Revolutions, Resolutions, and Resilience

Another revolution around the sun. Time to take stock and plan for next year. Looking forward and back like the namesake of the upcoming month. We got in our seed order last week. I expect dwindling supplies, so you might want to put in your seed order as well. One of my resolutions for next year is to do a better job keeping seed from my heirloom plant varieties. I've ordered some more American Chestnuts to plant, and plan to get some elderberry and mulberry trees in this winter too. We're spending way too much time cooped up inside and it is reflected in our poor health. (h/t Magi). “There was a study of more than 7,300 [COVID] cases in China, and guess how many people caught the disease outdoors?” Leung asks. “Just two.” Being outside in nature is curative on many levels.

A Time to Regenerate

The world seems to be between a rock and a hard place. COVID has amplified the problems and made obvious the dysfunction of the system. Meanwhile the money machine goes brrr, funneling ever more wealth upward. The ecosystem is degrading faster than we imagined. People are protesting in the streets around the world. If there is a way out of this mess, I don't see it. Is it really the end times? If so, should we go out with a party celebrating our life, or fighting the system tooth and nail to the end, or perhaps both at the same time? I know this much, I'm going to do my best to live in harmony with the ecosystem as I wrap up my last decade or two. Of course that has been my path for many years now, so why stop at this point. As I stated last week, I feel for the young folks who we are leaving with all this dysfunction. This week I thought I would explore ecosystem restoration because restoring our political, economic, and social systems is beyond my ability.

Unconventional

I managed to avoid most of the DNC convention other than a few clips on Rising and Jimmy Dore. What I did see was hollow, vapid, and without substance...full of platitudes and no policy. All they got is 'we ain't Trump'. Perhaps the inept response to the pandemic will be enough to sink Trump, but this sure rings of 2016. We'll see. I find myself in agreement with Caity and her view that this isn't normal...

So abnormalize the status quo. Abnormalize it every chance you get. Abnormalize it by holding a clear idea in your mind of what a healthy society would look like, then point out all the bizarre deviations from that vision at every opportunity. Remind people that this is crazy. Assure them that it doesn’t have to be this way. That the only thing keeping it this way is the fact that the powerful keep pouring vast troves of wealth into manipulating us into thinking that we should.

Reformation, Reclamation, and Restoration

We sit at the intersection of multiple related crises. Climate chaos, environmental degradation, economic instability, social disintegration, political corruption, public protests, declining health and lifespan and more. Can we find opportunity in the midst of this changing landscape? Is it darkest before the dawn or is it the middle of a long night? Perhaps this chaos does provide an opportunity to reform, reclaim, and restore our natural and social systems. People seem ready for something to change, but the oligarchs are playing every trick in the book to maintain the status quo. These questions came to me after I listened to Jimmy and Dylan Ratigan ...watch about 8-10 minutes to hear the debate about crisis versus opportunity. For some reason the time code isn't embedding but a click (or copy and paste) should take you to the cued portion at 1 hour 28 min and 40 sec. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=23Dc2ZfpKmo&t=1h28m40s