The Web of Life – Finding Eco-inspiration

These days there are so many “Causes” that even the most passionate and energetic of us can feel overwhelmed, burdened, hopeless, and good deed-ed out.  We can only give so much money, especially in these poor economic times – I know that many young people, like myself, are facing the monumental task of paying back tens of thousands in student loans.  We can’t fork over $25 for the World Wildlife Fund, Amnesty International, Save the Children, Sierra Club, etc etc etc.  For that matter giving money isn’t going to solve most of the world’s problems anyway.  Great movements or cultural changes generally haven’t come about through increases in member funding, rather it is when lots of people decide to give their time through actions, or their energy by making important lifestyle changes.  What do we do in between work, school, sleep, cooking, cleaning, and spending time with friends and family?  We hear entreaties to recycle, reuse, buy “green” or organic or local produce, buy this fish not that one, eat less meat period, eat more vegetables (but organic, local, etc), use this bank because they don’t support mountain top removal, drop your phone company because they destroy habitat, stop buying new clothes due to really bad manufacturing processes overseas, stop shopping as much period, use a fuel-efficient car or public transit, make sure to properly dispose of old batteries, replace your light bulbs with fluorescent, purchase organic pet food to be a conscientiousness pet owner, and on & on.  And somehow we’ve got to accomplish all of this between the hours of 5 and 10pm, or over the weekend, right?

Eventually the best of us start feeling buried by these obligations we feel to society and to the earth, and by trying to meet our own expectations of ourselves.  I know I’ve found myself stumbling along, exhausted, at the end of a long day and said f*** it before deciding not to throw yet another plastic bottle into my car a.k.a. Little Green Traveling Recycle Bin.  Then I get into my car (after pushing aside a small mountain of old recyclables).  Or, the week before a planned girl’s night out, you give in to the temptation to spend an evening shopping at the local mall.  Ahhhh, cheap, sexy goods.  I think that sometimes we have unrealistic standards for ourselves that can actually work against our goals.  If, every time we fail to meet these standards, we beat ourselves up about it, we will start to associate the entire subject with loathing because it so often leads to us feeling disappointed in ourselves, or the world around us (as in, Why is it always me tossing other people’s water bottles into my car?)  All the while we continue hearing about climate change, global poverty, high extinction rates, lots of trash and pollution, and all the terrible things facing our generation and those to follow.  How can we forge a lifestyle that we can actually live with, and that will help us be who we want to be?

I’m sure there are many approaches to answer this question but I think where it all starts is just recognizing, really internalizing, how interconnected the world is.  And this applies at and between every level – cellular to interstellar.  All of the problems we face can be summed up in the idea that everything we do has repercussions, which can be negative, positive or neutral.  Think of Earth as a living organism and each of us a cell in her body.    Anything we take came from somewhere and everything we send off ends up somewhere else in Her body (excluding space waste).  Now, not to get all Tree-hugger on you but I’m just really breaking it down to a concept that is simple yet beautiful.  It is unlikely that any one of us is going to solve all of the Earth’s problems, but what we can strive for is “least harm” and choosing a venue or two to focus our positive efforts.  Also, make sure you put your energy, time, money, etc where it will make the largest impact per effort!  The importance of buying organic depends on the product so beware of “green-washing” where people market items that really don’t make much difference but cost a good deal more.  Below I have listed some actions, categorized by Easy, Moderate, and Intensive, that anybody can take whenever they wish, and that do make a difference.

 

A  Few Easy Things That Do Make a Difference

-Install smart power strip to turn off TVs and computers completely

-Use online banking, shopping to reduce junk mail and paper waste

-Line-dry laundry or dry on low-heat

-Use home-energy monitoring device to track your electricity usage

-Turn your thermostat up or down by 1 degree

-Turn off your lights and/or open more blind & curtains during the day

-Turn off the water when brushing teeth/washing face

-Use less disposable paper items (cups, plates, napkins, etc)

-Buy Organic when it comes to the “Dirty Dozen”: Peaches, Apples, Sweet bell peppers, Celery, Nectarines, Strawberries, Cherries, Pears, Grapes, Spinach, Lettuce, Potatoes

Moderately Intensive Eco-Actions

-Subscribe to service to reduce junk mail/catalogs

-Install/upgrade to dual-flush toilet

-Reduce road travel, walk more

-Become a “Week-day Vegetarian”

-Shop for clothes at your local consignment shop

-Make educated, responsible seafood purchases using the Monterey Bay Aquarium’s excellent Seafood Watch Guide: <http://www.montereybayaquarium.org/cr/seafoodwatch.aspx>

Big Actions

-Buy green power

-Purchase organic mattress (better for YOU)

-Install rain barrel and use to water gardens, wash cars, etc

-Cut 3 airline flights/year

-Donate money to charity (make sure to research using charity watchdogs first)

-Begin growing your own food or purchasing from local growers (See: Community Supported Agriculture)

-Consider an energy-audit for your home to help you be more efficient

-Make your next car a high MPG vehicle, or better yet, begin using more public transportation, bike riding or walking!

Print out this list and circle a couple things that capture your imagination.  Choose a simple action and wait until it is incorporated seamlessly into your daily routine before trying another action.  Before you know it recycling, composting, buying veggies at the farmers market each Sunday, and turning off the lights when you leave a room will be automatic or even a cheerful part of your week!  No matter what choices we make, these decisions WILL affect the world, and will have an effect on US.  Remember that beautiful blue and green organism – the Earth – and how we all make up a part of it, for better or worse.  I think that a healthy human makes decisions based on a balance between what that person wants and what is best for the world (these things intersect much more than some may think).  The same things that make a human being healthy – good diet with vitamins and minerals, activity, clean water, absence of cancer, poisons or other disease, moderation and balance, are the same things that make the Earth a healthier organism.  We do get barraged by information and it is important to take some of this in; we don’t always have to act on every troubling thing we hear but it’s good to admit it into our comprehensive understanding of the state of our world.  However, just remember that we can make a little difference so easily – by purchasing a product with less packaging for example.  Keep in mind your image of the interconnected, living Earth, and make choices that will be better for the planet and better for us too!  If you screw up don’t give up – just start over again, and rather than beating yourself up about it,  remind yourself of your original inspiration: our fantastic, beautiful web of life on this planet Earth.  That’s what it’s all about right?  :)

Dusting off the pen and paper

I’d like to start writing again.  I’ve got a few drafts in the works – regarding sustainability in our culture, biodiversity, Ibogaine, and a few other things.  Now that I’m finally graduating with my undergrad degree I will have time to myself again for the first time in years!  It’s quite a strange new feeling.  Stay tuned – if anybody still actually reads this!

My Christmas Wish

I am trying to raise $250 for Heifer International, an organization that I have supported for a number of years now.  I love that they promote self-sufficiency (teach a man to fish…ya know) and that participants must “Pass on the Gift” to neighbors by giving away the first offspring of their animal.  Heifer has received much praise and is lauded as a legitimate, effective charity.  I would greatly appreciate any donations you have the ability to make (they can be as little as $10).  Thanks for your time, and happy holidays!

http://wishes.causes.com/wishes/125968?bws=fb_stream_wish

~Kristen

I Am Dead

I have “sacrificed” my digital life in order to raise money for the Keep A Child Alive campaign against HIV/AIDS.  To bring me back help me raise $150 that will go toward the overall goal of $1,000,000

http://buylife.org/user-profile.php?cons_id=1141525

<3

Kristen

Bjork

Voice like an exotic bird, call of a wild cat, drawing forth the deepest yearnings of my heart effortlessly.  A fully realized person, unafraid to explore the dangerous realms of love, pain, sex, vulnerability, anger.  She is also childlike, a person who never left behind the unabashed wonder of the world around her, and delighted to play, letting her imagination guide her along.  When she breathes, colors swirl from her nostrils into fanciful shapes, when she stands she leaves behind her a woven figure of some woodland creature, when she cries the tears are black or blue or red depending on the nature of her pain or joy.  Unafraid.  She is a thing of nature, fascinated with the textures, colors, shapes, cries, calls, chirps of the forest, the seaside, the deep dark of night.  Also sensory deprivation.  What is the basic spirit molecule, intangible force, that makes us who we are?  She strips herself, like Ishtar, for all to see, but unaware like a child – more interested in the discovery than the attention.  A true Artist.  Her growls and cracked calls for love remind us that we are not alone in our yearning for completion.  She reminds us that the pure desire for love itself is beautiful, beautiful enough to live on for a time.  She rides the border between structured song and the sporadic, mysterious music created by birds, insects, falling water, rustling leaf litter, and the ocean rhythmically thumping against rocks.

Breathe

Respiration is pretty amazing.  Many people  assume that we breath in, extract oxygen, and then breath out to release CO2 that is formed from that oxygen.  Astoundingly, the oxygen expelled in CO2 did not come from the air we breath at all!  Our spectacular bodies have evolved to take care of obtaining O2 and ditching CO2 by breathing in and out, a dualistic cycle, drawing air over our moist bellows bursting with fractal alveoli that open and close periodically like pulsating sea creatures.  The oxygen molecules, once free-dancing diatomic matter, are grabbed by hemoglobin ships and carted through the vast intricate web of rivers, streams, and capillary trickles.

Why do we do this?  Capture O2 from the air around us?

Its affinity for electrons, second only to fluoride, allows it to snatch them up at the bottom of a cellular escalator that draws electrons and H ions from glucose (C6H12O6 – tasty tasty sugar).  Oxygen picks up 2 hydrogens and the result is – water.  Technically a waste product.  Where does carbon dioxide come from?  CO2, conversely, is formed by the remaining carbon and oxygen left when glucose loses its hydrogens.  So interestingly the CO2 we expel does not contain the O2 we breathed in – it is formed by the breakdown of glucose.

How do we get rid of carbon dioxide?  Hemoglobin carries some but is not nearly so fond of it or capable of hauling it around, as it is for simple O2.  Rather, most of the CO2 enters red blood cells and interacts with water, H20, to form carbonic acid, H2CO3.  Carbonic acid is very unstable and immediately breaks apart into H+ and HCO3 (bicarbonate).  What next?  We need to get rid of the CO2 buried within the system.  H+ ions are what cause acidity, and to prevent too much of that hemoglobin snatches up H+.  The wily bicarbonate molecules slip out into the blood plasma and eventually pass through the lungs.  There, in those branching lobes, the exact opposite reaction occurs – carbonic acid reforms and this time breaks apart into water and CO2.  The same compounds we started with.  Why?  How convenient that it should be released directly where it can be disposed of.  The reason is that blood, due to inherent characteristics, loses its affinity for CO2 when a lot of O2 is present (as it is in the lungs).  The pH increases and CO2 is dropped like a hot potato and expelled as we speak, shout, pant, or sit quietly, pondering many things other than respiration.

Another interesting fact – plants perform respiration in addition to photosynthesis.

Painless Cattle

A few days ago I read something extremely disturbing.  It was an article by philosopher Adam Shriver that promotes the idea of genetic manipulation to create cattle that do not feel pain, or at least have a dimmed response to it.  The assertion is that cattle are subject to pain and discomfort throughout their lives, and sometimes during slaughter, and that this would improve their life experience.  I disagree with this “solution” for several reasons.  First of all, cattle should not be exposed to pain significant enough to warrant this bizarre development anyway.  They should be raised, kept, and slaughtered humanely and without pain.  This leads to my next concern – cattle who cannot feel pain will almost certainly be kept with even less regard than their pain-sensitive predecessors.  If, as it is assumed, current conditions are causing such discomfort, then what motivation would ag-industry workers have to make improvements armed with the knowledge that the cattle can’t feel pain anyway?

I am also seriously worried that this knowledge could lead to heinous abuses of animals, and disturbing behavior by cattle who aren’t aware that their action is harming their own body.  Finally, what sort of precedent would this establish?  Obviously it would be an admission that current practices cause cattle to feel excessive pain, and that we would rather manipulate their ability to feel than to treat them better.  Even more simply – this process would deny a species some of the most basic characteristics of living things – response to stimuli and self-preservation.  What next?  Further manipulation of living organisms so they can be tightly packed, grown quickly, grown large, and easily distributed to the ever-growing masses?  This is a route we should not travel as responsible, intelligent, and supposedly empathetic beings.  The end is not worth the means to obtain it – not by a long shot.

You can read the article from Neuroethics here: <http://www.springerlink.com/content/vrv4m6288w702123/fulltext.pdf