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Deep Humble Learning Is What's Required

 I am finally well again, after surviving a three-week virus that had me wondering if I would ever get well. When you're down for that long, hardly remembering what it feels like to be your normal self, it is cause for happy celebration once the virus leaves. And for three days now, I've been well, and I am SO grateful! Now I can begin to catch up with everything that fell by the wayside while I was sick.  Today was a special day, for the monthly meeting of our Earthcare Working Group met here at Prairie Hill. We began our meeting, as usual, going around the circle of all of us, each telling of some inspiring or interesting earthy thing that we experienced during the last month. It is such a positive way to start our time together. And it becomes a bunch of individuals sharing of themselves before doing something together. After our check-in, the program consisted of two parts. First we discussed the book that we've been reading for the past couple months: The Light Eaters:...
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Five Lessons

(I've been sick with a stubborn virus for the last 10 days, and not feeling much like writing anything. But I found this (see below) piece in my file and it seems to give the kind of inspiration I need, and perhaps it will be good for you too.)  “Lessons from Geese” was transcribed from a speech given by Angeles Arrien at the 1991 Organizational Development Network and is based on the work of Milton Olson.  Lessons from Geese Fact 1:  As each goose flaps its wings it creates an "uplift" for the birds that follow. By flying in a "V" formation, the whole flock adds 71% greater flying range than if each bird flew alone.  Lesson 1: People who share a common direction and sense of community can get where they are going quicker and easier because they are traveling on the thrust of one another.  Fact 2: When a goose falls out of formation, it suddenly feels the drag and resistance of flying alone. It quickly moves back into formation to take advantage of the lifting p...
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Life Supporting Life

 As an antidote to the dismaying happenings in our government lately, I've been spending a lot of time out in nature. I go to my garden where I've planted hundreds of seedlings I grew inside. And also to my favorite spot at Kent Park, where you can look out over prairie and sky, birds flying overhead, trees shading the landscape, a wide expanse of the earth with less evidence of human interference. There I can breathe deep, open my mind and heart, and join the other millions of lifeforms in our world. I can remind myself that I'm just another little being, connected to everything. And I can ask for guidance. I love to think about how life sustains itself. All of us beings (plant and animal) grow and thrive for awhile, and then when we're done, our bodies sustain the following generations of life. It's like natural recycling, there from the beginning. Our earth's natural rhythms perfected this process long before we coined the term recycling. As a follow-up to ou...
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Joy, Hope and Awe

 I've been thinking about the theme of this particular blog post for days, but then I doubt that I can do it justice, so I busy myself with something else. Today, though, there's no excuse for putting it off. So I'll just start writing. Probably the same as many of you, it is hard to pay attention to what's happening in the world and still feel positive energy. I get twenty or thirty requests for money from Democratic candidates every day, and I've stopped even opening them. I imagine they are worthy causes, but any extra money I have goes to my family. So I delete and delete, and some days I even delete all the posts about what's happening in the government. Some days I decide I can tolerate reading only one, which is usually Heather Cox Richardson.  And that's just the political stuff. Then there's the planet. It is so easy to lead our human lives, surrounded by things we've created, and forget about what's happening to the environment outside ...
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Earthcare Working Group gathering this coming Saturday

 I know that the majority of you who read this blog are from places pretty far from Iowa City. So you'd not consider driving to our gathering on Saturday afternoon (May 2, 2:00, Prairie Hill Cohousing). But even so, you might be interested in what we're doing and might decide to do something similar in your own area. The film we're seeing is something you could watch at home. Being on microplastics, it is not a cheerful subject, but it will be good to know more about this reality in our world and have some ideas about how to cope with it. The best thing about monthly gatherings like this, focused on caring for the earth, is how good it feels to be among others sharing the same concerns, and also enjoying the sharing of the good earth-related insights and happenings in our lives. Even though we may sometimes be focusing on difficult realities, the regular coming together of neighbors and friends for the common purpose of learning and honoring our Earth is fortifying and upli...
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Earth Day Thoughts

 Spring has brought me a multitude of opportunities to learn more about our Earth in the last several weeks. And on this, Earth Day, it seems appropriate for me to think back on these different experiences and share some of the wisdom. Sometimes I find it depressing when I interact with people who seem to think everything is fine on our planet, that those crazy liberals are just making up this climate change crisis, that populations of animals and plants are not disappearing, that our human ways are perfect and no need to worry, that news reports to the contrary are just lies. I've spent some time trying to figure out why so much of our country's population seems to be blind to the real state of things, our chaotic and corrupt government, our rising temperatures and unpredictable weather, the collapse of some ecosystems. I strive to be compassionate with these individuals, even though I'm really concerned that they are living in an illusion. And when I get back to my own ho...
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At the End of the Path

  At the End of the Path Walking east in the sharp air of fall, tracing the edge of harvested corn, along the smoothed way of tractor tread, a south wind makes the grasses move like waves,  and the distant slope calls to me. Halfway to the field’s end, there to the left, a track branches off and down. It goes straight and purposefully into the low pasture, toward a stand of new saplings along the streambed, red and gold leaves catching the early sun, shimmering, beckoning to me. My feet decide, as I turn to follow the path, imagining deer and perhaps a fawn seeking shelter during the heat of day near the creek banks, under the trees. Or it might be a coyote,  night’s ramble over and heading home. I feel excitement, walking carefully on the path of mysterious others,  heading down through matted grass, wanting to follow, not knowing what I’ll find. Then the path turns suddenly  tacking west toward a rugged oak tree, old, weathered, a few leaves showing signs of l...
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