extraordinary machine

Monday night. Book club. I usually shun these girly get-togethers, especially with middle-aged women that have toddlers. Inevitably, the conversation will always turn on you if you're not careful, towards potty-training, funny things kids do, and reading Harry Potter.



I arrive at Nichole's little blue-green rambler in West Seattle as the sun is just beginning to make it's way west. Her house is cute, what I'd expect from a cute indie environmental scientist who married an aeronautical engineer--organized.



The other ladies arrive, one-by-one, we gather snacks, wine, books, and head out to the back patio. Her house smells like candles. The good candles from Bed Bath and Beyond. Not cheap candles. And with those great iron candle holders. Not a small plate or mason jar lid, like I use because I'm too cheap to buy candle holders. We begin by sipping on some red wine, casually eating crunchy snap peas and peppers from her garden, dipped in fresh hummus, and she presents us with a red pepper soup that she's created, also with the offerings from her garden.



We talk about Three Cups of Tea. I actually had the pleasure of attending a reading in Milwaukee, whereupon Greg Mortensen presented his passion, his stories, his pictures, his extraordinary life...although he would never deem his life extraordinary. People would comment that he wasn't the man they thought such an entrepreneur would be. But he is exactly like what I thought he would be.



At that point, I hadn't read the book. After I did, confirming my suspicions that he was exactly like what entrepreneurs should be. Not a shirt and tie MBA, but a disheveled passionate spirit, a faithful man. There was a question, towards the end of the discussion, about extraordinary people. Did we know any or did we know anyone who had changed lives in this way, did we ever do anything to change lives in this way.



Off the top of my head, I could think of at least 30 people or experiences I'd had. I kind of think everyone, with the exception of a few, have done amazing things in the lives of others, or in their own lives. I kept looking around, expecting the others to chime in.

They all shook their heads in dismay, thinking "no, we don't know anyone who has changed lives. We haven't done any volunteer work."

"You've not ever done any volunteer work?"

"We didn't have to."

"Have to? Since when is public service a 'have to'?"

"Well, we had children."

"So that's your service to the community?"

At any rate, what have i done for you, lately, community?



Sitting here in my cubicle, my "opening" faces our IT guy, who consequently just promoted himself to some higher position in the world of Internet security, but who had no idea, while using the reference "Big Brother," where it actually came from.

I know because I gave an Orwellian response and he didn't get it.

I think you should always be conscious of where your references come from.

"I don't really read novels, just geeky stuff."

"You never read 1984?"

"I don't remember. I don't like those futuristic, apocalyptic stories."

"So then you don't actually realize that it's all happening?"

"I don't want to realize that it's happening. What can we do if we realize it's happening anyway?"

Be conscious of it, i guess. Our lives have changed drastically in the past hundred years. We're small-community people, tribal people.

We aren't able to handle the connectedness that consumes us and isolates us. We have to find ways to cope with the fact that everything we do now affects someone on the other side of the planet. Subconsciously, I think this weighs heavily on us, consumeristically-speaking. We're torn between needing our Venti latte every morning and our ever expanding waistlines (corpulence = greed = wealth) and not really wanting the latte at all, because it's a waste...a 30 minute jolt of energy and warm, sugary, milky goodness draining into your body, which turns it into fat because we just sit in our cubicles all day anyway, and draining our resources, filling landfills with the remnants of that foamy goodness, left to sit...sit and rot...just like it does in your body.



We're all guilty.



I live in a city where a "gay man and a lesbian were attacked by eco-terrorists."

Once again, people, leave the anarchist kids alone. They haven't realized that they need to move to places that aren't a city. Cities have to be governed. People have to be productive. But could they handle the isolation? The type of isolation that actually comes with not getting your fair-trade, vegan snacks and having to DIY everything? Not being able to look for trouble?



"The social anarchist, according to Murray Bookchin, is committed to four basic tenets:

1. Creating confederations of decentralized municipalities

2. Unwavering opposition to statism

3. Belief in direct democracy

4. Fostering libertarian communism "



I don't think these tenets say "go out and fuck with other people who don't subscribe to your dogma."

It's all still dogma. That's the problem. Some of the anarchist kids in our city are a bit confused, maybe, and get a little caught up in the catchiness of the movement rather than being a part of the movement. Again, dogma. Movements always catch people in vulnerable situations, connect with their dissatisfaction, and draw them in. So how do you know if you're a real part of the movement, or not? How do you know if you're a pawn? Or if you're just dressing the part, and not really living the part?

Maybe it's best not to be too concerned with any of it, drown it out with fluorescent, buzzing lights and lattes, breed and build new houses out of the forest that you cut down to make your house, drown it out, throw it in the river.
Wash your hands.
All clean.