Sometimes the world feels so small.  Other times it seems infinite.

Reflections from The Cabin in the Woods

Six months in the woods.  But not without internet and left-overs and square dancing and cats.  A lot has happened in my time at Circle Pines but I've barely had the time to think much on this.  The leaves are falling.  Some trees already completely bare.  Bright yellows, oranges, and reds littering the paths.  Bare crooked limbs still reaching for the sky. 
When I moved here in the spring with Case the wild flowers were just getting their start.  We met Jonathan who taught us the sounds of the birds in the spring.  We were fortunate to have him show us around the property and the area.  He told us of the different birds that migrated through and ones that stayed.  This was the first year that I realized that different seasons have different sounds.  That different birds have different seasons.  

In the spring we observed the woodcock mating display complete with climatic whorling sounds finished with the whoosh of their dash back to the grass.  There was also the deep, baritone sounds of the bull frogs from Stewart Lake.  Some nights we could hear them from the cabin.  When I first heard them I thought that their low drone croak was either someone driving a speedboat (when there was a bunch of them at it) or a kid playing the trombone.  There was also the high chirps of the spring peepers back in frog pond.  Not to mention the countless birds singing including a Scarlet Tanninger that we caught sing its song to a red electrical box.  

Throughout the summer there was the hammerings and the cries of the Pileated woodpecker.  One rainy day in the garden a Pileated landed not too far from me digging around for grub, I was amazed by its size and brightness of its red head.  The sandhill cranes often trumpeted in the morning near the cabin, I think they may have slept in the field near us.  Kevin saved a Flicker from the roof his beak was crooked and eye swollen shut.  We don't know what happened to him.  We took care of him until we could take him to a wildlife rehab place.  His name was Jeffry.  We also found a box turtle that we thought was injured.  The front part of the bottom of its shell was all folded up.  We thought we were going to have to do surgery but it turned out that box turtles are supposed to have a hinges so they can fully close the front part of their shell.  When Case and I were cleaning out Juniors cabins we saw a cicada killer wasp attack a pair of mating cicada's and inject them with something paralyzing.  We thought that she maybe was laying her eggs in their bodies so Case wanted to keep them to watch them hatch.  But after research we found that they actually only paralyze them then drag them back to their nest.  Regardless the cicada's never woke up.  The firefly display was spectacular this year, among several other glowy crawly insects and funji that helped light the path back to the cabin.  In the night there was also the whinnying and the whining of the coyotes and the who whos' and the screeches of the owls.  The screech of the screech owl I think may be one of the eeriest sounds I've encountered in the woods.

A new wave of sounds has come with Fall as the birds migrate back south.  The birds seem to come almost with the wind in chattery flocks.  sometimes I swear there are as many birds in a tree as there are leaves. I wish the trees had as many apples as leaves as well, but the frost got them in blossom in the spring.  The Sandhill cranes are migrating, I haven't heard them by the cabin for weeks.     Fall has been a sad time for the deer around here.  Several hundred deer (maybe in the thousands by now) have been contracting a virus through midge flies that cause them to bleed internally.  This makes them feel hot so they seek water, so there are several that made it to the lake.  I've been watching one decompose at the intersection of pudding stone and the bunny trail.  When I found here she had just died, I was really sad because she appeared to have been a nursing mother.  But it is what it is.

The People:
This is what initially drew me to Circle Pines.  Two very influential women on my life had suggested this place to me.  Joy Pryor would talk about it to me when we were organizing Really Really Free Markets together.  Then later in my life I worked for Creston Community Gardens through Creston Neighborhood Association.  My boss there was Deb Eid, her and I got along real well.  She would talk about how she could speak more "radically" in the office and openly.  So me and her got along very well.  One weekend last year she set me up to come out to CPC for a work bee weekend.  I was hesitant as I had school and no ride.  But she emailed Tom and he came up to Grand Rapids to pick me up.   I was really glad. I had a great weekend.  Tom and I talked about renewable energy and sustainability on the way down, then he took me for a walk through the woods to show me around.  We had a lot of fun talking about stuff and by the end of the weekend he asked if I might be interested in a gardening position in the spring.
I also remember my first weekend here, having a sense of comfort and feeling at home.  I remember talking to Kat for hours about people and the world and going out to milk goats with Ron.  I don't really remember who else was at cpc that weekend.  But through out time I kept seeing Derick and Isabella, Gary and Mara, Johnathan, Bob and Anna, Crystal Micheal and Jonah,  and tons of other people whom I've enjoyed spending some time with. 
More recently I've been getting to know the other people that live in the area.   This is largely because MiLAWD held meetings at circle pines until recently. They all have their strange and radical quirks which I find enjoyable.  They are organizing to take legal action against the state of Michigan for allowing Fracking on Public lands. 

Summer Camp:
Summer camp is some strange whirlwind that seemed like forever while it was here and now I feel like it blew by very fast.   So much happened in each day.  It's hard to capture. 
I learned a lot from the kids.

The Conflicted soul of Circle Pines:
CPC's current functioning is largely unsustainable which seems to be the history of this place.
Though it desires and teaches sustainable ideas it seems that itself is incapable of making itself
sustainable.  This is because of its financial requirements to stay afloat.  The financial stress, shifts the vision of some (actually most) of its functions.

There is more to be said in reflecting on my summer, but I shall add more another day. 

Operation Infinite Justice

This is my friend Zach.
 *****
Through the phone I found you in fragments,
Like the IED that exploded and forced a piece in your head.
Holding on to the fragments of youth you kept in between the jumbled
stories of Afghanistan, murder and guns, in the name of our wonderful country,
 came flickers of unicycling, dancing, and singing,
and running around in your man thong or cooking dinner,
You introduced me to Olive oil. 

I'm angry.  I'm sad
War is Fucked up.
I miss you.

The Wisdom of a Dandelion

My cousin was swinging from the old maple in his backyard.  I joined by giving him occasional boosts into the air.  Being the concerned seventeen year old female cousin that I was, I inquired about his love life.  He told me of this girl in his class with blue eyes and swoopy blond bangs.  I looked to a dandelion that grew besides the maple and suggested he bring it to her.  But he told me that he didn’t want to pick it that “we should leave it there for everyone to enjoy.”  Such a thoughtful answer really caught me off guard.  Here I was supposed to be teaching him how to go about life when he incited such a virtuous piece of wisdom upon me.  I thought about this for a while and realized the whole idea of thinking that we can own anything we see is really detrimental to society as a whole.  That if everyone was to pick every flower that they saw for themselves or someone special, that it would be the end of all wild flower and in a chain reaction the end of life.

In Ishmael, a book by Daniel Quinn, a man responds to an advertisement created by a Guerilla seeking a pupil, they speak telepathically, learning lessons of the world.  Ishmael describes there to be two kinds of people in the world, takers and leavers.  Quinn wrote, “The premise of the Taker story is the world belongs to man...The premise of the Leaver story is man belongs to the world" (Quinn 239).  Takers exemplified by modern society and leavers were the people of ancient cultures and tribes such as the Native Americans who believe in living in harmony with nature.  The takers seem to think that everything is of service to the human race.  The book goes on to suggest that the moment humans thought that they could act as ‘God’ that this marked the beginning of the demise of the human race.  My wise little cousin, by leaving that single dandelion allowed for it to propagate in the form of several more dandelions.

            The current collective mindset, the takers mindset of, “take what you can get” is not a sustainable mentality.  The world has limited resources and the human race is very inconsiderate to this reality.  But even in knowing this I feel a need to have ‘this and those’ things to survive in this world.  As if the world has created all of these false needs for people to fulfill, to keep people busy until someone figures out what’s really going on.  Mircea Eliade suggests that the human condition is that of struggle that “the modern world is in the situation of a man swallowed by a monster, struggling in the darkness of his belly.”  The modern world, the monster describes the current state of society and the act of being swallowed representing materialism, the need for work and the need for things.  He goes on to saying, “so he in anguish thinks he is already dead or on the point of dying, and can see no way out except into the darkness, Death or Nothingness.”   This second part, says that society often feels hopeless or destined to live a life of suffering, of service to the great machine.

            The most well-know literary example of a society swallowed up by its fear is George Orwell’s 1984.  The book fallows a guy named Winston, living in a radically oppressive collective society.  He locks eyes with a girl at work and falls in love with her.  He tries everything to avoid being swallowed up all the way by the thought police, but in the end it is a lost cause.   Some people believe we are heading towards the same sort of oppressive society as 1984 but others such as Karl Marx suggests we are practically living it.  Karl Marx said that “the oppressed are allowed once every few years to decide which particular representatives of the oppressing class are to represent and repress them.”  Basically that when electing someone to run the show that we only hope that we can choose the lesser of the two evils.  But the fact that society accepts the voting process we accept this illusion of freedom.

            Charles Bukowski in his famous poem The laughing Heart, encourages people to take hold of their lives saying that “your life is your life/don’t let it be clubbed into dank submission./be on the watch. /there are ways out./ there is a light somewhere./ it may not be much light but/it beats the darkness…”  Bukowski suggests that though society may have a large impact on human life, that there are still things that one can do that can give us light in dark.  He encourages people to seek those things and hold them close, that these things are the things that really keep us alive. Eckhart Tolle in, “The Power of now,” says that these things are “all the things that truly matter - beauty, love, creativity, joy, [and] inner peace” (17).

            Philosopher Carl Jung advises that knowledge and self-awareness is key in not being ‘clubbed into submission.’  He says that “it is, unfortunately, only too clear that if the individual is not truly regenerated in spirit, society cannot be either, for society is the sum total of individuals in need of redemption... the salvation of the world consists in the salvation of the individual soul.”  That by quieting the mind and looking inward one can find something like salvation.

     Though the wold may seemingly be working against the human race, or rather the human race is working against itself; I still believe there is a glimmer of hope for us so long as we do not give up.  Buffy from Buffy the Vampire Slayer is destined to fight evil for the rest of her life and finds it discouraging that she can never make it go away completely, but finds worthy purpose in fighting to maintain the balance of good and evil.  This should be a good example for any person.  Keep fighting for ourselves and for the good of all people because it may always be a battle to maintain the good in the world.  If we stick together in self realization there may always be dandelions to admire in the spring.

           

Bukowski, Charles. "The Laughing Heart." The Best American Poetry. Web. 10 Mar. 2011. 

Quinn, Daniel. Ishmael. New York: Bantam/Turner Book, 1995. Print.

Jung, C. G. The Undiscovered Self. Boston: Little, Brown, 1958. Print.

Marx, Karl. "Famous Marx Quotes - Philosophy Paradise." Philosophy Paradise. 2006.

Web. 10 Mar. 2011.

Orwell, George. 1984. San Diego: Harcourt Brace Jovanovich, 1984. Print.

Tolle, Eckhart. The Power of NOW: a Guide to Spiritual Enlightenment. Vancouver, B.C., Canada: Namaste Pub., 2004. Print.

"You cannot separate the issue of sustainability from the issue of justice from the issue of access to resources and from the issues of peace." -Vandana Shiva

Being vegan-
When I started eating vegan I hadn't fully thought through all of the reasons
I just thought it felt right.

My cousin is vegan.  My boyfriend is vegan.
I suddenly developed a guilt complex that made dairy and eggs less enjoyable.

Now its been  about 8 months and the reasons keep piling up.

How can you tell if a cow is happy anyways?  Is that something that you can taste or smell?
Do they whisper to you "thank you for killing me, I grew up on a happy farm and I was looking

forward to the day I died" or "thank you for killing me, I grew up on a factory farm sleeping
in my own shit just waiting for my day to die"

People may argue that its unhealthy.
I used to think about this a lot and think about a scenario where I find that it turns out that may actually be an "unhealthy" diet.  Would I grow old and regret not drinking my milk if my bones started turning to dust?
But now I think that this question is irrelevant.  This isn't about me.  This is about a system of injustice towards animals, people, and the environment.  It's all connected.

I think the way we enslave and abuse animals is also reflected in the way people and the environment are used and treated. Like slaves or commodities.  I think there is a correlation between feminists criticisms on women as being used as sexual objects to sell products and the use and exploitation of animals for human and monetary benefit.  I think this also plays into how we use our land, for fast and cheap things that are mostly irrelevant to the existence and survival of humans.  

We are BLOWING UP MOUNTAIN TOPS FOR MONEY and Energy.

I mean its nearly impossible to completely rid oneself to contributing to some amount of exploitative activity to animals, the environment, or people.  I mean I'm using a computer that is made of of parts from very countries that I don't know what the conditions were for the people who made this computer.  I know it probably took a lot of energy and resources to make contributing to strip mining somewhere and lots of waste.  Not to mention that I routinely plug this thing into a wall which takes energy from who knows where and what mode of extraction.  But veganism is one way a person can actively resist a culture of exploitation and abuse.

"Be the change you want to see in the world"  

“Our ability to perceive quality in nature begins, as in art, with the pretty. It expands through successive stages of the beautiful to values as yet uncaptured by language.” Aldo Leopold

brave new world

"We are not going back to the old days. We are in a brand new world and we need to deal with it."

-my friend & neighbor Eric Baxter

Butters

A child crying at the death of a pet is pure emotion. Our pet rabbit died. I was sad, yes, but it really wasn't so much of a big deal for me, Butters was old. I've been jaded and numbed to the ideas of death. But today I felt a strong emotion. I almost cried. It wasn't for Butter's though, it was for this little boy and his tears. And this gives new meaning for me to the phrase, "if not for ourselves, then for the children." This same boy recently decided to be vegetarian. When he realized that he was eating dead animals he sat on the couch and cried for 20 minutes.

We have a responsibility to preserve and protect whatever we can. I think that the awareness of the knowledge of pain that death of an animal inflicts on humans and the initial guilt when it is done at our hands (directly or indirectly) means something. I can't count how many time I've heard someone say that "it makes me feel guilty that these animals were treated poorly" before they chomped into a cheese burger. It's easier when they don't have names or faces. My parents made me eat one of my pet chickens growing up. I cried so hard, I took one bite and felt ill. "Where did you think chicken came from?"

We have to numb ourselves to the idea that "it's just the way it is" and "death is fact of life" in order to swallow any of this.
It's not just the Food industry either, its all across the board.
The gas companies want to Frack in the area I grew up. This could potentially poison our watershed. But the fact of the matter is, I still use gas and oil. I'm guilty of the cause. It was easier for me to ignore the problem when the gas companies were exploiting some 3rd world country for it. Not that I didn't think it was bad. But now that the land they want to kill has a name and a face, the guilt becomes more real.

But I don't know how to stop all of this nonsense.

The government and the businesses say that the people steer the ship
that we vote with our dollars as well as with a ballot.
I think this is a lie. We live in a plutocracy where big business steers the
ship and we choose from the false display of options that they give us
and call it democracy.

Children are so refreshing.

the Triple Bottom Line

The new fad in business! If you pretend that recycling makes you an environmental steward and that your workers are real people, then you can make more money as a corporate business owner! Invest in your community and they will invest in you!

I was reading over some of the plans towards making Grand Rapids more sustainable. One thing that kept coming up was the Triple Bottom Line. A new buzz phrase in the business community that says that success should also be measured by social/ethical and environmental performance, its basis is the 3 P's: People, Planet, and Profit
"Companies as significant as AT&T, Dow Chemicals, Shell, and British Telecom, have used 3BL terminology in their press releases, annual reports and other documents."*
Some Critics say "the rhetoric is badly misleading, and may in fact provide a smokescreen behind which firms can avoid truly effective social and environmental reporting and performance."*

The fact of the matter is that my visions for social and environmental responsibility are starkly different from that which a CEO of AT&T or Dow Chemicals will propose.

Sounds like just another way to cover up the irreversible social and environmental impacts of large businesses and industries.

My roommate reminds me how our culture tends to name things after what we destroy.   Much like these corporations using Social and environmental sustainability as a facade to that which they exploit.

So I guess my bottom lines is that if Shell or Down Chemicals are token examples of Social and Environmental responsibility in the Triple Bottom Line movement then I call Bullshit.

*http://www.businessethics.ca/3bl/triple_bottom_line_abstract.html

human [vs] nature

(Photo from a Vietnam anti-war protest)

When it comes down to it, what will you be holding on to?

Walter

This is my cat Walter

she is equal parts cute and naughty

sometimes she spends entire afternoons staring at the vent in our house

waiting for the resident mouse to make an appearance

One time she stole of chunk of fur from Butter's the rabbit without even asking, how rude
She also enjoys urinating on my roommates dirty laundry, tisk tisk

Rhoda, my roommates cat, doesn't like Walter very much.

Maybe she is just scared.

Despite her life of shenanigans she actually spends most of her life napping

What a cute cat.

It's so exciting to know of the life beneath our feet

Breathing, breeding, thriving
The soil is the earths most diverse ecosystem

A handful of soil can contain billions of different organisms

The earth is not a cold dead place

And the day came when the risk to remain tight in a bud was more painful than the risk it took to blossom. -Anais Nin

Explaining ourselves to death

"... explanations are unavoidable; we are constantly explaining - that unexplainable complex of being and feeling and explaining ourselves; life itself demands explanations for us, as do our surroundings and finally as we do, demanding explanations from ourselves until, finally, we manage to minimize everything around us, ourselves included - that is to say, explaining ourselves to death. Thus I expound to the philosopher with that disgusting (to me) and yet irrepressible urge to speak, that which always seizes me when I have nothing to say, the urge, I suspect, which lies at the root of my habit of giving far to generous tips in restaurants, to cab drivers, to driving officials or semi-official representatives, and the like; it almost might have something to do with my politeness, exaggerated to the point of self denial.. as if I were continually apologizing for my existence, for this existence." -Imre Kertesz, "Kaddish for a Child Not Born"

I read this novel a few years ago, bought it randomly in New York. It's about a guy who survives the Holocaust and his psychology and life after going through such a thing. How his PTSD as a result keeps him from feeling a part of society, keeps him from love. He "explains to a friend that he cannot bring a child into the world where the Holocaust occurred and could occur again."

Explaining ourselves to death. We can rationalize anything with explanations. I also find that often times things can lose their beauty when explained. Now after Botany I have a hard time looking at a tree without thinking of the flow of the sap and the meaning and scientific words for its parts. Something lost something gained though. There is something really mechanical about thinking of a tree (or anything) in science.

Born seeking explanations because the world doesn't make sense. So we the unsure make definitive explanations for the earth. Making explanations for me and my existence as if knowing better than I do. Their mere ability to explain set to shape me, but I have my own eyes, and ears. I know now to question the hardest those who claim to have the answers, the users of big words, the over-explainers. It's a lot more work paddling up stream.

How do you quantify the wildness of birds?

"How do you place a value on inspiration? How do you quantify the wildness of birds, when for the most part, they lead secret anonymous lives" (Terry's Grandmother)

-Terry Tempest Williams, "Refuge"

Leave the Driving

"the moral of this story
Is try not to get too old
The more time you spend on earth
The more you see unfold

And as an afterthought
This must to be told
Some people have taken pure bullshit
And turned it into gold"

-Neil Young, "Leave the Driving"

The Cost of Food

Our current system for providing food is severely unsustainable, most of it illogical and possibly insane when put into perspective. To help frame where I am coming from let me tell you about my school lunches at Sparta, Michigan. Then I will go into more detail about the statement.

Sparta, the self proclaimed Apple Capital of the Midwest, is a small country town about 20 minutes north of Grand Rapids, Michigan. A faint smell of cow manure always trailed down the halls. A few of my classmates already had plans of inheriting there parents farm, so most didn't care to try much at school. For lunch there was always a main course of some sort of pre-packaged burrito or the 'grand slam' burger. All of which arriving by semi-truck labeled Sysco. There was also a beverage of choice, Country Fresh milk, juice, or a soda. Then after paying, the line wrapped around to a salad bar. The lettuce was iceberg lettuce with bits of cabbage and shredded carrots out of a Sysco bag, to the end was the fruit. Usually there were usually apples, oranges and bananas. The apples were always disappointing. They were a deep burgundy, high-glossed, and thick skinned. They lacked flavor, often tinted green signifying they were picked too soon. There was always a sticker to peel off; they were often from Washington or Chile. I didn’t think much of any of this back then besides being disappointed.

Now I look back at this and wonder why in Sparta, Michigan, the apple capital of the Midwest, we were not eating Sparta apples. To me this is illogical. Why would it make sense for an apple travel over 2000 miles, when they are growing outside our door?

In this region of the world apples aren't just apples, they have different flavors colors and textures. Some are good for caning, others good for pies, some better for storage, all of them good fore eat'n. Though some preferred to others. My grandma likes the Northern Spy for her pies. The Gala's used to be the best for just eating but now that the trees have aged or maybe its been the weather, but they haven't been as good the past couple of years. At the farmers market the buzz is all about the Candy Crisp which seems to be the predecessor to the honey crisp which was all the buzz last 2-3 years. There are so many different flavors though, each a little different then the other. So what I am saying is that apple isn't just an apple, it's an experience, each apple is unique.

Did you know that there are 2,500 known varieties of apples grown in the United States (some sources now say 1000) and over 7,500 grown world wide as of 1999? 15 apples accounted for over 90% of production in 1999. These numbers have been greatly reduced over the past 100 years. At one time there was said to be well over 7000 in the united states alone.

Somehow industry has managed to produce a variety of apple for our school lunches that is consistently of horrible quality by my standards and lacking any character. To industry apples are burgundy, yellow, or red. That's it.

At Sparta, “All meals served must meet patterns established by the U.S. Dept. of Agriculture.” The department of agriculture is run by representatives from Monsanto. Large corporations have monopolized the market, making it hard for smaller local farms to compete.

“Agri-business,” as some call it, receives most of the federal subsidies, making it possible to produce food more “cheaply”. 10% of the farms are collecting 71% of the subsidies, an average of $123,909 annually and the bottom 80% receiving less than $586 annually. This is OUR tax dollars used to make it possible to make it possible to for these large farms to be able to sell their produce for cheaper than our local farmers. I wonder what an apple from Chile or Washington would really cost if they weren't receiving these subsidies, or tax breaks.

when wagering the costs of producing "cheap" produce the environmental, social, and ecological costs are often not taken into account. What is not factored in is the packaging, the unknown health effects of chemical fertilizers and pesticides, the amount of oil used (to transport the product, to make and transport the packaging, used in fertilizers, used in production), unfairly paid labor, lack of connection locationally and psychologically to food and how it is produced and where it comes from, the effects of Genetically Modified foods to us and our environment, Mono-cropping (large fields of one crop), how modern practices are effecting our depleting top soil, the list goes on.

I think the first and most important step is to support local. Then start advocating for more sustainable practices from these farmers, from restaurants, and from our stores.

In investigating why my former school system would choose not to use local suppliers I found a document that presented all of the hoops that would be 'necessary' in order to use local produce. Making it seemingly intimidating, difficult, and risky to use local suppliers.

It's focus is on food safety. But in reality most of the problems with food have come from the large industrial farms.

http://www.fns.usda.gov/cnd/Guidance/foodsafety_onfarm.pdf

The Yin and the way

It’s ironic taking any amount of time reading explanations of the Tao Te Ching, let alone the Tao Te Ching. The Tao Te Ching can be translated from Chinese as ‘the path of truth’ or ‘the way and virtue.’ It is said to be have been written by Lao Tzu though there is little evidence that he had ever existed. Taoism has become one of the three pillars of thought in China along with Buddhism, and Confucianism. It is written as a collection of 78 poems focusing on states of being (and non-being) and its' intrinsic interconnection with nature. Tao cannot be described, it is said that if you can name something then it is not ‘the way.’ So the irony lies in the fact that the Tao is meant as a guide book to help us return to that which cannot be explained. The fact that the Tao has been written implies to me that we (civilization) has already skewed from ‘the path’ and this could be why it has been written.

In addressing this idea we must first consider some thoughts on the possible roots of this imbalance and consider how we may return. One thought, which will be the focus of this paper implies the lack of feminine involvement in the structure of society. In “China: Its History and Culture” the author expresses an imbalance by connecting Taoism to the yin component of the yin-yang by writing, “[the] yang has been overemphasized and the yin must be restored to its rightful place” (Morton 39). The yin represents the feminine, dark, passive, empathetic half of the yin-yang. The author suggests that we are living in an unbalanced society dominated by the yang.

The Tao arose out of the bloody decay of the Zhou Dynasty (ca. 1027-256 B.C.) from the time of the ‘Warring States’ (403-221 B.C.). During this period several states were reduced to seven, the wars were fought over territory and leadership. The ideals of warfare, which prior had been considered a moderated gentleman’s activity, had shifted from acts of honor to fighting for less noble territorial and personal gains (Welch 18). Weapons were also introduced during this period, which also may have aided in the shift in thought. Weapons can be seen as extending masculine authority both literally and metaphorically, leading to an increasingly masculine minded society.

To me the Tao may have been written as a direct response to an emasculated society. The Tao says, “Know masculinity, Maintain femininity” (Laozi 72). Implying that there needs to be understanding of both to maintain harmony. Another important school of thought that was birthed from the Easter Zhou Dynasty was Confucianism. Confucianism has became an integral part of historical and modern Chinese ideology, taking hold for the first time in the Western Han Dynasty (202 B.C.-9 A.D.) (Wasserstrom 7). It emphasizes on morality through the importance of knowledge, hierarchy and division of labor. In considering the Tao as the yin, Confucian thought and masculinity could be compared to the yang.

In syncretism, a common practice in China involving using all three pillars as religious practice, a person uses mostly Confucian and Tao portions of the three pillars in their daily life. Confucian thought used at jobs and in conversation during the day, Tao for evening meditation, and the third being Buddhism reserved for prayer. So in theory, the yin and the yang, Taoism and Confucianism, masculinity and femininity, organization and reflection are both essential to a culture. The Increase in trade, which also emerged out of the fall of the Zhou dynasty, also increased a focus on commerce which utilized Confucianism, the masculine thought (Morton 27). This idea is most obvious in today’s consumption driven society, more interested in GDP’s as opposed to integrity of humanity, associating success and doing well with the ranking with a growing GDP. As these ideas have grown, GDP seems to be the inverse of happiness and satisfaction in humanity.

In the United States, and across the world, wars are waged over non-renewable resources, more cities and stores and factories are materializing, imperialism is alive and well. Consumer culture has spread like a disease across the world. Nature is seen as a resource as opposed to a holy place for meditation. The idea of masculine dominated society seems to be an inevitable symptom of ‘civilized’ society. Not to say that femininity is strictly reserved for women or that masculinity is strictly reserved for men. To me, Sara Palin and Hillary Clinton are both faces of the yang or the masculine part. Just the same I would consider Martin Luther King Jr. as speaking on behalf of the yin or of the feminine portion as his speeches advocated for a more empathetic society. This is why the ideas Taoism are important for us to consider today.

To me the Tao is kind of like driving a truck full of water, if one takes a curb too hard the water splashes hard in the opposite direction so the truck feels as if it is tilting so naturally one swing the wheel fast in the other direction, which the water sloshing back from the other direction gains even more momentum, hitting the other side even harder, the truck wobbles back and forth until it either winds up crashing on its side or working together with the rhythm of the water to calm itself back down, to complacently fallow the road. Tao is harmony, it is driving while knowing (or not knowing) the potential influence of water to the amount of control (or lack of) one has over the truck. The Tao Te Ching is a guide to teach us how to get back in rhythm with the water, through feeling and non-action, this is nature and the yin, this is the dark and the feminine. The beauty of Tao, and Eastern thought is that everything is cyclical, that whether we try or don't try balance will be restored and the forces of nature will prevail, through earthquake and tidal wave, this is the nature of things.

Works Cited:
Laozi. Tao Te Ching: The Classic Book of Integrity and the Way. Trans. Victor H. Mair. New York: Bantam, 1990. Print."
Morton, W. Scott, and Charlton M. Lewis. China: Its History and Culture. 4th ed. New York: McGraw-Hill, 2005. 22-44. Print.
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Feminism and popular environmentalism

Feminism and environmentalism are more intertwined than they first appear. To me they are almost interchangeable terms. The feminism and environmentalism I speak of are not the ones that can be defined by our popular culture. Both can be associated with inexplicable beauty, emotion, and ability to nourish. The emotions of this earth expressed thru tidal waves and thunderstorms; it’s breathtaking beauty found in the mountains and the valleys; it nourishing us with berries and greens. Unfortunately the agenda's of these movements to preserve these things seem to be working against themselves. They seem to have been hijacked and manipulated by our capitalist system, by money. The modern feminist movement seems to be working towards molding itself to fit into our masculanized society. Popular environmentalism seems to be sucked into the same market that has enslaved the wilderness, selling it to us and seemingly capitalizing on it. That mainstream environmental movement seems to be more focused on sustaining its office than seeking real solutions for our open spaces. So I think that both environmentalism and feminism trying to work within the system, have become a part of the system that has enslaved them.

Feminism isn't about men and women. It's about sense and sensibility. "Sensory perception is the glue that binds our nervous system into the surrounding ecosystem" (David Abram). We need to have empathy and sensitivity in order to feel connected and to achieve harmony. Fallowing industrialization being a man has become almost a synonym for machines. This association has unfairly defined men as being aggressive, competitive, and without emotions. There duty in a relationally, to provide and protect. Which providing and protecting is now defined in financial terms, financial stability and security. This is how femininity, being nurturing, was ripped out of the hands of the male gender.

The women's version of feminism became hijacked at the point when money became the focal measurement of self worth, women wanted to be a part of this culture too, to feel more valuable. In the current feminist movement there seems to be a shortsighted fixation on workplace equality. I feel this is the anti-thesis of what I think feminism and liberation should be. That possibly the fight for control in the realms of gender equality are blind aspirations for masculine mimicry to fit into the society rigidly designed to function as a machine. That in accomplishing gender equality in this society as it stands would not be a forward step for feminism, but a concession for true liberation that would require us to work outside of the system at hand.

Popular environmentalism I feel has been reduced its focus to sustaining modern human culture rather than nature itself. Not to say we are separate from nature, but we certainly have separated ourselves. Sure we can reduce carbon output by mono-cropping windmills in Iowa or our great lakes. But where are THESE resources coming from to build these? Shouldn't environmentalism and holistic sustainability go hand and hand? New 'solutions' are being sold to us every day. All the while 200 species a day are dying and we are running around in PETA underwear, further encouraging and reinforcing idea of living things as commodities. Being an activist has become a joke these days. Under the capitalist agenda everything is a commodity, including nature. It is unsympathetic to nature, to sensitivity, to beauty. The only parts that we save are all partitioned off and designated for specific use. Everything seems to be of a service to man, even the 'uncivilized man,' who seems to lack the qualification of being a person at all to us. We abuse and exploit them just as we do to nature.

An assistant to the governor of Michigan responded to a letter I wrote regarding modern fracking techniques. He wanted me to know that:

Firstly... " The Michigan Department of Environmental Quality is committed toenvironmental stewardship that protects Michigan residents and enhances the quality of life... (also)...

The Governor shares your commitment to Michigan’s environment, and he is working hard to ensure a sustainable future for everyone." I think this is only true to the extent that it fits into his corrupt agenda.

I really do feel that to be a feminist or to be an environmentalist at the true heart of what they are supposed to be and what I think they need to be are interchangeable terms. Being feminine is to have those unexplainable outpourings of feelings to be connected with the emotions of the world. The environment connects us to this as we walk through the woods and something is truly, purely, and simply beautiful. I think this is what we are made for; To see beauty as it is in nature. Not that which has been commercialized and sold to us, but beauty as created by nature. You cannot buy or barter for this. This is us and the trees. We need more empathy and understanding. I think this means to be nurturing, to be loving, to be caring, to express your emotions, to be conscious of your surroundings. This is the true meaning of feminism and to be an environmentalist.