33 years and counting

It was 33 years ago we moved into our partially finished house.

Today we moved filing cabinets back into the shed we used to sleep in while working on the house.

It  has a new roof and siding, the bear helped (earlier entry). The "writers shed" is a very peaceful place still.

December for me has been for the birds. Through the kindness of a neighbor and the generosity of her brother I have an amazing new lens for my camera.

Here are just a few of the birds photographed with this Nikon lens on my Canon Rebel. I surely do love to mix things up.

Crazy poses.  Any guesses for the kinds of birds?

There's more coming!  January 2 is the Christmas Bird Count.  My team of 7 birders are ready for the day.

November: the Edge of Winter

November is the time to prep for Winter. I have been collecting fallen ash trees for our winter's heat. Because of the ash blight, we have our woodshed full and have burned only pulpy wood so far.
      
We also had a bumper crop of apples. Gretchen put up 21 pints of delicious apple sauce.

We had apples to share. This adolescent Black Bear was with us at least 4 days in November eating drops by the lower garden.  He wasn't bothered by me, much.

He even tried to help in the shed repairs

Here's a great surprise from the garden. Our soil tends to be rich in humus, but yields 'just ok' carrots . This year I added three 5-gallon buckets of sand to one bed.  Guess which carrot came out of the sandy soil!

The results were shocking. All the "sand"carrots were 14" up to 17" with no off shoots. Next year I will be mixing of sand for carrots.

We are approaching a peaceful time of reflection and snuggling-in. I hope to find more time for sharing stories with friends  and focusing my life on the good things we can do to build Sustainability throughout this great planet -- which I'm not sure we humans deserve.

Bioneer's: Connecting for Change New Bedford, MA. A Leading Edge

I just returned from a weekend of inspiring solutions.                                

Music  

Dancing and Drumming

Great Quotes.

Kids

Voices speaking out.

Nikki Henderson: Food Justice and Jobs

The speakers ranged from:

David de Rothschild sailed the Plastiki across the Pacific and used his adventure to explain our misuse of plastic. It never breaks down, it just gets smaller. There are 6 pieces of plastic for every plankton organism.

Riki Ott shared amazing facts about the Exxon Valdez oil spill and the deadly health problems we now face in the Gulf as a result of BP's actions.

She also pointed out the absolute danger and hypocrisy we face with the Supreme Court's decision on Corporations as Citizens.  So, they lend money to polluter-candidates for public office because that is their "right".

But, when they are sued for bribing public officials, grand theft, fomenting unjust wars, murder, torture, fraud, stock swindles (just to name a few well-known crimes), then they are corporations and have special exemptions.

Annie Leonard:   A wonderful speaker explained how we get depressed by having too much STUFF.    She makes such a good point how the advertising media can hook us into believing we need MORE and more and more.

For this, George Beck has incited people to call and harass Annie with death threats. The FBI warned her not to speak in public. Now, that's real Democracy! 

Beck Blabs On.  Click off Fox.  Click on: (http://www.storyofstuff.com/).

Most upsetting fact for me:  One perfectly healthy newborn from middle U.S.A. had 200 toxic chemicals in its umbilical cord.

The overall message of the weekend was Collaboration and Education. 

Greg Mortenson was amazing in his presentation of Three Cups of Tea and Stones into Schools.His ability to empower people to work together is such an inspiration.

He is still trying to get the U.S. to sign the Land Mine Treaty.

Hope and Power

The Ameri-Corps staff were amazing examples of organization and kindness.The mass of young people in attendance gives me hope. They are connecting and mapping out the difficult road to a sustainable future. 

I was empowered by making connections with old friends and new. I was inspired by brilliant college students who work on the geology of rocks on Mars, awesome microbiology research, and robotics to aid humankind. All these examples of people at work reinforced the "Education and Collaboration" focus of the weekend.

Bioneers by the Bay:  Conference on Connecting for Change 

Go and Become Part of the Future

Frosty Edges

Living on a hill is another "edge" in my life.  We frequently miss the first couple of frosts each autumn. This allows us to have a few more salads, and even the pesto can wait until October.
        
         This morning, the last flowers are specially fringed in frost.

The vegetables have a look of elegance.

                           The meadow also had its own beauty.

  The water barrels did not freeze, but they looked Goldsworthy-ish.

10/10/10 Earth Support / Beyond War

Three weeks ago I received a call from an old friend. Marty was asking if I wanted to join in planning an action for 350.org 10/10/10.  When I arrived for the planning session I was surprised to see the group was made up of 10 members of "Beyond War" , a peace action group from the 80's. It was great to see everyone but I was surprised , there were no young people.

We decided to hand out 350 seedlings to help educate about Climate Change.
I dug well over 300 seedlings of white pine, oak, and red maple to combine with Donna's 100 seedlings.


Next some neighbors rode their bikes up to label and load the truck.

They made very short work of it and had fun.

Gret and I drove to Center Sandwich and Mocha Rizing (a great little restaurant and store) to set up....

and bag the trees.

       Ready to go!                             

I handed out my first seedling and it was planted in moments.

                                 

The day was a "10". People were so positive.

At one point I heard someone call: "Is that Barry?"  It turned out to be a friend I had not seen since our last Beyond War meeting over 15 years ago.

With a little help from humanity, perhaps these seedlings will be around for the 150th Sandwich Fair.