Recommended Reading

A couple of days ago, I read this article (http://www.nytimes.com/2008/04/20/magazine/20wwln-lede-t.html) by one of my favorite authors, Micheal Pollan, and I keep thinking about it. The article begins with Pollan working through this question of why bother about trying to save the environment - there seems to be too much to do, and not any reasonable assurance that others will join in on the efforts that need to be made, and we are not sure that it would not all be too late anyway.

I think it particularly speaks to me because I really struggle with this question - "why bother?" - not exactly as he describes it, not so much at the beginning of the effort, but more in the middle. I find that I can easily get myself worked up to make changes and save the world, yaddayaddayadda, but that in the middle, when the sacrifices and challenges are no longer novel and all I want is to just eat a cheeseburger and get on with my life, or not spend 3xs as much on the fancy green light bulbs and instead get the regular ones and have enough left over to buy a pretty new skirt. I find myself wilting at that point - find myself standing in the aisle with a light bulb in either hand, talking myself into buying the cheap one. But I think Pollan is right - I believe that it will take one person after another making all the changes they can, it will take one person after another calling for technological, legislative, and truly, moral, change. I do believe that.

And I believe something that Pollan doesn't talk about directly, but opens the way to with his discussion of "living as if". Pollan uses Vaclav Havel, a Czech politician who was instrumental in the overthrow of communism in Czechoslovakia, as an example of what can happen when people go ahead with what they believe is right even when all but sure that those attempts will be futile if not personally dangerous. I think that what Pollan doesn't explicitly say, but is exceptionally true, is that there is something very pure and valuable about doing what you believe is right, regardless of surrounding situations. That in a very direct and simple, yet somewhat elusive way, there is value in doing all the little energy saving, emission reducing things you can - whether or not they lead to others following, to legislative changes, or to technological advances. I believe that there is something valuable in doing what you know to be right, even if that action is ineffective or fruitless.

Additionally - I also wanted to point you towards Pollan's comment about observing Sabbath - I kinda love this idea - it's so simple and direct. I've been thinking about implementing it in my own life, perhaps with the modifications of allowing for use of lights and food-related devices.

When You Get What You Ask For

One of my girlfriends here is a woman who is significantly older than the rest of our little group, a woman who went through some major change and upheaval in her life, and moved down here for an indefinite period of time, looking to really find fulfillment for herself. She subscribes to a somewhat more “new-agey” vision of the world than I do, but I love to hear her talk about her process in moving here and staying here and planning the next stages of her life now that she’s substantially altered its course and is no longer on a traditional path. Recently, she was talking about how hard it has been for her to get her career set up here, how she has had to do so much waiting, and being patient. She said that she has been using the time to do a lot of writing, both personal and work-related, but she was becoming increasingly frustrated with all this waiting, until recently she remembered that before moving here she had been thinking over and over and saying to all those around her that she just wanted time to write. She wanted to just write and write, and look! Here she was with so much time to write! How funny, then, that she had been seeing this period with so much impatience. She was using this as evidence that the universe is listening to you, that you will receive what you ask for if you can keep asking for it and keep moving towards what seems like the right destination.

As much as I scoff at the idea of the universe “listening” to you, and delivering what you ask for if you can only keep the faith, I realized that something very similar has happened to me over the past year. This time last year, as I am sure some of you will remember, I was telling anyone who would listen that all I wanted to do was to go sit on some beach somewhere, to just go stick my head in the sand and sit still for a year. I kept asking ironically, “Does anyone pay for that?” I was sitting in my carrel at Firestone Library, staring at the putrid green walls feeling awash with how low I felt my inner self to be, with how exhausted and depleted and done I felt, not just with my thesis but with the world as a whole really. I was not really feeling all that excited by the wonderful job opportunities revealing themselves, or able to power through the writing process, or coping all that well with what were my responsibilities and obligations. I was flailing a fair bit, and very very scared.

I have had about 8 months of a paid semi-vacation. I’ve struggled with the fact that it isn’t quite a vacation, but that there isn’t really much in the way of real work either, and I’ve struggled with the culture and my place here, and with disappointed expectations. But I have done a lot of sitting in the sun, and waking slowly in my own rhythm, with no classes to run off to, panicked because I was late, a lot of swimming and reading and watching TV even!, a lot of talking with friends and going out for drinks. Someone has paid me to do all these things. I got what I asked for. Look at that.

And it feels pretty good. The first part of the year was difficult, but ever since I accepted what this was, I’ve felt (for the most part) happy. The happy isn’t always effortless or easy, but I’ve managed to find it and to continue to find my way back to it when I fall off the horse. This happy is about a number of things: finding friends whose company I enjoy and who I can share my true self with, finding pieces of this culture that I can love, finding ways to block or ignore or simply brush off some of the pieces I cannot find a way to love. But even more than all of that, I think I am beginning to come to see that some of the deep, bubbling happiness I have been feeling recently is about the replenishment of myself that I was doing even when I was not aware I was doing it.

I have been quiet. And not even in a spiritual, open, questing way – just quiet. As me. I have let my brain stop thinking all its thoughts for brief spans. I have Sat Still and have not attempted to unduly enrich myself. I have read some books, but not that many, and probably 60 or 70% non-classic, non-revelatory novels. I have watched a lot of TV. And not great documentaries, or news, or even film.

I feel like the little kid who has spent the summer running and swimming – tan, more flexible, muscles exercised again, head emptier, full of easy grace and easy smiles and the confidence of mastering all the nooks and crannies of the woods on my bike.