|
| Government | Living in Place | Monkeywrenching | Musings | Reality | War & Peace | Wilderness |
MUSINGS! |
November 22, 2005Consider the FutureThe news, that is, the real news, not the newsertainment on TeeVee, is filled with portents of disaster: global climate change, melting glaciers and permafrost, rising coastlines, agricultural disruption, species extinctions, rampant diseases... all providing the thrill of imminent threats to one's personal safety and equanimity. It is, of course, all true: Peak Oil, climate change and the consequences thereof are very real, evident everywhere around us, coming soon to a bioregion near you, probably faster than anyone fully realizes. And yet, here atop my mountain of years, I'm optimistic about the future, a future I will not see fully realized. Yes, civilization, if such a thing has ever existed, is in deep shit, poised on the brink of decline, if not complete collapse. Peak Oil will result in global economic recession and depression, undermining the very basis for modern society and all its technocratic distractions. This is A Good Thing, in itself, for all life on this planet, even for human life, if one can view the inevitable outcome dispassionately, from the perspective of many years under the belt, some of them hanging over a bit, and far fewer years ahead on the next horizon. Consider the consequences of a continuation of the status quo. The cancerous philosophy of continued, unbridled, economic and cultural growth; increasing imperialism and fascism in national governments; continued oppression within nations to support global hegemony; the failure of democracy in an increasingly militarized and regimented world. Not a pretty picture. Not to fear. Soon enough, corporate investors will be forced to deal with the inevitability of finite energy resources; automotive fuel prices will rise to a sane level exceeding the equivalent of $10 a gallon. When the choice comes between keeping one's house warm and driving 35 miles to work, guess what the choice will be? Faced with the economic inconvenience of spending half one's income driving to work, more and more will choose to work closer to home, or live closer to work, within striking distance of bicycles, electric scooters, horses, and even those two locomotive devices most every human comes with as original equipment: shank's mare, les pieds, our own feet and legs. Imagine a world made for walkers and bicyclists instead of automobiles! Shopkeepers living over their shops, pleasant lanes and footpaths connecting businesses and residences, none more than an easy walk apart. Instead of parking lots: garden allotments, pasture for horses and goats, open space for children and wild things to play, there to teach and learn from each other. At some point, choices will be made about transportation of raw materials and finished products to market and homes, as opposed to transportation of humans to far-off illusory destinations. Humans will gradually learn to stay put, to stop this insane busy-ness driving us to all corners of the planet, to find comfort, satisfaction and sufficiency within the area encompassed by a comfortable day's walk. I won't live long enough to see this come to pass, alas, except in my own small world where I live the change I wish to see in the wider world. Come to think of it, I have seen more people walking lately, more bicyclists, more electric scooters. And there are moments when the incessant automotive cacophony of 7th Avenue diminishes and even dies away altogether, and I hear the restless surf pounding a mile away, the sea lions barking beneath the wharf out past the silty San Lorenzo River mouth, Great Blue Herons clacking overhead, and the sighing whisper of autumn leaves falling to their winter rest. Time for a walk, a good hearty salad, a glass of ruby wine. To Life! Michael Leona Gulch Pacific Plate August 15, 2003 Last night the stars were visible from the streets of New York City for the first time since 1977. In Washington, DC, the White House was dark, except for a single dim bulb in the Oval Office. This demonstration of the fragile thread of "civilization," if that's what it is, was brought to you by the Electricity Industry, those folks who power the feeble illumination in our nation's capital. Since at least George "Poppy" Bush's regime, energy deregulation, the process that changes electricity wires into suction tubes from customer's pocket's to ENRON's bank vaults, has weakened the energy infrastructure of North America and the UK, if not dismantled it, in an effort to minimize expenses and maximize profits. One result has been California's comic opera, as the Bushies attempt to further consolidate their hold on the political clout of this nation's largest state constituency. Governor Davis (the only official to stand up to the scam) had to be deposed to pave the way for another Bush theft of US democracy, a process consisting of pouring money into the state's referendum process until it floats the preferred candidate. Regardless of the political and economic intrigue that resulted in thousands of hotel guests camped outside their rooms (no electricity to power their "convenient" key card locks!), this latest failure of technology is a Good Thing. It's a healthy experience for the citizens of the United States of America, the most insufferable of all imperialist empires, to be brought to their knees now and then, just for a little while, just for the sheer exercise in humility. Give them a taste of what the people in Iraq experience every day. Mix in a couple of explosions in waste processing plants, some raw sewage running into their streams, armed military units patrolling the streets in Star Wars uniforms, hospitals forced to function in the dark and heat; just to make the whole Disneyland experience a bit more real. If it's good enough for the people of Iraq, it's good enough for us Americans, too, by God, or Allah, or Whoever's in charge of this grand panoply. Who knows, the people might just get used to using less electricity, enjoy seeing the stars of a clear evening, and find unfettered joy in depriving trans-national corporations of their filthy profits. Michael Leona Gulch Pacific Plate October 9, 2002 I took a drive to North America this morning. I haven't been there for over a month and I was curious what it's like these days. We hear rumors drifting over the hill from time to time, here on the Pacific Plate. Rumors of wars and wars of rumors. Seems the village idiot was appointed Beloved and Respected Comrade Fearless Leader over there, or some such, and now it's gone to his heads. He thinks he's Ruler and he wants to take the world off into war. Or so they say. Course we know he's just a puppet, with green frog strings pulled by McDonnell-Douglas, General Electric and Monsanto, all eager to profit from the deaths of people with darker skins than his. It was nice up on the fault, the crumpled border between the plates. Tendrils of fog wafted among the trees, the sun shone through to limn the Ponderosa and Eucalyptus with golden light. In counterpoint, the Americans were out in their automatic mobiles, being driven at high speeds, unaware of the living beauty around them, eyes fixed ahead on the flow of traffic, alert for any opening, shoulders pressing cell phones to ears, always in touch, forever connected. The side of the road is carpeted with flat cats and unidentifiable pressed organic remains, suitable for collecting in a scrapbook; the detritus of the modern transportation industry, unnoticed victims of progress, if that's what it is, which I doubt. The metallic automotive stream sweeps by unnoticing, intent on its destination, intent on reaching the first red light first, to sit in smug automotive torpor, first, Number One, Numero Uno, sitting still, burning dead dinosaurs. Everyone's behind me, By God, and I'm gonna peal out of here first. Maybe that's what the Bushniks want, to be first, Number One, top of the list of murderers, rapists, thugs and international terrorists. This is the "War Against Terrorism" isn't it? Takes on to know one! Gotta practice what we preach against. If those towel-heads don't like our freedom, we'll just throw it away! Guess I'd better stay here on the Pacific Plate, a pacific place for us pacifists. Let the war mongers join with the growth maniacs and destroy what little of value they have left. Just don't expect to take ours when you've run out of yours. We'll meet you at the summit with monkeywrenches held high. We'll tear up the macadam and pile it in a heap on the high curves. We'll roll rocks down on your shiny automobiles, and fell great trees across your blood spattered highway. When the oil barons have all dripped dry, we'll cock our snooks and piss on you from a considerable height. If you let them fuck it all up for you, don't come looking to us for help. Hayduke Pacific Plate December 5, 2001 This is so absurd! Do we really need another mechanical toy to get more and more people off their feet and dependent on machine transportation? Our society is obese enough as it is. The only exercise some people get is walking from the house to the garage. Ah yes, cars were so much better than horse and buggy. Get rid of all that nasty horse shit. No need to buy hay. No need to bother harnessing and unharnessing. No vet bills. These new innovations make life so much better! So now we have a device that's supposed to get rid of cars in urban areas? Hah! I say! Now we'll have cars AND these ridiculous battery powered scooters. We'll have more congestion, not less. We'll have more unhealthy people, not less. We'll have more energy consumption, not less. We'll have more mining, more plastic production, more toxic things to throw away, not less. When do we say enough? When do we make do with less? When do we stop this insufferable busy-ness? What's wrong with fucking feet? They've worked perfectly well for millions of years! Why are we so hot to get people passive and unmoving? Now we'll have people riding their weeny electric scooters to the exercise boutique instead of driving their cars! BFD!!! This thingie has nothing to do with handicapped folx; that was one of Segway's earlier inventions. This idiot thing is designed for perfectly healthy human beings, each with the requisite two feet to propel them efficiently from place to place. And forget about baggage. This is designed to carry a small briefcase, not groceries, firewood or anything larger than a breadbox. Nor do we need to get from one place to another in a hurry. Feet are designed to propel human beings at a human pace, a pace where compatriots can converse easily, observe the surroundings, smell the breezes, commune with nature. Machines just get in the way. "There's more to life than making it go faster." Mohandis K. Ghandi November 28, 2001 Damn, can't crow about the weather any more! 21 degrees here this morning in Duke City, which is cold for the locals, but hardly passes as chilly elsewhere. The Sandias are intermittently frosted with a dust of the white stuff that lasts for an hour or two in the morning. Meanwhile, the crows provide an amusing evening's entertainment as they mob their way to higher and warmer altitudes. "Crow time" comes as sunset approaches, the black beggars flock to the treetops and mock each other from a considerable height. When the wind blows, as it has lately, they frolic on the airy waves, surfing, tumbling, diving beneath the combers, popping up in surprise and delight at their own aerial proficiency. Life is good. Michael Lobo Place East Mesa August 5, 2001 It's Sunday night in Duke City. We went up to the hill at the edge of golf course and gazed upon the sparkling splendor of the dying city at sunset. You can almost see the lights creeping up West Mesa toward the volcanoes, those ancient silent witnesses to the folly of man in the desert. Sustainable growth. The Rio Grande slides quietly by, its sibilant hissing muted by the eternal rumble of commerce coursing through the Big I, the spaghetti tangle of Federal highway dollars heaped in a pile at the junction of I 40 and I 25. El Rio Primero ain't what it used to be these days, tamed and chilled by numerous dams upstream, kept within its constricted banks by BuRec "flood" control projects, earthen levees and "low flow conveyance channels." The Mexicans had to take bulldozers out and open up the delta the other day, cause the Rio doesn't have enough water to make it on its own to the Gulf. D-9 Viagra for a flaccid member, castrated upstream by industrial agriculture. The police and TeeVee helicopters split the night air regularly, searching for news and/or miscreants. Channel 7 APD on the prowl. Gotta catch those vicious criminals parking their vehicles in the empty K-mart parking lot with For Sale signs in the windows. Can't have an independent economy in the big city. Gotta keep Things under control. Of 650,000 souls in Duke City, seven met recently to oppose militarization in space at the hands of our very own McDonald-Douglas or Lockheed-Martin or whoever the hell they are these days: Albuquerque's contribution to the military-industrial complex. They've moved their headquarters onto Kirtland Air Force Base, there to be protected from the riff-raff by armed military police, A-10 tank killers, microwave crowd control devices and, of course, nukes. Nothing like a visit to your local Pentagon welfare bums, after passing through security at the gate of a military base. Nuff said! Low riders, tiny-wheeled gold plated pimp-mobiles, cruise Central with their ground penetrating sounds system set on stun. Neon gleams and buzzes in the heavy evening heat, adding fake authenticity to the 50s simulacrum of Sunday night in America. The moon hides its face behind scattered clouds over Sandia Peak, ashamed to reveal its full-moon splendor in the garish glow of sodium vapor street lamps lighting the clouds from beneath. Life is good in Albuquerque, if only for a moment, until the growth maniacs are locked away, finally and forever, in padded cells illustrated with scenes from Dante's Urban Inferno. Then it will get better. Greetings from Lobo Place! Long may the roadrunners ply these pithy pathways, until they can scoot down the middle of the street with no fear of passing automobiles. We'll keep the faith, here in our humble adobe revival Home of Love in the Desert. It's tough duty, but someone has to continue the tradition set by our Noble Bard some 45 years ago or so. It's hard but its fair. Michael and Jean Lobo Place Duke City on the Grande |