another couple days

Friday. Got home late, again, decided I was too exhausted to drive up North. Too tired to think of anything else to do, I laid down on the couch in a state of blankness. Too wired to rest, I popped up and started cleaning things up a bit. Mom called to see what our plans were and we talked for a while about the state of the gardens and other things, an unexpected and pleasant conversation which changed my mind considerably. Instead of looking for reasons to stay here this weekend I began looking forward to leaving in the morning. Stayed up late, drunkenly sent an old friend a message on Facebook (and let me just say here, that I find FB unnerving, repulsing and strangely hostile to life. Upon my first descent into that madness I realized that I was entering a sort of graveyard, a kind of hell populated by the constant clicking of keyboards and millions upon millions of constructed personas, carefully or stupidly crafted out of painfully revealing snapshots and insignificant thoughts expressed in unconsidered words. Much like the rest of the world, I suppose, except that here no one hugs each other, or smells each other, or looks each other in the eye. Instead we silently become friends, and watch each other's motions (or not) through a magnificently devised and aptly named Screen, never hearing each other's voices or seeing each other's hands. It's fine enough for idle chatter and connecting with pals, if you're into that sort of thing--and I'll admit there were a couple faces I was happy to see, if only for the moment that I remembered being in their presence--but it leaves, well, everything to be desired, in my opinion. Why don't we all just barf on ourselves? The best minds of our generation...are not spewing tripe on Facebook. Sorry, friends. Okay...maybe I'm just jealous, really, that I can't have fun at your big fat party. But it's not because I wasn't invited.) It was a stupid note, of course. To bed, late.

Saturday. Up early. Could have sworn it rained and thundered in the morning but I guess that was a different day. Nice hearty breakfast and yerba mate for the road. Arrived around noon, to a sky still cloaked in clouds after an overnight rain. Mom and Dad showed us the new compost pile they'd mixed up with the chicken shit they'd gotten from a friend down the road, and another pile of composted shit in the pole barn which they'd picked up from a family acquaintance further north, for the meager price of $20 a pickup load (Dad gave them $30). A few sprinkles as we set to work weeding all the beds with stirrup hoe, scritcher, claw, by hand. The sun burned holes in moving clouds. Toward the end of the afternoon Cosmic M, Mom and I wandered out into the fields and woods, through daisies thick as thieves (and their artless accomplices), toward that patch of Werewolf Root near the oak on the south fence. It was lovely as ever, that place, and still after my heart, but I was not open to it or the frolicking Monarchs or much else, so after wading in and superficially admiring the neighboring thistles and ferns, we pressed on through the low spot where I met my first agrimony last summer, out into a sunny field full of mullein, on through milkweed and raspberries to the gravel pit, under black spruce and maples to the Big Hill, and back again through fields gleaming with daisies and yarrow, fleabane, sprinkled with bedstraw; glowing with cinquefoil, buttercups, goatsbeard; on fire with hawkweed and sorrel; blushed with sweet red clover; quieted by one purple in hue, which we could not name; swimming in waves of green, all. Spent the evening on more weeding and sharing a quiet and tasty dinner prepared by Mom while Dad was away for hours, playing the role of esteemed public official and only male representative on panel of judges for the "Little Miss" pageant of a town up the road. Managed to drag my weary old ass outside for the stars and fireflies, who had in one week gone from magical to desperate, in the cold Summer wind. Quite worth the trouble.

Mmmm, eggie weggies...

Sunday. Up early. C Monkey finished up the cinnamon rolls he'd started the night before and the two of us got to work in the cool of the morning. The birdsongs were exceptional. Among the singers, seen, were a pair of brown thrashers, orioles, goldfinches, rose-breasted grosbeaks, bluebirds, red-winged blackbirds, woodpeckers various sorts, pigeons, doves, robins, hummingbirds, swallows, bluejays, at least. It was a windy morning and it stayed that way, blowing all day without a moment's rest, pushing over corn and sunflowers and anything else big enough to stand in its way. In response to Mom's suggestion (which I'd previously poo-poohed, thinking it too impractical or just un-doable), I decided to pull the pile of tangled grape vines out of the old chicken-coop foundation and wind them around the arbor, to create a way up for the honesuckle, clematis, firecracker vine and morning glories in need of a lift. Turned out quite nice and just right, a good morning meditation. After a late breakfast we spent the rest of the day winding, weeding, spreading compost, seeding cover crops, undersowing, chipping, mulching, watering. Can't speak for the others but I put in a good eight hours and was glad for it, if a bit tired. Home by just after dark.

For a weekend which I had thought might be better spent here at home or in a canoe, we really got a lot done, and things are in good shape because of it. Hopefully next weekend we'll be able to swim, play bocce ball, shoot pool, kick back, lie down...

Couple of pagans, gardening and drinking beer.

plant dream / dream medicine

I dream of plants, often.

Earlier this year, a colleague brought to my attention a rather interesting piece of writing by Michael Pollan which got me musing about poppies and the history of their use as food and medicine, and how they, like so many valuble edible and medicinal plants, have been forgotten, eschewed, disregarded or demonized by the culture at large. What a loss. During this time, which was still a few weeks before the first Spring Ephemerals emerged, I dreamed of the soft new green of May and saw a plant with distinctive lobed leaves which I believed to be Bloodroot. It was not familiar enough to me to be sure, so on waking I looked it up and found that was indeed Bloodroot, which happens to be a member of the Papaveraceae (poppy) family. And, as it happens, I encountered quite a lot of Bloodroot in my ramblings this Spring.

I mention this because I dreamt last night of Spreading Dogbane, a dream which I might not have remembered had I not found myself aimlessly flipping through a field guide over breakfast, presumably looking for the name of a flower I recently introduced to the garden. In this dream a man was explaining to me how he used Spreading Dogbane as a medicine, in minute amounts, over an extended period of time... I was a little surprised to hear this, because this is not a plant to be taken lightly. As I recall it, Matthew Wood's description included the words "you will never be the same again". It is potentially highly poisonous, to be used only in situations which call for powerful transformation, by persons with years and years of accumulated knowledge and wisdom.

So I have to wonder what this plant is doing, showing up in my dreams?

There are couple patches of Spreading Dogbane that I know. One on the river, in a place among those I love best in all the world. Another at the homestead, on a slope near a giant oak tree. Might have to wander out that way today, and see what I find. Or what finds me...

Passage of Many Moons

I think it's fair to say that most Americans are more familiar with the concept of dog years than the reality of lunar cycles. I'd wager, also, that a majority of women are unaware of the relationship between moon and menses ("what men sees?").

Another moon circles round and becomes crescent, rises to fullness and wanes into darkness. Do you experience this, also? Or perhaps the better question is, are you aware of this also? It pulls at your blood as it does as mine, whether you know it or not.

And so here I am, at the ripe old age of thirty-five, living for many months now in the clutches of a good old-fashioned mid-life crisis, looking back on not five or ten years but many more than one hundred months, all these circlings of our moon... not a cycle of death and rebirth but one of living and dying. Period.

This is what women know: no one is born again. We are not saved. We enter this world once, we live once, we die once, each of us. Unlike many, I've never feared death, but I have been foolish enough to think I might out-run life... I've literally attempted to run away from my own life force, the blood in my veins, the beating of my own heart... You might imagine how I've fared.

Am I getting too personal, here? I realize that my audience--all three or four of you--is mostly male. I'm sure my meaning is not lost on any of you, but I suspect you cannot fully appreciate what it's like to hear your younger sister tell you, in her almond contralto, that she's only twenty-six, she still has time--that same refrain you sang for years, in a hushed voice: time to go back to school, buy a house, find work she loves, have children, build a life, time to change... so much time...

My mother tells me things, now, about the life she's lived. Things I won't share here, far too much to reveal, and other things: the roots have quadrupled in size in one week; flowers have gone to seed; remember where we were at this time last year... I do remember. But this year, where we are now, is not where we will be or where we strive to be. She turns my attention toward what has grown and changed, to revolving skies full of clouds and constellations. She tells me how she had hoped to bequeath to me, and to her daughters, the kind of love that would let us feel as though we could bring another life into this world. These are different times, now, than when we were welcomed into the world. And we both know that, and we grieve for it.

This sadness that takes us--Robert Bly, what was it that you said about grieving for a hundred years, and about it being right and beautiful?--it comes, to some us, with the passing of every moon. Each and every moon. Each and every life, taken by war, lost in blood. Every idea unmanifested, every color unpainted, each song unsung, every call unanswered, each bite untasted, each caress not felt, each sunrise not seen... it goes on... And so we go on. Persistence, maybe. Perseverance, perhaps. Lunacy, more likely. It pulls out us out to sea, and back to shore again. And again, and again, and again... Amen.

to remember

fireflies, frogsong, daisies bending in starlight

I forgot...

to list all the other stuff that was planted last weekend: sunflowers, bachelor's buttons, zinnias of many colors, california poppies, cosmos, nasturtiums, marigolds, radishes, turnips, parsley root, various beans, nigella, caraway, chervil, sylvetta arugula, sorrel, marshmallow, milk thistle, dill... plus all the natives: coneflowers, butterfly weed, fireweed, spiderwort, black-eyed susans, prairie smoke, pasque flower, more...and others: sedums, celosia, sunflax, fuzzy things...can't remember it all... I'll add to the list I started below, when I have time...

(i'm just so) full of it

Look, don't wonder what that's supposed to mean. If you don't know then you should probably just stop reading right now.

(Don't worry, this isn't another one of those f the world and love everything posts...or vice versa...)

I'm pretty tired today. An average of five hours of sleep for the last three days has been both fantastic and exhausting. Friday I was up way too early. Saturday I was up way too late. Sunday I think was yesterday.

On Saturday, after a late brunch (yes, even) and a few little chores, I headed off on my own in a northerly direction. As I drew close to my destination, I saw deep blue stormclouds ahead, electricity plunging toward the ground... The color alone was exciting, much less the possibility of a storm, but it seemed so distant... I headed down the last few miles of road, driving under the white line that separated blue skies in the south from purple in the north. No rain for us today, I thought.

I arrived at the homestead around three o'clock, with just enough time to walk around and see how many seeds had not sprouted, how many plants were not growing, how my beautiful little melons had wilted--I was rather dismayed at the condition of things, not remembering perhaps that growth happens in its own time, that there is waiting, that there are setbacks but also transformations. I saw, only, failure and negligence, drought.

And then it started to rain.

It kept coming down for a few hours, not steadily or heavily but reliably, anchored by a stretch of lightning and the pull of thunder. No dark skies, just a gentle grey... I played piano and cut rhubarb in the rain, for the (absolutely delicious) torte mom was putting together. Just before sunset, the clouds thinned and the sun broke through, as it will so often do... Birds took to the sky again and I waded through the field, wet to the knees, while infinite numbers of daisies whispered to me the lyrics of a long-forgotten song... Light-filled drops of rain clung to blades of grass like so many tears, waiting to be blown away by the night wind. A sweet evening.

After wandering around for a while attempting to capture some small remembrance of this beauty with my total-piece-o-shite camera, I hopped in my little red wagon and took off for my sister's place, further north. We went into town for a beer at the Muny, and after hours of talking and some pretty decent jukebox tunes (seriously, folks, A Little Less Conversation!) we closed the place down, and then closed the night down... Guess we haven't seen enough of each other lately. Lonely factor's getting pretty high for some of us out here.

So, after we'd voiced and vented and sometime just before sunrise I took my last sip of wine and crawled into bed. Woke to the sound of the f-ing cat doing her I'm-so-horny-I-need-to-get-out-the-house-now or maybe just I-want-the-F-out routine, but whichever it was it was enough to make an extremely tired person feel like the world was coming to an end. Managed to squeeze in a little more but holy crap, was I beat when I got back to mom and dad's...I took one look at the garden and practically had a nervous breakdown. For a moment it just seemed like the whole thing was coming apart... but, you know, as usual, there's nothing for it but to go, so I downed a cheese sandwich, put on my grandma's red straw hat and stepped out into it.

Quite suddenly, I had a change of heart.

Things are different than they were, and that's just how it's going to be. That unexpected beauty we experienced last summer may not come again, but something else will, and we'll learn from it, live with it. Until yesterday I hadn't been able to see anything coming together this year, in this garden, but somehow putting all those seeds in the ground made me feel, once again, that sense of possibility, of color and texture and scent and flavor, of something not yet seen...of the unknown. That wicked hummingbird moth in the chives, a bumblebee at my knee, corn that emerged overnight... So much had changed in just a few hours, with a bit of rain and warmth. After that, I worked all day in love instead of madness, in peace instead of fear. And so we must continue, as gracefully as we can.

I had a beautiful weekend.

details tomorrow... for tonight:

String Theory

It's not an original title, any more than it's an original idea, but it's something I feel compelled to address in this space because it has a lot to do with everything else here...

Yesterday I was mousing around in some old writings and was a little surprised by how many words I found having to do with cloth or fabric, in one sense or another. Although I have some skill with knots and strings, and I've dabbled with them for many years--in the forms of macrame, crochet, knitting, sewing, weaving by loom and by hand (on and off-grid) and others--I hardly regard myself as a craftsperson, so it was somewhat illuminating to see that particular thread running through my thoughts... of knots and loops, looming questions, lives and thoughts woven, raveling, tapestries and dropped stitches...Once you come to know these words through your hands, they take on a different meaning. Felt is not just an emotion or a sensation, it's an act of transformation.

Years ago I read what I thought at the time and still believe to be an important work by a woman named Mary Daly, titled Gyn/Ecology. It's a book that many people might find intolerable, not merely because of its lesbian-feminist slant but because the language she uses is almost confrontational, spinning words in a way we're not used to, suggesting (for example, one I can remember) that the use of the term 'coupling' to describe activity between the Space Shuttle and the Space Station might be understood as a sort of way of fucking (in) outer space. Some people get off on that idea; others would prefer to know the Moon from Earth, and don't have to go stick something in it just to prove it's better than cheese. But I digress... The point here is that this book (which, incidentally, I loaned to a good friend of mine who never returned it and is now dead, so I may never see it again) really changed the way I thought about language, made me think a little harder and more deeply about all these words and how they're used, how they come into the lexicon and penetrate our minds, whether we like it or not (btw, David Foster Wallace wrote a great piece called Tense Present having to do with lexicons) and maybe it wasn't actually even her book that got me thinking about spinning, so much as few others (Starhawk, maybe, or Women Who Run With the Wolves) but whoever it was made an impact. The whole Universe spins: threads, yarns, records...and from these, it warps, wefts and weaves the Fabric of the Cosmos, man...

But what was the point of all this? Oh, yeah, I was out on the World Wide Web tonight and happened across this TED talk having to do with coral reefs, crochet and mathematics, and the difference between an idea and its manifestation...




There are long and twisted threads which form the ties that bind my grandmother's tablecloths to strands of DNA. You don't have to understand any of that to be able to knit a really cool sweater but you do have to know the pattern... and considering that a serious number of people don't know how to sew a button on their own pants, I think we should all give the knitters, knotters, spinners and weavers some appreciation for the patterns they've seen, and made real.

Water, people. Water.

Just heard a lone rumble of thunder here, and then it poured for a few minutes. Dry as wind, it's been lately, but so sweet the rain, the sweetest...

More on water, to come.

Please remember to pray for rain, if you are of the kind who do. We need it.

Inventory

I'm at home this weekend and happy to be indoors, for a change, due to cool wet weather. It rained all day yesterday, putting bit of a damper on river plans for the family gathering over on the St. Croix, but we spent a reasonably pleasant day together inside, sitting around, doing a bitchin crossword puzzle and getting schooled by my four year-old neice at Wii bowling. No rain today, but it's nice and grey, and since my hands are free I figure I should make a few notes on the garden.

All vegetables and herbs have now been planted, pretty much. Mom and dad finished up seeding over the past week and put the last plants in the ground on Friday. (Only hours later, of course, they had to haul out the giant rolls of plastic to protect everything from frost...Never fails.) So, now seems like a good time to take stock of what we've got growing this year. I've been trying to (re)acquaint myself with plants by learning their scientific names, that I might better understand their relationships to one another and to us, so I'll list them by family:

Alliaceae:
Chive - garden, garlic
Onion - yellow, white

Apiaceae:
Dill, Bouquet
Chervil (Greek nobles referred to it as khairephyllon, or “leaf of joy”...I concur)
Cilantro, Slow Bolt
Fennel, Perfection
Parsley, Italian flat-leaf
Parsley root, Hamburg
Parsnip, Harris Model

Asteraceae:
Endive,Tres Fine Maraichere Olesh
Jerusalem Artichoke
Lettuce - Antares, Anuenue, Blushed Butter Oaks, De Morges Braun, Forellenschluss, Italienischer, Jericho, Lollo di Vino, Pirat, Tango, Sweet Valentine
Radicchio, Indigo
Sunflower - Tarahumara, Velvet Queen, various

Brassicaceae:
Arugula - Roquette Salad, Sylvetta
Broccoli - Nutri-Bud, Piricicaba, Romanesco, Thompson
Brussells Sprouts - Long Island Improved, Roodnerf
Cabbage - Copenhagen Market, Danish Ballhead, Mammoth Red Rock , Ruby Perfection
Cauliflower - Cassius, Early Snowball
Kale - Nero di Tuscana (Dinosaur), Red Russian, True Siberian
Kohlrabi - Early White Vienna, Purple
Mustard - Chinese Thick-Stem
Radish - Cherry Belle, Daikon Miyashige, Misato Rose, Rat-Tailed, Plum Purple
Rutabaga - Joan
Tatsoi - EvenStar Landrace
Turnip - Purple Top White Globe

Chenopodiaceae:
Beet - Chioggia, Detroit Dark Red, Early Wonder, Lutz Salad Leaf, Yellow Intermediate Mangel
Chard - Fordhook Giant, Improved Rainbow Mix, Ruby/Rhubarb Red

Cucurbitaceae:
Cucumber - Armenian, Double Yield, Mexican Sour Gherkin, Mideast Prolific, Parisian Pickling
Melon - Blacktail Mountain watermelon, Charentais canteloupe, Cream of Saskatchewan watermelon, Ha-Ogen, Mystery Indian (from the trash guy), Swan Lake
Squash, summer - Benning's Green Tint patty pan, Cocozelle zucchini, Dark Star zucchini, Dark Green zucchini, Golden zucchini, Sunburst patty pan
Squash, winter - Acorn, Anna Swartz Hubbard, Buttercup, Early Butternut, Eastern European, Lakota

Fabaceae:
Bean - Black Coco, Blue Lake pole, Calypso, Charlevoix Red Kidney, Henderson Bush Lima, Hidatsa Shield Figure, Rattlesnake, Scarlet Emperor, Soybean Iowa 2053, Windsor Fava
Pea - Cascadia snap, Golden Sweet snow, Oregon Giant snow, Sutton's Harbinger shell

Lamiaceae:
Basil - Red Rubin, Siam Queen, Spicy Globe, Sweet
Mint - spearmint, peppermint (variegated)
Sage - common, purple

Malvaceae:
Okra - Cajun Jewel, Red Burgundy

Poaceae:
Corn - Golden Bantam sweet, Hickory King dent, Hopi Blue sweet/flour, Oaxacan Green dent, Smoke Signals pop, Stowell's Evergreen sweet

Polygonaceae:
Sorrell, garden

Ranunculaceae:
Cumin, Black (aka Roman Coriander, Nigella)

Solanaceae:
Eggplant - Classic Black, Japanese Long, Neon, Round Mauve, Swallow
Pepper, hot - Anaheim, Banana, Cayenne, Cherry, Fatali, Jalapeño
Pepper, sweet - Golden Treasure, Lady Bell, Sheepnose Pimento, Takii Ace, Valencia
Potato - purple, red, Russet, Yukon Gold
Tomatillo, Toma Verde
Tomato - Amish Paste, Aunt Ruby's German Green, Beefsteak, Black Krim, Chadwick Cherry, Cosmonaut Volkov, German Pink, Hillbilly Potato Leaf, Hungarian Heart, Italian Heirloom, Moonglow, Peacevine cherry, Pink Brandywine, Yellow Perfection

That's about it right now. Some of the beans aren't in and I have yet to get most of the flowers seeded but hope to take care of them next weekend. I'll keep the list updated as things are added, or die...

Love's Christmas

When I was a very young child, still young enough not to understand that there are certain ways of thinking of things, I lived with my Mom and Dad, my older Brother and my younger Sister, in a beautiful old balloon-frame triplex on a not-so-fancy street in the city which was in those days and is again, now, my home. There were two Russian Olives in the front yard, two Silver Maples in the back and some Lilacs along one side, with a round, tiered rock garden full of Snapdragons and Others on the south, adjacent to the brick-red concrete block wall that was also the back of a convenience store. The back and side yards were protected on the East and West by a wood fence which kept our two-foot soft plastic pool and cat-piss-yellowed igloo out of sight, and separated our small-scale card table events from the stinky alley junkies who from time to time stumbled out of the Red Owl parking lot to relieve themselves on the garage. Inside, we ran on oak floors and squeezed in between fluted pillars, under high plate rails and faded wallpaper; there were doors that swung and doors that hid, windows of glass both beveled and stained, lights that turned on with the pop of a button, radiators resting soundly under pots and plants, a fine old black piano in the foyer, that round mirror, the big metal sculpture we cracked our heads on, many lots of books and a turntable, among other things--clay and costumes and dangerously massive wooden blocks (with killer ramps) and tiny cars and marbles and myriad musical instruments, serious forts and unabashed nakedness--with nearly all the furniture having been built by my father, to hold (it seemed) the many softer things that had come into being through my mother's hands.

In this house, every Christmas Eve, we sat in the round at the dining room table and shared a fine steak dinner on stoneware, after a ritual champagne toast, while listening to Mozart or Claude Bolling or Erik Satie or something of the sort. It was the seventies then but I can tell you now, with a pretty high degree of confidence, that I must have been--if not the happiest--the most self-centered kid in the whole Universe.

And so it came to pass, in this incomparable little world of mine, that we ate steaks, again, one sweet evening in June. In my heart of hearts, there was nothing more I could have felt to say, than what I said (and I might mention here that it was not until only a few years ago that I understood, again and at long last, what I'd meant by it) and that was this: it's like Love's Christmas. And so it was. None of us remembers the date anymore, but we all know the name, so I'm just gonna call it. Let's make it 6/6, and we'll remember it that way, with all our smiling faces in a circle...

Happy Holidays,

patterning piece

I was out this evening, half-walking half-running around and on my way back into the neighborhood when I started questioning why it is that I and we admire these industrial landscapes so much, and it struck me that there's something appealing about the patterns they repeat, such simple ones, so easy to comprehend--lines, squares, grids, boxes--and the structures these patterns create, so defiant of Death (and Life, by turn), impervious to pain, untouched by suffering... Good God y'all, do we Really Live Here? I mean, sure, it might blow your mind to truly examine a pitcher plant, or see a spider, or know what water is, but I mean Jesus Christ People, don't we know the goddamn difference?

Too Close to Home

It can be difficult, working with family dynamics.

The place that we've been working on is owned by my parents, and they live there. We--CM and I--come and go during weekends, throughout the year, and try to help out. We're also trying to envision a future for those 118 acres and those of us who are connected to them, and to bring that vision into focus. This kind of work takes many years, as all important work does. We have been guided in this effort by the principles and concepts of Permaculture, which I might say in really brief terms is a philosophy of wholeness. There are plenty of other places on the web where you can learn about permaculture; this site is where I--and, I hope, a few others--learn about what it means in the context of one particular homestead.

I bring this up because, well, because my little rant yesterday had I think quite a lot to do with the conflict between espousing certain values and actually living them.

I am inseparable, or I should say I am not capable of separating myself, from Everything Else: the intoxicating fragrance of this year's late lilac, the hummingbird hovering an arm's length away, long-awaited rain and the rumble of thunder in the distance... I don't make a distinction between Inside and Outside, in that way. I have a similar trouble separating myself from Other People, such that I often neglect to consider that they may not have a clue what I'm feeling, talking about, etc. (and, in fairness, vice versa).

The first principle of Permaculture is observation, and in mine, the condition of one's home says quite a lot about the condition of one's psyche, which as we all must know, has a relatively significant impact on one's thoughts, moods, spirit and general well-being.

What I'm getting at here is that I fail to understand how we, as a family, can continue to work toward a "sustainable" future together when there's about 10,000 square feet of a lifetime of accumulated shit around the place.

C Monkey raised the question yesterday, and I rudely dismissed it. He suggested that perhaps we all need to ask ourselves why we are doing any of this. I thought at the time that it was a little high-minded, an overly intellectual approach to something that should be bloody obvious. But, you know, he's probably right. The thing is that not everyone thinks that way, or is even capable of thinking that way, which brings me back to Permaculture. Another way of describing it might be as a set of tools for observation of patterns from which we can learn how to model and shape our own habits, in the form of Life. The truth is that not everyone really wants to do anything like this. Some people sort of prefer not to consider a whole lot.

Trouble is, when our lives are all tied up together, then it's not really just your thing anymore...your decision to let it go to hell, whatever It is. Russell Means has shared with us this profound idea, that Being Free is about having the freedom to be Responsible. For ourselves, for each other, for the planet. And coincidentally, in looking for his exact words just now, I found them here, in this post of his, from this very day.

It's difficult, also, to work in a place which is separate from where you live, or to live somewhere that you don't work. It's a challenge to be present in both places, or to feel at home in either one. Yesterday I felt like neither was anywhere near. Today I'm comfortable at home, in my place in the city, but wishing I could just walk outside and spend the afternoon planting seeds in the garden. But I can't be two places at once, just as we can't build a future without a past.

Maybe it's just me, lately, who's not really communicating. I'm working on it, folks, I really am.