Part normal post, part… well, I might piss someone off.
The weather shifted so suddenly recently. From high 90s and thick air to cool breezy reaching-for-a-sweater weather. I am peeking out at my 50 tomato plants and wondering if we'll get as many as I thought we would… no matter, none will be wasted. A green tomato is lovely in its own right.
This was a fairy garden we saw downtown. I'm hoping to recreate this for a solstice present for the kids… or at the very least for V's birthday in February. So fun!
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I've been feeling kind of down lately. Er, I don't really know how to describe it. I'm not depressed by any means. I'm somber? I'm serious about the sad state of the world while simultaneously feeling joyful about my own life and the blessings in it. You see, I can be both!
It's the damn ecological genocide that's happening all around us and those pesky politics that get in the way of… oh… LIFE. It's insane. It's absurd. It's got me feeling pretty on edge and a little frightened. I cried the other day. I just cried. I mourned. This is so SO bad. This tar-sands issue is more than a little freaky- especially considering the quotes from Bill McGibben saying "if the tar sands are thrown into the mix it is essentially game over."
I'm mourning because of them. Because of my little bright-eyed cushion-throwing babies. Because it's not relative. Because there is value in the physical natural world- regardless of the existence of an ethereal one.
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I live in right in the midst of two big college towns- 15 minutes from University of Michigan's football stadium. This stadium boasts an insane capacity- with an average game attendance of like 115,000 or something like that. This is a touchy issue for some people. I have many passionate football lovers in my life. But anyway, I posed this question last week on my facebook, and I thought I'd pose it here: I wonder what would happen if we took just one weekend's worth of energy spent on football madness and harnessed it for social justice. I guess it's not that football is all that bad (although I've always found it to be kind of boring and more about hype than anything else…)- the desire to be with friends, eat good food, be for a cause, a team… all of that seems to have healthy roots in human nature. BUT, in the context of the real world, with suffering and poverty and incredible injustice, toxics and sickness everywhere… I suppose it's less to me about the actual football, and more about the fact that we need all those things- camaraderie, bravery, masses of people for a common purpose, energy, money, etc. to combat these issues. And yet, I never see 115,000 people swarming to get these things done every Saturday. But football? Easy. Just takes Ohio State kids coming to town. So bizarre to me. In the words of Derrick Jensen, I believe that it's one of our biggest "toxic mimics"… the sports fanaticism, I mean. Especially in light of what's actually going on around us. There's nothing quite like sporting events to show us what people can do and organize when the motivation is there. It doesn't quite compare to other examples, because there is such an activism involved. Painted faces, uniforms, days of celebration… it's unlike anything else I've seen. And yet, I see it as somewhat misguided energy in light of the problems at hand and the areas in which we really need that activism.
I was going to write more about how this yearly "Never forget" thing has been irritating the heck out of me… but I think I'll just stop here. I am tired. Please, feel free to comment on this issue. I feel thirsty for some kind of dialog on this stuff- not enough people are talking about it.
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I know exactly where that fairy garden is! It’s beautiful and I wonder who took all the time to create it. Every time I looked at it, I saw something new 🙂
I’m not sure that any big outpouring of positive energy toward social or environmental issues will happen until it touches more people more directly. Still, you can think of the big Susan G. Komen walks for breast cancer and all the other fundraising/charity events that happen all over the country as putting positive energy toward change that helps people. Hopefully those type of events will continue to grow and expand into new territory and we can start seeing some real progress on changing people’s attitudes/actions toward our planet.
I have to admit, imagining the Big House full of 115,000 people all striving directly for positive environmental change, or working for women’s rights, or just coming together to share information and positive energy… it gives me goosebumps (in a good way).
ditto on the goosebumps.
I’m with you.
Goosebumps indeed! I hope to see it one day. 🙂
I agree completely, and have said similar things many times. I don’t really understand why it is that I care so much and things don’t even seem to be a blip on the radar for most. It would be AMAZING to see that amount of positive energy being put to use in a positive and productive way!
Yes yes! I’m feeling much better having written this out, and now I actually think I’m going to be able to refocus my energy. It’s kind of a roller coaster sometimes, but I feel motivated and positive. We all just have to keep doing, I guess. 🙂
Love that fairy village! And your kids can now tag team you I see. Good luck with that. 😛
i’ll bite.
while i completely understand and have voiced the same annoyance, it’s too simplistic to ask “why sports but not social justice” without taking into consideration the enormous significance of sports — cultural, social, political, democratizing, economic, health related. the question of sports’ place in society is widely discussed in scientific literature. the question to ask isn’t “why can a huge group of people get together for a football game but not for social justice?”, rather, “how do we get a huge group of people to care?”
115,000 football fans from your general area are not going to randomly get together to rally for social justice but that doesn’t mean that it’s impossible to get people (some of them football fanatics) to do so. look at the march on washington for jobs and freedom. 200,000-300,000 people. there is organization and collaboration required to pull off something of such magnitude just like there’s organization and collaboration in pulling off these weekly football games.
during last year’s annual light the night cancer walk, i marched alongside what was probably quarter of a million people. $3.2 million dollars raised that night to fight cancer. not social justice but a worthy cause indeed. light the night is an enormous national organization and that’s why an event that large could occur.
look at what happened in egypt! look at the rally that just took place in israel! i’m rambling now. what i am trying to say is that it can happen. as seeds all over the country grow bigger it WILL happen. and when it happens, ohio state or whatever football team will be having a regularly scheduled football game with 115,000 attendees because that madness, while not nearly as important as social justice, does have a deeply ingrained place in our society.
Grace, when I read this, it got me thinking some. I mean, I think about this stuff a lot, even to the point of anxiety at times. Sometimes I get really upset that we brought an innocent into this life who will have far worse to cope with than we have. Agh. Sometimes I have to consciously stop this thought line in order to be able to not feel panic. Of course I’m grateful every day that Henry is here; he is a great teacher for me.
But, it sucks, you know, being aware, thoughtful and not anesthetized to it. A wise lady I know reminded me that once we raise our consciousness, it’s impossible to let it go back (this applies to so many areas of living that have changed for me in the last 5 years or so).
But what I am thinking (wondering) about is how people care so much and expend energy, money, fear and time on “preventing” or worry about terrorist attacks, a potential event. On the flipside, they’re not spending energy, money, fear and time on what is real and concrete, and should be feared far more than the possibility of terrorism…killing the only place we have to live, that our descendants have to live, that non-human kind has to live and so on. Fear is such a powerful motivator, as we see from all the effort and money thrown into “homeland security” and it’s ilk; why are not more people afraid of a crashing planet on which very few people can survive?
Sorry, I really don’t have anything positive to say, and too, am tired and rather gloomy overall about many things right now. Must be the fall changes…consult your local metaphysician. 😉
I completely feel you Grace. It seems like some giant media force is pulling the shades over our eyes and distracting the general public from issues that really matter…and it’s so expansive and addictive (facebook, TV, celebrity news)…that it’s hard to break away from it – I’m no exception and feel guilty on a daily basis that I have somehow been trapped by this and spend more time reading about celebrity gossip and what my friends are doing on facebook than being active about issues…heck, even reading about important issues (I hate to admit it, but it’s true)! I remember when global warming and deforestation were more hot topics than they are now – it seems as though some incredibly powerful media gatekeeper is getting better at distracting America than ever…and at the same time our abuse of the planet gets worse. Somehow, somebody is making decision to distract the public and actually have us believe that Lindsay Lohan going to jail IS news. And we buy into it, we talk about it, and we don’t fight it (for the most part). People complain and ask for “real” news…and for more people “real” news consists of accidents, shootings, etc…which to me, is not “real” news. Tell me about the health of my planet, new legislation, what’s going on around the world…THAT is news. I am scared for this world but at the same time I feel as though I can’t be anything but hopeful. Most of the time I feel frozen with fear and simply ignore the real topics, although they are always in the back of my mind.