• Tag Archives local

  • And Now, Reverse Field and Head Home

    Posted on by Charles Comment

    Spring                                                          Bloodroot Moon

    Everything’s rolled up and in the bag, ready to check out, then board the metro for Reagan International.

    This was a trip where I had to confront some unpleasant truths about traveling.  For me.  My physical stamina, which I rate as pretty good, is still less than it was.  And that matters for my planning.

    Also, not new, but apparent during this trip, too, was the easy slide into OMG, what am I doing?  This is a neurotic pattern that I recognize, having largely learned to slip its bonds, but in a foreign place, separated from my regular routine, wife, friends, dogs it can and does easily return.

    On the up side I have learned that my new interaction with art will include embedding art history within the larger history of ideas, letting these two large disciplines bump into each other, suggest questions and directions for each other.  One place I know these streams will converge is in Reimagining Faith.

    There is, too, a renewed interest in early American history, especially the Revolutionary war period and its immediate aftermath.  Not sure how strong this is, though it did occur to me that it might be a good journey to take with our Western raised grandkids.

    (Hotel fire stairs.  1910 vintage)

    There is, as well, a definite sense of my own regional identity, an Upper Midwesterner, and the way that identity differs from and could inform the culture of national policy.  This is an odd phenomena since I feel very much a man of the North, of the continent more than the country; yet I feel more and more like a citizen of the planet, also more than the country.  Whether this is a personal experience or a more broadly shared one interests me.

    Specifically I wonder if the internet intensifies globalization of perspective while reinforcing local identity.  I wonder if think global, act local and the whole locavore movement might feed this pattern, too, making the local the touchstone not for national identity, but for Terran identity.

     


    📂This entry was posted in Aging Art and Culture Great Work Reimagine. Reconstruct. Reenchant. Third Phase Travel 📎and tagged

  • Working At It

    Posted on by Charles Comment

    Samhain                                                Waning Thanksgiving Moon

    All day today at the Sierra Club finishing up the first round of interviews for the new policy position.  A bit much for me in terms of people interaction, though very interesting in terms of the people I met.

    Afterward, I had to eat dinner in the city because we ended at 4:3o, the gut of rush hour.  I knew I needed a good hour and a half, so I chose the Red Stag, a full sit-down meal with dessert.  The Red Stag serves local beef, lamb, vegetables and I imagine, fish, though I don’t know that for sure.  The food is excellent.  I had the grilled lamb on chopped leeks with carrots and kale.  Following through on my decision to eat more vegetables and fruit, I have also chosen to eat only half of what I would have normally of the entree.  That means I have a small box of lamb and leeks with one whole carrot of the six on the plate in the fridge.

    This time I made it up the driveway with no problem thanks to the quarry derived granite grit I put on the slope yesterday.  The night has turned colder, heading down perhaps below 10 degrees by tonight.  9 degrees Acuweather describes as extreme cold; 4 degrees, predicted for tomorrow night is extremely cold.  These folks are not from here.


    📂This entry was posted in Cooking Great Work Health permaculture Politics Weather +Climate 📎and tagged

  • Being Native To This Place

    Posted on by Charles Comment

    Summer                                Waning Summer Moon

    Weeds.  Weeds, by definition, are a plant out of place.  This is, if you think about it, a curious definition.  Why?  Because the hardiness and persistence of most weeds indicate that it may be everything else in the garden that is out of place.   So, we may have to admit that the true definition is anthropocentric one.   Weeds are plants out of place in the horticultural preserves we call  gardens and landscaping.

    An article in the Scientific American got me thinking about this, as did this mornings work removing quack grass and other hardy locals from the clover in our orchard.  The Scientific American article has the provocative subtitle:  The Real Price of Flowers.  The underlying message is this:  plant what grows where you live.  This means you will have much fewer energy inputs than if you maintain out of zone plants.  Most experienced gardeners know this, though some pride themselves on their ability to grow out of zone plants.  Here the trick is to get them to survive our tough winters.

    The Minnesota Zoo, when it began, had a similar zoological mission:  contain animals that live in the climate of the 45th latitude.  They had (and have) a smaller tropical indoor exhibit that includes Komodo dragons, Gibbons, Tapirs and Toucans, for example, plus a coral reef, but in the main they have native Minnesota animals:  moose, wolves, beavers, wall-eye, muskie, pileated woodpeckers.  There are also many that thrive in our climate:  pumas, wolverines, lynx, otters, fishers, musk ox,  Amur tigers, grizzly bears, snow leopards, sea otters.    I say had because it now has a summer African exhibit and I wish it didn’t because I like the original mission.

    Permaculture attempts to take this general notion and apply it to our horticultural and agricultural practices.  That is, permaculture emphasizes plants that work together, that live in the climate, soil type, eco-system native to the location of the garden or farm.  This allows the least outside inputs like fertilizer, pesticides, even tilling and other mechanical techniques.

    We need to know more about the plants we call weeds.  After all, they live here, too.


    📂This entry was posted in Garden Great Work permaculture 📎and tagged