abused for years, by locals who toss beer cans and garbage in the gulch,and by hunters who discard elk and deer carcasses after taking what meat and trophy parts they want to keep.

I had driven by this creek numerous times, though I hadn't stopped until now. I had Sam with me and we both wanted to get out someplace new. So, this is where we ended up. I had to keep Sam on a leash for this walk - if I hadn't, he would have availed himself of the opportunity to douse with that special fragrance loved by dogs -- "Eau de Carcasse." There were at least 30 carcasses along the stretch of water we walked. Eeeuwww!

I had my camera with me, of course. The light was fading fast and I knew I had to hurry to catch it before nightfall. As I looked around for something that appealed to me -- a scene or detail I might want to shoot, I thought about what many people have told me when they see my photographs of Montana -- that I must live in Paradise, that Montana is so beautiful, pristine, that they want to visit here, to see what (I) see.

Yet here I was, scanning this trashed-out, dumping place for some little detail to photograph. It was worse than a garbage dump. This creek with its sad parking spots, its lovers' lane, its game carcasses strewn in the bushes ... this damaged wetland was a stark testimonial of how little we humans care for the earth.

In anger, I almost turned right around to leave. But something in the water caught my eye. A beaver dam, breached in the middle, icy willow branches bravely stacked against the winter, against the beavers' predators. The little dam was something I needed to see last night - it was a glimmer of optimism, of hope, in this trashed out riverbottom.

I sat for a few minutes, just feet from the large ribcage of an elk. I scolded Sam for being too interested in the bones. He put his head on his paws and watched me shoot -- quickly -- as the light changed and the water shape-shifted.

I wanted to redeem my species somehow, to reach back in time, find the memory of who this little dancing creek had once been, before the cement plant started polluting the waters, before people started using the valley as an unofficial dump and drinking place ... I wanted to catch the narrow slice of sky reflected in Prickly Pear Creek. I wanted to remember, with my mind's eye and my camera, the way graceful branches danced with the current.





I tossed a stone just upstream of the beaver dam. I clicked and clicked the camera shutter until I could see only the beauty of water, of evening, of a beaver's industry and natural design ...

until I could see
only the deep
blue sky and black
branches and golden
light swimming in
blue night
rippling


This is how to see the place
where you belong.
This is how to love
the places you spend your days
and nights.
Look under the surface
love the beauty you find there
no matter where you are.


~~~~~~~~~~~~

Singing Land
Your burning skies are never-ending
Across your red brush plains
Out where the dingo still is king and eternity remains
There between the old and ancient there's an oasis bright
Your gentle children who have gone are close to me tonight

In your singing land, in your singing land
Shine on, oh shine on over me

There's a feeling still and eerie, there's a feeling strong
The path humanity has come and the path that he has gone
Me I am I am just passing three score years and ten
And I'm just a stranger who may never come this way again

In your singing land, in your singing land
Shine on, oh shine on over me

Under the spell of caterpillar dreaming
New life shapes its form
Along the river's naked banks
That are straining for the storm
Oh sacred rock, in thunder ocean
The tree of man grows clear
The woodlarks sing, the brolgas dance and
Dawn is slipping near
-- song by Dougie MacLean

I have put together an audio/visual experience for you in this little slideshow with Dougie Maclean's song (above) To listen and watch the slideshow, click the arrow in the center of the screen below:




Posted for Poetry Thursday's totally optional prompt for this week, which I am totally ignoring. As usual. ;-D or check out the other poetry posts for this week by clicking this button:




I posted the first bunch of photos in this set, Love the Place You're with, last winter ... this winter I went back to the same place to see if I had a similar response to the place and I did. It has imprinted itself in me. It has become a numinous thing for me. It has become the kind of place that shows up in my dreams.

Groceries or Gifts wrapped in Furoshiki?

The furoshiki is a square cloth, dyed in a variety of colors and patterns, that is used for wrapping, storing, and carrying things. The name "furoshiki," which combines the words "furo" meaning "bath" and a form of the verb "shiku" meaning "to spread," dates back to the Edo Era(1603-1868) when public baths were in fashion, and people carried their belongings in a square cloth, then spread the cloth for use as a bath-mat.

Over the years, people realized the versatility of these cloths and began using them in many ways. Very large furoshiki can hold futon (Japanese bedding set) and small furoshiki can wrap just one teacup. The typical furoshiki is 70 square cm and until very recently, Japanese would not leave home without one.
They are folded like a napkin or handkerchief when not being used, so a furoshiki will conveniently fit in a briefcase, purse or backpack.

I would love to get our local natural food store, and the food coop we belong to in Bozeman, to start providing furoshiki as one of our choices at the check-out-stand. They now give shoppers a choice of using a plastic bag or purchasing a cloth bag (or, of course, you can bring your own cloth bags or reused plastic bags -- this is what we do now.)




I'm going to experiment with wrapping miscellaneous groceries in a furoshiki to see if it might be a practical thing for the Real Food Market to begin offering as a choice.

May 17, 2006, at the Foreign Press Center/Japan found Japan's Minister of the Environment, Ms. Yuriko Koike demonstrating the use of a furoshiki she designed and produced, which is made of recycled PET bottles. She encourages the audience to start using furoshikis instead of the many, many paper and plastic bags used to carry purchases home. Here is an excerpt from her talk:

I am introducing this furoshiki [square cloth used for wrapping objects] that I designed and produced myself. The picture is a bird-and-flower painting by Ito Jakuchu [1716–1800], a Japanese painter who lived in the middle of the Edo period [1603–1868]. At first sight it might look like a scarf, but I made it as a furoshiki. I called it the “Mottainai Furoshiki.” Mottainai [waste not, want not] is a Japanese word that is extremely difficult to translate. This furoshiki can be used as a scarf, but I also suggest that you take it with you to the convenience store or other shop and use it instead of a plastic shopping bag to carry home your shopping. The furoshiki is very familiar to the Japanese, but it is not used very much these days. So I am now involved in a campaign to revive this piece of Japanese wisdom about the environment. I have tied the two corners of this cloth. If you tie the four corners, you can used it to wrap up this globe. (I am the environment minister, so I brought along a globe!) You can also use it to carry two bottles of wine, which I’m sure you all like very much. You can wrap the two bottles like this and then take them to your friend’s house. The good thing about the furoshiki is that it can be used to wrap both round things and square things. And this furoshiki is made in my constituency of Toshima Ward. It is called the “Red Furoshiki of Happiness.” The design shows how you can use it to wrap things. Both of these furoshiki use fiber recycled from PET bottles.

I said just now that you can use the furoshiki instead of a plastic shopping bag. In Japan, 30 billion plastic shopping bags are used every year. We are carrying out a campaign so that the use of the furoshiki, eco-bags, and personal shopping bags becomes something quite natural. This was the case 20 or 30 years ago, but then people succumbed to convenience. Our campaign is a kind of admonition of this trend. By making such easy-to-understand, enjoyable, and rather fashionable presentations, we hope to enhance the consciousness of the people. Regarding the two pillars of environmental administration, we hope to share easy-to-understand contact points with the public and proceed smoothly toward the two goals of building a low-carbon society and a sound material-cycle society.

later in a question answer period, Ms. Koike elaborates on what she is doing to encourage furoshiki use in Japan:

... department stores like Mitsukoshi have (now) set up furoshiki corners. Previously furoshiki were hidden in a corner of the kimono section, but we have been asking stores to put them right in the center as much as possible ... Also, recently I have been recommending Japanese companies and foreign companies as well to make furoshiki instead of expensive paper bags when they are offering a service ... Furoshiki are a familiar item for Japanese, but I was delighted that foreign companies have shown a good understanding of the furoshiki idea as well.

How to tie a furoshiki around round objects such as a bowl of fruit or a melon, from WAKU:

This Two Knots Wrapping(Hikkake-zutsumi) style is used for rectangular articles. It is useful when the diagonal length of furoshiki is not long enough to be tied. Two corners facing each other on the short side of the box are just twisted around each other and each corner is tied with the nearest on the long side of the box.　The style looks neater when the two knots are aligned in the center of the bundle.