Respecting our Mother

It's Earth Month, and the April showers have arrived to start greening everything up

I spent a good part of the last three days cleaning up the yard and getting the garden beds ready for planting.

Now, it's time to wait and watch the daffodils and tulips rise from the ground to greet the sunshine.

Last night, we attending the opening film of the new Endangered Earth series at JCC.  The evening opened with a screening of Deb Lanni's original short film, Embrace, a beautiful montage of  the diversity of life forms sharing our Earth.  This was followed by the debut of student filmmaker Cody Delong's original documentary, The Leavers: Creating Community in Chautauqua County. The film is an exploration of the many individuals and organizations who, through individual actions, are building a sustainable community in Chautauqua County. I found this especially fun to watch because Tom worked with Cody on this film (and was named as "producer") and inevitably ended up "in the movies" himself. 

Finally, there was a screening of Overview, a short film exploring the perspective of astronauts who  have seen the Earth from space and have experienced the "overview effect."  The experience is one that enables a transformative perception of the planet and all who live here as travelers aboard a single spaceship in the greater universe.The film also features insights from commentators and thinkers on the wider implications and importance of this understanding for humanity as a whole, and especially its relevance to how we meet the tremendous challenges facing our planet at this time.

Next week's film will be Carbon Nation, Wednesday the 17th at 7pm . in the Carnahan Theatre.

The series will continue with Waterlife on Monday, April 22, and Fresh on May 2.

Last night, we slept with the window open. What a treat.

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I've been thinking about our own transformation (always a work in progress) since our deliberate decision to "downsize," move to a smaller house in a smaller town, embrace all things local, and reduce our destructive impact on the earth. It's not always easy swimming against the tide. But I think we're making good progress.

*We've shut off a lot of the propaganda that incessantly urges us to consume like there's no tomorrow. No more corporate news, or essentially, noise. One of the best pieces of advice I can give anyone is TURN OFF YOUR TV. Tune into the real things around you instead.

*Our attention to recycling (especially since the BPU started accepting boxboard this year) has reduced our garbage to generally one kitchen size bag per week.  With more diligent efforts at composting, we can reduce that even further.

*We have dramatically changed the way we eat, with the emphasis on whole foods, plant-based, and local.  We started out with a pretty good supermarket here (Wegman's), since they carry a good selection of organic and even local foods. But since we joined the Furniture City Foods buying club last year, we've been able to tap into even more regional and organic resources. My mantra is BUY INGREDIENTS, NOT PRODUCTS. Processed foods tend to be fattening and toxic.  "Fast food" now means "grab an apple or orange."  We pack a cooler for road trips instead of subjecting ourselves to the offerings at turnpike service plazas.

*Our vegetable garden gets bigger each year. We've done a little bit of food preserving (canning applesauce from our trees, freezing berries, excess zucchini and chopped tomatoes, dehydrating apple slices and experimenting with other things), Tom is taking the Master Food Preserver course from the Cornell Cooperative Extension later this month, and then we'll be set for squirreling away much more of our own food for the winter. He'll also be instructing other people who are interested in doing this.

*We went from two cars to one quite a while ago, and Tom walks or bikes to work, sometimes taking the bus.  Yes, there is public transportation in Jamestown, greatly under-utilized, but part of Tom's job as sustainability coordinator at a mainly commuter college is to find ways to incentivize people to drive less. The easiest way to do this is to put four people in one car instead of four people in four cars. It's an idea we're also promoting for getting people to church and other events. An advantage to small city living is that we all live in closer proximity to one another. And we don't have to be lone cowboys. It's okay to do things with friends!

*We are thrift shoppers. When we need something, we try to find it secondhand. We use our libraries for reading material, and I am an avid "recycler" of books -- buying from thrift stores and then donating them back when I'm finished with them.

It's a learning experience and a challenge to wean yourself away from the destructive craziness that we grew up thinking of as "normal" -- that all the resources in the world were there for the taking and he who dies with the most stuff wins.  It's encouraging that some of our young people, who haven't yet been totally indoctrinated into conformity and complacency, seem to instinctively grasp how crazy it all is.  Hopefully, they will figure out how much better life can be with fewer encumbrances and more cooperation.

One way or another, the future will be different.