Carbon Tax and Travel

I recently received an email from the political action group, MoveOn.org about a new campaign entitled “Stop Price Gouging.” Their original goal was to collect 350,000 signatures, they are now approaching 500,000. I have also received a few local circulating emails, about the need to increase the gas tax. Even with record prices, we are still increasing our demand for fuel. Peak oilers are saying that prices will need to reach $7/gallon before we dramatically shift our lifestyles. With global warming now upon us and peak oil around the corner, the need for dramatic shifts in lifestyle should be understood. But it isn’t and the record profits that the oil industry is seeing don't help.

All this got me to feeling guilty on Memorial Day Weekend. Did I want to contribute to this mass exodus of folks using more and more energy traveling for the weekend, especially with gas inventories being so low? But then a friend reminded me (who cycles around town regularly), that holidays are the time when you want to use your car. Taking the bus, cycling to work—that is where most of us can make the biggest impact on energy savings. If we need to drive, taking the kids on a 3-hour drive to Montana for a few days to hang out at the hot springs (in a mini-van with my cousins and their kids) is the probably an okay use our precious resources. Of course, I would have preferred to hop on high-speed train to Missoula and bussed the rest of the way - but not an option. The guilt wore off once I saw the kids having a blast in the pools.

But we are not alone, Canada’s complaining, too. Here is a great article from the Toronto Star on the need for a carbon tax. | Juliet

http://www.thestar.com/comment/article/217825

Root Digging in Harrington

The second week of May, the kids and I were invited to go Root Digging with the Spokane Indians outside of Harrington, WA. We arrived slightly late and proceeded to get lost the last 1/2 mile, but eventually found the group of students from Wellpinit looking for Camas Root.

We didn't bring a digging stick or a bag, but borrowed some, were shown which plants to look for and we were off. The area was barren, hot and windy. Dust was blowing and the plants were dry, but my kids proceeded to get extremely excited. The thrill of finding the plant (and they weren't even planted there!) and then digging for the bulbous root brought out the competitive spirit in both of them. They were also thrilled to see real Spokane Indians, especially the long-haired teenage ones that seem to bring out open-mouthed admiration in my children.

On our drive from the root digging area to the lunch/picnic spot on the shores of Twin Lakes, we rode with a employee from the Bureau of Land Management and Native American. He proceeded to discuss with me all the ways that they enjoy the starchy root, some put in a pudding, some dry it and make a flour, some just dry it and snack on it (his preferred method) and how pervasive root digging still is to native culture. At Twin Lakes a representative from the BLM thanked everyone for participating and thanked the earth for providing for us even in the most barren of places. // Juliet

Village Building In Portland

The City Repair Project in Portland is hosting a Village Building Convergence from May 18-27. If you aren't familiar with Mark Lakemand the City Repair, check out his website below. They are doing amazing grassroots community-building work there. The Convergence is a hands-n event that runs throughout the city. Citizens, participants, etc. will build over 30 ecological gathering places throughout the city of cob construction (mud, straw and grasses). They also have an eveining speakers series focussing on placemaking, neoindigeneity and urban permaculture.

The beauty of the City Repair projects are that they are so simple, cost next to nothing, can be implemented in most neighborhoods and are extremely successful (in Portland at least) at building community. //Juliet

Go to: http://www.cityrepair.org/wiki.php/wow

Moving Kids Around a City

The kids and I recently visited Seattle for their Spring Break. We stayed with friends on Capital Hill and I was reminded how much I love density. Their house is located just around the corner from Volunteer Park with a great playground, greenhouse and museum, and just blocks away from a convenient bus connection, great restaurants, grocery stores, bookstores, garden shops, and yoga studios. The kids and I rarely used our car. It was great and the kids loved it. While riding the bus down through Capital Hill, my son kept thinking we were already downtown because of all the shops, stores and folks on the street. Both of my kids loved watching the city pass them by as we rode the bus around.
Sure there are some disadvantages, if you choose to think of it that way—my friend’s historic home is within 10 feet of her next door neighbors, on both sides, she can see directly into their homes, if she chooses; she has a small front and back “courtyard” for a yard; they park on the street in front of their house (no double car garage connected with the house). You can hear the hum of I-590 from their deck overlooking Lake Washington. It is in the city and it is just as it should be. Expansive lots, two and three car garages just don’t belong in the city.
Of course living in a city and visiting are different experiences. While I was being a tourist, she drove around Seattle a lot, shuttling her kids to and from schools, music lessons, t-ball games and dance classes. Finding a way to sustainably move children around in a city can be a difficult job. I have some friends here in Spokane who ride their bikes everywhere as a family. Last weekend he and his son rode their bikes from 14th on the South Hill up to Miller’s Hardware. I was quite impressed. His 6-year-old was a bit too tired on the way back so they rode the bus home. They have become mindful of what they take on as a family and if it will require them to drive. Piano lessons are searched for and found within the neighborhood, dance classes, they can ride their bikes to, etc. Their children are also fiercely independent. Their 10-year-old daughter either rides her bike to school (about 2 miles) or rides the city bus alone.
Now, when I was nine-years-old and growing up in Spokane, my friends and I thought nothing of riding the bus downtown (by ourselves) and shopping for posters, gummy bears and other great trinkets for 2 or 3 hours. I bet most Spokane parents would never let their kids do this today. What has changed today, that we don't feel safe letting our kids move more freely in our cities? // Juliet

Following are some links to related articles/conferences about childhood mobility in cities.
http://ecoplan.org/children/ch_index.htm

http://www.latimes.com/news/opinion/commentary/la-oewilliamson29mar29,1,7336979.story?ctrack=2&cset=true

Shopping Anxiety

I was across town last Thursday and decided to do some grocery shopping to kill some time, so I hit that neighborhood’s supermarket. It’s an Albertson’s, a fairly new and fancy one, a real shrine to all that is pre-packaged, ready to eat or quick to prepare. I don’t usually like shopping in these stores but it was there and we were low on some essentials.

It’s the old story for me again – I have been trying to shop at more local, sustainable venues, like my corner cooperative for organic produce and other foodstuffs (how lucky is that!), our local healthy food supermarket for other things, and in general just cutting way back on the packaged stuff and unsustainable containers. But the gleaming, ultra-convenient items in the Albertson’s-type stores continue to beckon, especially when I’m tired, short on time, or just happen to be there for some other reason. Or, if I’m out of balance, unfortunately the norm for me lately, and by that I mean not eating and cooking mindfully, not exercising enough, overextended, blah, blah, blah.

Anyway… so here I was at Albertson’s. No shopping list, just away from my kitchen full of dirty dishes piled on the counters, and no dinner plan. Of course the place smelled like roasting chickens, so that was a thought. “But God knows where those chickens came from or how they were raised,” wondered the sustainability angel on my shoulder. So scratch that idea. Maybe some healthy wraps… someone was telling me recently they had some delicious blackened tofu wraps from Huckleberry’s. Perhaps there’s something like that here… nah, but there’s a deli, and maybe I can ask if they can make a veggie wrap, with some spinach and a little cheese. So I ordered a few of those for us for dinner, and went on my merry way. Unfortunately, the wraps arrived in little hard plastic containers with lids. Continuing along, we still needed some staples for other meals beyond tonight. The wraps idea was still in my head, so I morphed that into burritos and bought some whole grain tortillas, a can of veggie refried beans, a block of cheese, and a bag of brown basmati rice. And I wanted to bring some snacks to my son’s class tomorrow, so I grabbed a bag of sugar snap peas and some pre-cut carrots. Anticipating future fatigue and lack of interest in cooking (maybe it’s the time of year, that dreary, drippy, can’t-decide-if-it’s-winter-or-spring time of year), so I picked up some frozen Amy’s entrées. Well, at least those are organic and sort of healthy. We needed shampoo, too, but I am still exploring the option of refilling some containers I have with bulk shampoo that I think I remember Huckleberry’s carrying.

I tried to stay out of the center aisles as much as I could.

The point of all this blathering is that I want to highlight how complicated I’ve let my shopping decisions become. No wonder I get so tired! I can’t just run to the store for a bottle of shampoo anymore. I think about the shampoo itself, its packaging, how I can reduce or avoid the packaging, etc. And for the comestibles, there’s the organic question, the health benefits (sure, those chips may be organic, but it’s still a lot of fat and salt), whether or not it was produced locally, whether it was produced by a company whose philosophies I agree with, how much gas I had to burn to buy it, and loads of other issues. I can’t meet all of these expectations, but I try. And in thinking about them, and planning for them, it gets pretty exhausting. I’m already baking our bread, making our yogurt, and mixing up our own granola. It’s hard to think of adding to that list when my life is so full.

There are lots of compromises that I have to make when I shop at a store like Albertson’s. Most of the stuff isn’t organic, and most of it is produced by large, industrial concerns. But they’re trying. There are signs of life. In perusing the produce department, there is an organic “section”, albeit all shrink-wrapped, but with stickers on some of the packages saying things like, “Why organic?” and “Why does it cost more?” – with accompanying explanations. So they’re trying to educate, which is encouraging. It’s nice to see organic going more mainstream. But there are some comical inanities too: packages of rice broadcasting that they’re “gluten free.” Well, I certainly hope so.

Warmer weather is coming and with it I hope a surge in energy. I need the Spring.

- Kelly

Peak Oil Round-up

It’s been ages, once again, since I wrote for this site. I am in the process of finding a group of amazing sustainable Spokane women to share more frequent entries with me. But in the meantime, some quick updates. The co-housing (loose-knit intentional community) is gathering steam. The PUD was approved by the City a few weeks ago and anyone interested in more information can email me at juliet@outtheremonthy.com. I will also try to continue to write about it.

Perusing my usual peak oil websites; the tone seems to be more urgent. I came across a couple of articles tied to food production in post-peak years and one discussing the potential (from Matthew Simmons) that we may have already peaked. The links are below.

There seems to be this ongoing debate as to whether the highly urbanized cities are really the best places to be during a potential peak oil collapse. Chicago, New York, etc. are heavily energy dependent with very little immediate food production. The Ethan Genauer piece says in a dwindling oil supply situation, “35 million Americans and 2 billion people worldwide will suffer chronic hunger,” and 2 million in New York City, where there is very little arable land for food production.

The Gwynne Dyer piece describes the impact of cheap energy on our food production by stating, “The miracle that has fed us for a whole generation now was the Green Revolution: higher-yielding crops that enabled us to almost triple world food production between 1950 and 1990 while increasing the area of farmland by no more than ten percent.”

Here in Spokane, we have Community-Minded Enterprises starting a community garden campaign. Please see our new Go Green Directory for a complete article on this and how to get involved. The community garden idea is fantastic, it builds community while also feeding folks. I would love to see shared urban gardens springing up all over Spokane.

Oh, and more cheery news from James Howard Kunstler (if he didn’t have such a great sense of very-dry humor, he would drive me crazy) fears that a President Obama would be assassinated. Go to http://jameshowardkunstler.typepad.com/clusterfuck_nation/2006/10/enter_barack_ob.html for the full story.

Here are the food articles and peak oil comments:

http://www.energybulletin.net/21736.html

http://www.energybulletin.net/18521.html

http://www.energybulletin.net/21696.html

Form & Spaciousness

It has been weeks since I have written for this blog. The form that my life has taken these past few months has been in a constant state of flux and completely unsustainable. I have often found humor in the fact that I espouse a sustainable lifestyle but on many levels fail to live up to it. Right now, I am in the process of balancing my life, setting more boundaries for myself and finishing up things that I have made commitments to. I am starting to see a more balanced life ahead of me.

The other day my 5-year-old daughter came home from a friend’s house, and she was very impressed that his family was growing strawberries. She looked at me point-blank and said, “Mom, we need to start growing food.”

I couldn’t agree with her more. In fact amidst finishing our house to sell and dealing with changing life situations, my favorite pastime, gardening with my children, has been completely neglected. I felt pangs of motherly guilt over this one, and am committed to delve into the garden next season.

Many of us, are seeking balance, wisdom and peace in our lives. About a year and a half ago I realized that there was a great discord between the life I found myself pursuing and the core of who I am. It was not the life that I longed for. At a surface level, I could have decided to ignore this gnawing feeling in my gut and kept the “peace.” Out of fear of change, I could have single-mindedly lived out my obligations, but is that all that life is? If my soul is not fulfilled, what is the quality of my life? So, I embarked on a journey (and I am still on it) not knowing all that it has or will entail or where exactly it is going—but it felt right.

Since then I have come to understand that unless I can embrace the root of who I am and trust in that feeling; unless I can live in a genuine manner, honoring myself and those around me by being true and forthcoming, I will never become what I need to be for myself, my children or my world. I want to be an example to my children of how to live an authentic life. How to be willing to embrace life even in the face of chaos. How to be strong enough to live fully.

We tend to run around not facing up to the difficulties in life, expecting things to be a certain way, and not really building for ourselves the lives that will sustain us. For me, living a life without depth, was unbearable. We hope to create a world based on sustainability and balance, but are unwilling to do the work in our own lives that will help this play out at the larger level.

I am constantly trying to evaluate how events or growth in my own personal life can be played out in the larger world. My brother was watching an interview the other night with a Texas hedge-fund investor in the oil markets. He believed that we had passed the global peak of oil and his greatest fear was a global recession. The next decade could bring chaos to many of our lives. I have always thought the most damaging effects of Peak oil on the general populace will be a psychological one. Many of us are afraid to let go of lifestyles that although, unhealthy and unsustainable, are what we have grown comfortable with, what we identify with.
But in reality, they are not who we are. The changes that Peak oil and a potential global recession might bring are at their core, a potential catalyst toward creating a more meaningful world. If we are strong enough to begin making changes now, physical, emotional and spiritual, the results might not be so catastrophic. Our product, image-driven lifestyles need to be restructured for our future survival.

I have been enjoying the writings of Eckhart Tolle lately. He talks about the two dimensions that make up reality, one is form and it is constantly changing; the other is consciousness and it is eternal. For Tolle, consciousness is deep within us all, we access it through the core of our being. He believes that this “space consciousness” is what connects us all. Tolle believes that only if humanity can embrace and begin to understand this can we become the balance, wisdom and peace that we desire.

I still find joy in friendships and experiences outside of myself. I do not always recognize that that joy is always inside of me. I have not quite gotten to the point where I can completely let go of my expectations about what my future holds, but I am trying. Sorrow and fear about my life situation and the world find me when I cannot. Who knows, maybe more gardening will help.

Below is an excerpt from Stephen Mitchell’s translation of Lao Tzu’s Tao te Ching. It is believed to have been written around 500-600 B.C.E. Its quiet beauty is a source of solace for me. I try to meditate on it daily. The Tao, of course, is Tolle’s “space consciousness.”
     
Whoever is planted in the Tao
Will not be rooted up.
Whoever embraces the Tao
Will not slip away.
Her name will be held in honour
From generation to generation.

Let the Tao be present in your life
And you will become genuine.
Let it be present in your family
And your family will flourish.
Let it be present in you country
And your country will be an example
To all countries in the world.
Let it be present in the universe
And the universe will sing.

How do I know this is true?
By looking inside myself.
          -#54 Tao te Ching