It's not over till it's over

  Sharing some thoughts from the other day...

I posted on my Inner Workings blog from the newsletter "The Flowers are Speaking" in her article "At the Edge of the Woods," by Mary Porter Kerns.

This is what struck me first as I read through it. And I reread this paragraph several times. 

I am comforted in one way, with a strong sense that the Earth will be fine—our Great Mother Earth will always generate new life. Yet, my grief in knowing we are losing the worlds that generations of our ancestors knew and loved is overwhelming when I allow myself to think about it. It is scary to contemplate how all that we depend on for our food and shelter might be radically changing over the coming decades. And so, I usually don’t. I may even delude myself occasionally into thinking that since I am in the later years of my own life it won’t affect me. But of course, it will, because my life is bound to the lives of my children, all the descendants of those beings currently living, and the worlds we will all be born into again and again.

 The lifespan I'm currently experiencing had become so overwhelming, I forgot about the lifespans of other things and reincarnation.

Needed to get back to nature, eh?

Kerns said: "...as she dealt with the invasive species of Oriental bittersweet, she listened to its voice...

Oriental bittersweet and their beautiful orange berries shared this wisdom when I sat with them at the end of last season, but I had not fully digested their wisdom until now. They said, “Allow us to help you trust that a new balance will come. A new equilibrium often takes longer to achieve than the span of a single lifetime. Let us help you sit with your discomfort. Remember that new life always arises from the ruins of the old. For now, trust that each curve of our vines holds our desire to create new life from the dirt that holds us both.”

This made me copy the whole article, because it's so rich in its simplicity. Dealing with unwanted growth - anyone with cancer can identify with this probably.

Or just disease processes of any kind. Or discomfort from unexpected avenues.

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Sharing with Thankful Thursday, and Skywatch Friday

I did go back to nature...as best this ole body can do these days. Drove up to my favorite lookout (Tanbark Ridge, 3175') on the Blue Ridge Parkway. Breathed fresh clean air (with whatever pollen was still floating around). Set up my folding chair and settled in for a half hour of higher altitude breath work.

Besides occasional tourists stopping by to take their photos with the mountains, there were occasional jets overhead. A faint contrail can be spotted in the sky. But I mainly looked up with that sparkling little round cloud among all the mares' tails.

The slide above the fronds of the bush shows the roadway of the Parkway on the other side of the valley. And if you look very hard (and have a better screen than I do, maybe you can see the car which just is to the left of the mudslide. The next time I go I think I'll put fresh batteries in the old Nikon which at least has a zoom capacity. Where I can connect its photos is the question, since I no longer have the computer where that app worked. We shall see if the card reader works, and if I even have a card in the camera.

What fun things to do when I should be seriously taking care of more business-like parts of life. But today is rest.

Having a flexible mind makes navigating life much easier, as you are not thrown off course easily.

And I went back again on Tuesday for another half hour, catching some sun on toes and shins for a half hour. Breathing wonderful highly oxygenated air from all those woods. Hot for that half hour, but our weather is due to get wet again, so changes of plans.

“[In] all this inky black void, the Earth was there with this beautiful blue hue to it. The blue marble.”
—Frank Borman, astronaut

My sunrise photo from the Parkway, May 20, 6:52 am. This will be my next header...

Change must be within people

 Robertson Work is a friend, and a genius. His Compassionate Civilization book gives us alternative ways to view, and work on, climate change. 

Here's a snippet of his ideas, which I'll give you just a few paragraphs below. Check out this Substack. That seems to be the way lots of good writing is being done these days.

ecological-and-social-crises-are calling us to reinvent ourselves.

Now is the time! We are empathic earthlings of the living Earth!

"As a former UNDP policy advisor, international civil servant, founder of the Compassionate Civilization Collaborative, and most importantly, an aging nobody, I call on the over eight billion of us and our leaders in government, business, civil society, media, and academia to launch a global initiative of reinventing humanity as Earthlings committed to ecological regeneration and social justice.

 In World War II, President Roosevelt called on industry, government, and citizens to unite in defeating fascism. In my country, I call on Vice President Harris, Governor Walz, Bernie Sanders, Elizabeth Warren, AOC, the ACLU, Third Act, and other leaders and movements to articulate a compelling vision and effective action plan of social justice and peace for all people and ecological regeneration of all ecosystems of air, water, soil, minerals, plants, insects, and animals.

Around the planet, many are calling for whole system transformation including the United Nations, the Dalai Lama, the Plum Village movement, the Global Compassion Coalition, Greta Thunberg, Kate Raworth, Phil Lane Jr., Daniel Schmachtenberger, Jacinda Ardern, Nafeez Ahmed, Vandana Shiva, Daniel Wahl, Arundhati Roy, Rutger Bregman, the Great Transition Initiative, the Sunrise Movement, and many, many others as part of a planetary movement of movements."

 

And the good news is...

Aug 14, 2024 on Facebook, Mom's Clean Air Force posted this:

That's a seven months' measure. Excellent news. Renewables are going to supply electric power everywhere, I hope.

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I wonder if I'll ever return to a life of going out, doing things, taking care of my apartment, maybe even doing something I enjoy with clay? So far this dragging on Brochiectasis flare-up...just seems to get worse some days. And if I have a good day, I hardly know what to do with it! I still am not sick enough to need medical treatment, darn it all! Just keep on helping clear my lungs with nebulizer, the shaking vest, and sleeping with the C-PAP (which isn't for the big B but for sleep apnea). 

Anyway, I hear thunder out in the mountains, but nothing like last evenings' clap that was probably blocks from my house. I got up and just unplugged the computer and hoped that the electricity and cable would keep working so I could see the end of Jeopardy's Tournament of Champions! It might have been a repeat, but I only vaguely knew who won, and I was right. The players were all outstanding. As always, I knew few answers, but sometimes ones that stumped all three geniuses. That's always fun!  And we had a bit of heavy rain...I didn't pay much attention.

Saturday was spent indoors mostly coughing. I had hoped to be able to go to the Tailgate Market, try to sell some old pots. Not this week. I am not complaining for attention...just stating this is the life I have. I think of neighbors in electric wheelchairs, and how limited their lives are by depending upon that device. They are stronger than I am in many ways.

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Today's quote:

In science one tries to tell people, in such a way as to be understood by everyone, something that no one ever knew before. But in the case of poetry, it's the exact opposite. 

-Paul Dirac, theoretical physicist and Nobel laureate (1902-1984)

An ecological revolution

 It's not political.

It's not based on anyone's borders, or offences against anyone else.

Well, at least anyone human.

Just look at the history of our earth...

We've had an Industrial Revolution...a world-wide change that affected all of the earth inhabitants.

But nobody paid a bit of attention to the wildlife, nor the oceans or forests. They were also affected.

The next revolution is coming. And I have no idea how it will look. But basically, something will make a crisis. Then people will lose a lot of the power they depend upon. Then the wildlife, oceans and forests (and all of ecological life) will come to the forefront of existence, with humanity as just a part of the whole.

That's the main sign that it's happening, humanity will no longer be looked at as any leadership any more. Perhaps we will be caged to control our contrary ways. Or maybe we'll have some mental evolutionary changes that help us feel equality with the environment. That would indeed be preferable to the cages.

We just don't get it yet.

What should it be called? 

How will we recognize it?  I like thinking of how the first machines made humanity's work easier for them. And how attractive they became.

So I'm thinking this will be very attractive in comparison with the climate change disasters, failing civilizations, and need to survive for humanity in the near future.  The many dystopian movies and books are of little interest for me. It's the ecological dominance in the distant future that is intriguing.

Sarychev Volcano Eruption captured from International Space Station (ISS). June 2009

Today's quote:

The environment we create will determine what prevails. In other words, what we nurture and encourage wins.

JANE GOODALL