It Is Hard For Some To Know
The world is a living being
Boozhoo! Aaniin! Welcome to another midweek(ish) version of An Irritable Métis. In this case, the END of midweek version. This is where things are usually a little more random, a little less … irritable. Usually. If you forgot what all this is even about, you may remind yourself here. If you want to help keep a writer out of hard labor, well….
Happy Earth Day. I guess. I don’t know. It’s hard to be excited about it, isn’t it, given how we’ve done so little to take care of this world that has given us so much? What started out as a good idea – Earth Day, I mean – has been hijacked and commercialized essentially to the point of irrelevance, hasn’t it? Or am I missing something? I don’t have as dim a view of it as, say, Columbus Day – re-branded or not – but it’s in the same zip code. I’d say this particular day of recognition is more afflicted than almost any other by hypocrites1 bent on spinning its vibe into profits for themselves. Kind of like how big companies spin PRIDE, for example.
To be honest I’d forgotten Earth Day was looming on the horizon. Then I was reminded via the daily CJR newsletter thing I subscribe to; Mark Hertsgaard and Kyle Pope wrote a piece called “Earth Day, and the media’s point of view” and had this, among other things, to say:
By all scientific accounts, the environmental crisis that activists highlighted more than half a century ago is much more dire today, and the need for far-reaching action more urgent. And yet those network news anchors from 1970, dismissed as anachronisms in our digital era, were in many ways ahead of where journalists are now. Just imagine each of America’s big three networks leading their broadcasts with the recent UN climate report, packaged under headlines like “A Question of Survival,” and then spending the entire program explaining the problem and exploring solutions.
It’s sobering to think of how far we’ve gone in the wrong direction when it comes to addressing pollution, climate change, etc. It’s easy to point fingers but it remains one of those issues we are all responsible for, because none of us are particularly willing to change our lifestyles, civic engagement, etc. in a way that will be a catalyst for meaningful change. Meanwhile those entities2 that make it harder to change our lifestyles and engage civically just keep cranking the screws tighter and tighter. It’s also hard to think about giving up more when so much that is meaningful and essential is being taken away by these same entities3. So the idea of a celebration just feels a little … off. What are we really celebrating? It’s like when an abuser showers the abused with affection for a brief moment before vigorously resuming the abuse.
It’s good to refocus now and then though, right? To reflect and be grateful and all that? Maybe that’s how we should approach it: as a chance to remind ourselves of this magnificent world we all share and how we need to get our act together. Maybe that is how most people are approaching it and I’m just a big ‘ole sourpuss.
Can we at least promise each other we won’t forget about the gift, and the responsibility to give back, by the time Saturday rolls around?
Transcendence
Transcendence is a beautiful word. It just sounds like something one would want to experience. That roiling jumble of awe, wonder, and epiphany that just … takes over. Races the heart. Tears-up the eyes. Prickles the skin. I have been fortunate to experience it on many occasions. Sometimes when playing music, or being in the presence of a transcendent performance by someone else that I can catch a wave on. Art, any kind really, can do it. Just not all that often.
Out in the wild world though, that’s something different. I experience transcendence to varying degrees almost every day. Today it was in watching the mists that were clinging to the mountains outside my window, and the dark storm clouds engulfing the northern range on my evening drive home. The loud, hollow chuckling sound made by sandhill cranes; the other day, one flew over and made so much ruckus he sounded like he flew end-to-end through my house! I could sit here all night and make note of experience after experience that have moved me in the natural world. Not all of them even pleasant, but all transcendent.
I can speak to the devastating transcendence of heartbreak. It too is part of the magnificent risk of just being alive.
I wonder, as always, what will be lost in a data-filled and digitized future. What nuances and subtleties. Will our identities become hardened and firmed, even less capable of shifting than they are now? Will we forget the self-ordering complexity of the living planet and what it expects of us denizens? – Antonia Malchik, On the Commons
“The self-ordering complexity of the living planet and what it expects of us denizens.” What a line, and what an important point. We have a reciprocal relationship with the entire world and everything on it, the same way we do with each other. Think of how if you play the “I forgot my wallet!” trick with your friends after a meal out or something. Don’t you feel an obligation to pick up the check next time? Being done for without doing back creates a negative space that must be filled. We all feel it even if we can’t name it.
I’m reminded of this beautiful quote from Métis writer and scholar Chantal Fiola, who said, in speaking of learning from our elders: “You have a responsibility to act on these teachings that are shared. You can’t just get a teaching and do nothing with it. When you receive a teaching it then becomes your lifelong responsibility to develop a lifelong relationship with it and ensure its existence and share it.”
When the world provides these transcendent experiences, it is a teaching. You can’t just take it, revel in it while it’s happening and for maybe a day or two later, and then go back to swiping right and left and sharing memes on your stupid phone. The world needs those of us who love it so deeply to stand up for it, and to give back. Give back. We have everything to lose!
Oof, man.
The Transcendence of Rivers
There aren’t many places I like to be better than on, or beside, or in, a “big, beautiful river.” And lucky for me I get to do another summer workshop with my beloved Freeflow family on the magical Big Blackfoot! This one will be about place. You may register HERE. This is the lowdown:
Many of us feel defined by place. Places important to our lives or our livelihoods. Places we have come to love through our travels, whether in the real world or through the stories we love. What is North America without the story of how many Indigenous cultures came to call it Turtle Island? Who cares about the One Ring if not for the landscapes of Middle Earth? Would we know Ellen Meloy’s name without the deserts and rivers that sustained her? What about Ed Abbey, or Amy Irvine, or Terry Tempest Williams, or Craig Childs? What about Tommy Orange’s Oakland? What about James Welch’s Hi-Line? What about Louise Erdrich’s Turtle Mountains? And what about your place? Are you a freelancer trying to get people to care about climate change? Are you a novelist building your own world? Or maybe you are a poet exploring land and rivers and want to make your images glow.
This workshop will be a study of place. Places important to you, places of cultural significance, the history of your place, even your imagined places. What what makes them special? What makes them worth fighting for? What makes you love them? What are the details that can make a place a character in the story? There are many ways to get to know a place; through story, through science, through history. We will discuss them. In the end, we will all be better writers when it comes to exploring these wonderful places.
These are always invigorating for me; days on a river always are. Hopefully they are for the folks who come out for them as well.
And there are only a couple more weeks to register!
AND DON’T FORGET ABOUT THE SCHOLARSHIP!
And Finally….
This beautiful poem by Linda Hogan….
Enjoy the world, friends. She enjoys you back.
“Forget not that the earth delights to feel your bare feet, and the winds long to play with your hair.” — Khalil Gibran
Assholes, actually
Again, assholes
Yeah, you guessed it: assholes
The sandhill cranes are chuckling with abandon here, too. Which always makes me think of dinosaurs, not that anyone knows what ancient winged dinos sounded like...but I like to imagine they sounded like the cranes. Also, the place workshop sounds wonderful!
When regarding the way we are destroying the planet, I live by one word... velocity. None of this damage has to occur at the rate it is occurring. Everything can be slowed down. At 75, I have the luxury of being able to slow down all mechanized movement and daily consumption. During the two years of Covid, I drove less than 500 miles total. I ate only two meals per day and often fasted, once for five days... water, juice, bananas. I'm not trying to be holier-than-thou. I am only pointing out that the velocity of human endeavor, at it's current rate, is unnecessarily maddening and destructive.