field notes:

6.12.2003

George Bush as Shadow

Terry Tempest Williams, in an interview in the Eugene Weekly says that we have cannot allow the land and democracy to become separate issues.
These are core issues at the heart of the land. We can't separate them but we have separated them and that's the problem. So when we talk about the Earth, the animals as one consideration – when you talk about issues of water and politics, every being has a right to clean water, we incorporate conversations about democracy.

She calls Bush our shadow, "arrogance, impatience, entitlement, greed capitalism; we are all complicit in that."(sic) She calls upon us all to speak with whatever voice we have. She conducts this call without righteousness and with humility and reminds us to look inside and to listen to other views.
I'm interested in looking at what that shadow means. This is a time of reflection, contemplation, calming down and settling. As a writer, I'm trying to find places that test my own courage and comfort.

We are a nation at war. Can we have the courage to stay in that place of darkness and not be undone by it, not be undone by despair? I have enormous faith in the capacity to transform. This is a powerful time in the evolution of the human psyche – like the Renaissance and the Reformation. Look at the global response of humans to this war. That is powerful. It's never happened before.

In other news, according to the Marin Independent Journal, there have been absolutely no sightings of the black bear since last week. Either he's staying out of sight and has found alternatives to dumpster-diving, or he roamed back up to Sonoma County. I noticed that some thimbleberries are ripe, and there's a type of blackberry that's also ripe--could be he's found a big stash somewhere and he's busy trying to eat enough of those to fill his hunger. I'm keeping my eyes peeled.
posted by Lisa Thompson on 6:56 AM link | comments []

6.11.2003

It's a new day. I've broken through the shell of this cold that's bespelled me for a solid week. Yesterday was the breakthrough. I stayed awake all day. I'm tempted to gloat. I'm tempted to vaccuum the house, go for a long hike, swim, and do all the yardwork. But I'll try to respect the cold. I'll continue to be restful. I won't tempt it's wrath. I've heard the stories. This cold has put several people I know under for a month of 14-hour-per-night-sleeps. It knocked my dad on his keister, took out my neighbor and one of my friends.

Respectfully, then, let's just say I'm feeling a slight rise in energy. My recipe: 4 little yellow pills every 2 hours, Chinese herbs called Ganmaoling tablets, contents unknown but hand-delivered by a trusted friend with assurances that they worked for her, and the caveat that they didn't work for everybody; kuri squash soup; a slight break in the weather yesterday during which I walked meekly under partially, gratefully, blue skies and sat on a grassy rise above the beach and soaked up the blue hues on the bay's surface after a week of grey; and the arrival, after a month in media-mail-never-never-land of my beautiful copy of THE BOOK: 'The Rag and Bone Shop of the Heart' a collection of some of the most relevant poetry one could want. Don't let the subtitle 'Poems for Men' scare you off. It could just as well be titled 'Poems for Humans'. The compilers, Robert Bly, Michael Meade and James Hillman were riding the crest of the 'Men's Movement' when they gathered these poems.

Here then, is one from the first chapter, 'Approach to Wildness':
from
Notebook of a Return
to the Native Land
I would rediscover the secret of great communications and
great combustions. I would say storm. I would say river.
I would say tornado. I would say leaf. I wouls say tree.
I would be drenched by all rains, moistened by all dews.
I would roll like frenetic blood on the slow current of
the eye of words turned into mad horses into fresh children
into clots into vestiges of temples into precious stones
remote enough to discourage miners. Whoever would not
understand me would not understand any better the roaring of a tiger.

Aime Cesaire
translated by Clayton Eshleman and Annette Smith

and the recipe for Kuri Squash Soup, by DeLicia:

Cook some white beans with bay leaves and sage. While they're cooking
cut up a kuri squash into manageable pieces. Saute equal parts celery
and onion, and 1/2 part carrot, and of course some garlic, salt and
pepper. Throw in the squash. After a time, add the bean juice, and a box
of organic vegetable stock (ah, these modern times). Later, add the beans.
Simmer for awhile.

posted by Lisa Thompson on 7:36 AM link | comments []

6.9.2003

I'm wondering about the black bear that came through here recently. Our local paper comes out only every Thursday, and the other bay area papers haven't run stories in the last few days. Where are you, black bear?

A quick search on google news was fun--turns out there other neighborhoods dealing with black bear incursions in Fort Myers, Florida, Middletown, Conneticut, Baxter County, Arkansas, and Louisiana, all within the last week. In the Conneticut story the reporter notes that reported bear sightings in the state averaged 90 between 1996 - 1998, but that last year that number rose to 600.

Have black bears become the new crow? Are they one of the "weed" species that are highly adaptable and will thrive alongside human culture as long as they aren't actively hunted out of existence? Perhaps they could be, if people weren't so
afraid.

One requirement of a species that wants to thrive alongside humans is that it not scare us. Better to be small, like pigeons, or cute and seemingly harmless, like deer or feral cats. Most people love bears, as long as they stay in predictable locations for thrill sightseeing in Yosemite, on nature channels and in storyland. Who doesn't love Yogi Bear, or for that matter, the Three Bears? We even love Poppa Bear, who loses his temper, but only after his home turf is invaded by another species...and we can all relate to that.

posted by Lisa Thompson on 10:09 AM link | comments []