31 photos of all the participants for the Earth Day Celebration

 Last Saturday we had our big CELEBRATION at Lake Tomahawk, hosted by the Climate Conversation Group of the Unitarian Universalist Church.

I've already posted some of the photos I took while we were setting up. HERE.

The SWAN Action Network display with some of the members, Carlos, Barbara. Hannah, and Robertson.

First some appreciation for background music, from Annelinde Metzner, Bill Altork and Sue Stone.

Linda plays many instruments! She is also the Music Director at the UU Church in Black Mountain.

Bill Altork was our strolling guitarist. He also writes his own songs for YouTube recordings.

Linda playing the recorder. She shared that when the wind was blowing (it started coming off the mountains (very cold) around noon.)

Sue Stone sang tunes and played her guitar. She is the pianist often at the UU Church.

I doubt that Bette is signaling a "stop" to Bill, more likely expressing something about the display.

The conversation starter...This is just a small sample of the 300 figures in the original installation. 

 A Conversation: Climate Disruption, Human Displacement,
 and Reconnection by Suzanne Ziglar

Kate shows Anna how a rain garden works...a display that included take-home information that was popular.

Some of the participants looking at each other's displays. The free seeds and plant starts were popular. 

As the woman in the foreground considers a packett of free seeds, in the background Kerrigan Monk from the Black Mountain News interviews one of the participants.

Susan Moore brought a lot of free seeds, here she's talking with Bette Bates.

Linda Tatsapaugh discusses her display about Plastic-Free Buncombe County with Larry Pearlman.

A petition for (our county) Buncombe County to be plastic free...with lots of information on the dangers of plastic in our own lives (we each probably consume a credit card's worth of micro-plastic-fibres every week.) This display included a place to sign the petition to limit single-use plastics in our county!

R. J. and Helen Bell discuss the plant-based foods display.

This display focused on the industries' pollution in raising animals, and the animal rights hurt by meat based diets, as environmental impacts.

Two artists discuss making small paper books, Suzanne Ziglar on the left, and Jean who demonstrated her techniques on right. I missed seeing if anyone else came over to make a paper book, but it was a great idea.

Some of the SWAN members who put together today's "action" - Barbara and Hannah seated, R.J. and Kevin standing.

Interested couple looking at the Swannanoa Watershed Action Network display

Here Carlos explains the "Save the Planet" game to Kate. It came originally from a double spread page in the New York Times last August. 

I was surprised when I asked Kerrigan if she wanted to play it and she said "Yes."

Barbara, Kerrigan, Hannah and Carlos played the game, a cooperation between players to reach a certain score in so many turns. We were just 5 points short of saving the planet...it only takes about 15 minutes, and is educational. I think school age children would enjoy it, but we didn't have many children come through our Celebration.

Hannah explains something about the watershed, just west of the Continental Divide and flowing along the drainage through the Swannanoa River to the French Broad River in Asheville. Sue Ellen is signing up to get more information from SWAN.

After a rainy night, blue skies were welcome. This was my view from the picnic shelter.

The inside view of the banner.

Bette strolled her grandson outside the shelter, perhaps inviting other young families to come explore our displays.

We all felt the event was a good use of time and energies, and were happy with the outcome for our first try at this. 

When I asked these triplet girls if I could take their pictures (later when they came to the SWAN exhibit) they said "no." So I'm glad we had this one. Photo by Susan Moore.

Dealing with that north wind coming off the heights (we're just 15 miles south of Mt. Mitchell here!) we all cleaned up pretty fast. 

And by 1:10 we had left the tables to the next people (and ducks and geese) who wanted to use them!

Deepest thanks to all the participants who brought their displays to make this event successful. We all went home with a sense of learning from each other, and having shared with the public our hopes in dealing with climate change. 

The Earth Day Celebration

 Yesterday a few individuals came together to share with each other and the public, their ideas of dealing with the climate crisis with personal actions, with hope, and with community efforts.

From 9:30 setting up on a somewhat chilly morning, when the rain was just putzing out to nothing, to a windy gusty 1:10 when we left, it was a great joining together of dedicated people.

Free seeds and a few plants. I brought home some kind of orchid, which was donated without a name.

Some great artistic posters were hung on one side.

The Swannanoa Watershed Action Network had prepared well, and just put together their display. Here are Hanna, R.J. and Carlos. There will be more photos of others on this crew later.

Robert was handy with a hammer

Suzanne Ziglar might be considered the mother of this event. Here she set up a portion of her climate crisis conversation art installation. 

 A Conversation: Climate Disruption, Human Displacement,

 and Reconnection by Suzanne Ziglar

The display of humans interacting with the climate crisis leads to idenfying our emotions, sharing them, and coming up with what ways we can do something in our own lives. This has included discussions of our recycling habits, our use of plastics, and even our personal care products to examine how many chemicals we use. It is also an important way to build a community!

Free seeds were available on the table with the blue table cloth. I didn't get a chance to talk with the Creation Care Alliance person, but was glad that she was there. Working on our grief issues in regards to the climate crisis is important.

Jean was our artist in residence, making art booklets out of scraps. She also made the banner.

Anna and Sue and Robert discussed some good ideas in agreement.  Sue brought free samples of a detergent strip which replaces the huge containers of powder or liquid to wash clothes.

Bette Bates gave Carlos Espinosa a sample of something to taste...I don't know what it was. She gathered lots of products that are either ethically made without the use of plastic, or represent alternatives to plastic.

This is the way the picnic pavilion looked from the lake.

Our banner and one from the creation care alliance.

We were so very grateful that the 5 hours of thunderstorms had passed by 9:30 when we were arriving. And though the temperature was colder, we were visited by many more people than if the rain had continued. We did have wind gusts that took down some of our displays, but everthing came out ok.

And I will continue with more photos tomorrow of some of the activities we did!

Today's quote:

Dorothea Lange said:

“You know, so often [photography] is just sticking around and being there, remaining there, not swooping in and swooping out in a cloud of dust; sitting down on the ground with people, letting the children look at your camera with their dirty, grimy little hands, and putting their fingers on the lens, and you let them, because you know that if you will behave in a generous manner, you’re very apt to receive it, you know? People are very, very trusting; and also, most of us really like to get the full attention of the person who’s photographing you. It’s rare, you don’t get it very often. Who pays attention to you, really, a hundred percent? Your doctor, your dentist, and your photographer.”