Last weekend, we participated in a neighborhood meet-and-greet. Here we are on the local community blog, the Uptown Update, posing with a couple of our neighbors.
After the long winter, it is nice to get out and explore our ‘hood and get to meet a few folks on a lovely Spring day, even if it was in response to some hard stuff happening around us. We love our new home, and it was good to meet some other folks who are working towards positive change here.
Every day should be Earth Day. Gillian and I are trying to live more mindfully each day, making changes that seem little, are relatively painless, but if more and more people practiced probably would make a difference. Here are a list of things that we do (or don’t do) to live in a more earth-friendly manner:
We’re also going to start composting and gardening this summer. When we shop, we try to be mindful about it, thinking about the object’s usefulness and life time, and think about what’s going to happen to the object after it’s no longer useful.
I was also gratified today to see all of the environmental links that my contacts were saving on Ma.gnolia. Actually, for the past few days.
So what if Bush won’t get serious about green house gas emissions? If he won’t create the policy to get our emissions lower, We The People can still make the life style changes to do so. If I model the behavior, perhaps my friends, family, and colleagues will be inspired to do the same. I know that I learn from the people around me, and have adopted more sustainable living practices.
So happy Earth Day everyone! Do something, however small, good for the Earth today and every day.
It was an eerily familiar feeling this morning, being gently woken up, as if someone was standing by my bed rocking it ever so slightly.
We live in a solid building, so I knew it wasn’t the wind shaking us. I had to think for a second, wake up a little and think about where I was.
No, I really do live in Chicago, not Oakland any more, but I wasn’t so sure at 4:35 this morning.
That was definitely an earthquake.
I thought we had moved away from that stress! I guess you can’t even count on the earth beneath your feet.
Occasionally, Gillian wonders out loud about my time spend online. Am I an Internet addict? I described myself as an information addict in my online profile in a couple of places, quite facetiously, before I learned that there was a movement to include “Internet addiction disorder” in the next edition of Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders.
I do wonder. As with all things, I strive for balance, and this obsessive-compulsive world of ours, it is hard to strike balance with anything.
I am online for a living. Every day I am at my computer, sometimes all day. I may be using applications that are not connected to Internet activity, but in the background I am listening to Pandora and have my instant mail program going in case anyone needs to reach me. I usually log into Facebook because inevitably I will run across and article or web page that I want to share with my friends. I’m always logged into Ma.gnolia because I discover new sites that I want to save and share every day.
The computer has become an indispensable and incredibly useful tool. I couldn’t do my work without it. Like the telephone, it is just another utility that we all use everyday to help us communicate. But there are other useful applications for personal organization, which becomes more important the more information is thrown at us. Frankly, we need these tools so that we can sort through everything to find the really important stuff that is going the help us.
I admit to having days where I get sucked into the vortex of research, finding one site that leads me to many others. Down the rabbit hole I go. It is perhaps not the most efficient use of my time, and there has been more than one occasion where I really didn’t know when to stop. I convince myself that if I just keep on trying, if I am persistent enough I will find the piece of information I am looking for, even if I get distracted by shiny objects along the way.
Yes, I do want to find a more healthy balance for virtual life and real life activity. But I have been saying for years that I strive to find balance, between the professional and the personal, spiritual and civic, and it’s all connected. The Internet has facilitated staying in touch and getting in touch with old friends in a way that never would have happened without it. For me there is no separation. Virtual life is real life.
I’m sure there are people out there who really do need help balancing their life between time spent online and managing important issues in their life. I feel for folks who are neglecting paying their bills or doing their laundry or taking out the trash or spending time with their spouse and kids because the just can’t get off line.
However, I can’t help but wonder about the trend in our culture to diagnose every dysfunctional behavior. Does everything have to be an illness? Can’t we just take responsibility to change our own behavior? I think it’s pretty funny, perhaps paradoxical, that there is an Internet site and online community for Internet addiction. I scored 13 on the test, so I think I’m in good shape…but did I answer truthfully? I could be in denial. Honestly, I don’t worry about it, and I do feel that the Internet is something that impacts the quality of my life in a positive way.
Today is my mom’s birthday.
She hasn’t been with us since January 10, 2001, but everyone in my family finds a way to celebrate her life each year on her birthday.
On the anniversary of her death this year, my family had a very sweet email exchange about how we were all recognizing the anniversary of her passing. Our mother loved food, and it turned out that each of us was preparing a special menu in her honor and raising a glass to her.
My mother struggled with it the way that so many women do in this culture. I used to blame my mother for my my own formerly unhealthy relationship with food. I have struggled with food in my own way, and I have happily ended up with in a healthy place of loving delicious cuisine. Now I credit my mother with my very healthy appreciation of fine dining. I thank her for my educated palate.
My beloved is an artist in the kitchen, and each year on the anniversary of her death and on her birthday, we have a special meal that we know she would love. In January we had steak and Ceasar salad with a lovely Cabernet. My sister and her husband also made steak. My brother had artichokes with hollandaise (which we would have had but the artichokes here in Chicago just weren’t up to snuff).
So this weekend, Gillian has prepared a special menu yet again. We’re having shrimp scampi tonight, and tomorrow, shrimp cocktail with potatoes gratin and a lovely steak. I wish she were here, and I’m sure in her way she is.
Gillian and Mom got to meet before Mom died, but Gillian never got to cook for her. I’m sure she’s enjoying the ever meal that we prepare in her honor.
Paradoxologies 