litbitch

bye-bye, Big Coal

Well, this is exciting. The big new coal power plant planned for Eastern South Dakota has been scrapped, due to insufficient investment. Is the invisible hand of capitalism finally working? Of course not. Though it  may have stirred up the air a bit. Big Stone II's biggest investor, Otter Tail (oh the irony of animal imagery with ecosystem-destroying investments) pulled out not only because of the (now, of course, over) recession, but "the Minnesota company also said it was unsure how the debate over global warming would affect coal plants like Big Stone II."

Lost? Jobs, of course. But only 45 permanent positions; over a thousand estimated construction jobs. Does it suck for the region? Yes. Why am I celebrating this? Because the construction of this plant would suck more for the region, and the rest of us.

Coal powered plants account for more than 40% of all air toxins, including 40% of all CO2 emissions; a third of all mercury emissions; lead, arsenic, and other scary toxins.  Waste is stored in abandoned mines and impoundment ponds, which are vulnerable to leakage - often into locals' aquifers and drinking water.

And don't get me started on the damage inflicted by coal mining itself.

Full story here.

Part of an excellent series the NY Times ran on environmental issues: coal-poisoned water in West Virginia.

well, I'm paying for this damn site

and I don't feel like just canceling it and copying everything into word, so I guess I have to start using it again.

Most of my attention has been on environmental issues lately, so I'll share my thoughts and progress in little bits, as much to keep track of my intentions and education as to share. I really dislike preaching. So...

environmental/social goal of the day

With the growing population, the ability to feed the world is becoming more and more challenging. Using corn as a biofuel was widely revealed as a really crappy idea when the cost of food skyrocketed in the last few years. Genetically modified food may become necessary, but I'd like to fight that as much as possible.

Much of the corn we produce is inedible in an unprocessed form. It's created for things like corn syrup and cornstarch. Corn syrup scares me a little anyway (acid?!), and I certainly don't need the blood sugar spikes, so I'm going back to my earlier avoidance of all things cornstarch-sweetened. That land would be better used to produce edible, healthier corn, or, better yet, healthier food in general.

Beginning as soon as I finish off these last few twix I stole from Wendy's party.

corresponversation

n.  A conversation, usually lengthy and multifaceted, via written communication, either on paper or in electronic form.
There is some debate as to whether this can be applied to instant messaging. Unfortunately, William Safire just died, so there is no final verdict as yet.

Feel free to use this portmanteau as you wish. You may credit me if you like. Or send me a dime tribute for each usage.

solace

Dear City of Portland Circuit Court,

I’m a big fan.  Not of the Circuit Court in particular, but I’ve never had cause to interact with you before today, so who knows?  I am a fan of your city. I have been for decades.  But I must say, I’m terribly disappointed in you.  If you wanted to give me a speeding ticket (and you obviously did), you could have proceeded like a “man,” as they, sexistly, say, and done it to my face, rather than the legal equivalent of texting me a Dear John letter.  Etiquette aside, neither of us now has any idea why I was allegedly speeding at that particular moment.  Maybe I was trying to escape the crazed driving of a deranged, stoned hippie.  (I mean, this is Portland; that's as likely as not, right?) Maybe I was veering out of the path of a homeless dog.  Maybe I was being pursued by an evil villain while trying to save the world.  I don’t remember at what exact time those events took place, and since you chose to take a photo of me instead of pulling me over, neither do you. 

My city of Minneapolis no longer allows traffic cameras.  They have been ruled illegal by the courts.  Perhaps, being the other top cycling city in the country (Yes, I know you’re ranked #1 and we’re #2, but we get to jump 2 spots because it gets really cold here), you are trying to discourage the use of cars by handing out tickets willy-nilly.  But I needed my car to travel across the country and serve as an ambassador to your fair city, as flying would have made too large a carbon footprint, and while in Portland I was escorting a friend who did not have a bike with him, having also come to visit your fair city from somewhere else. (Bikeless?! Yes. He’s from Los Angeles. It’s kind of a disability.)

So here’s the deal.  I love Portland.  I know we’re all in a recession and that Portland’s unemployment rate is ridiculously high. But I think it is patently, across-the-board, unfair to issue traffic tickets which are not only terribly expensive, but will also affect my insurance rate (and my otherwise spotless record), while I am too far away to redress the accusation in court (not financially or environmentally wise to drive back, really), and cannot address the specific accusation because I do not have a photographic memory and therefore have no idea whether your reading was right nor whether, if it was, I had some excusable reason for temporarily accelerating. 

As such, I am pleading “no contest”, though I may in fact be “not guilty”.  You know what? If you really need it you can even keep the money as my (albeit currently unemployed) donation to your beautiful, if misguided, city.  Just keep this ticket off my record, because I am a good driver and I deserve good driver insurance rates. 

I leave the rest in your hands.

Thank you for your time.

 ZB, Minneapolis, MN

earn your damn job title

I'm getting tired of many of the NPR programs. At the moment, I refer to my local news updates, and Talk of the Nation.  Fortunately, I don't hear the latter very often, but the format seems to be have on a few experts, let them state their case, then take "listener comments" without addressing any of the issues broached by those listeners.  Why the fuck would I just want to listen to a bunch of people sounding off?  Oh, right, because I want validation.  Y'know what?  I can get validation at a bar, or next door.  I listen to the news for insight and information, and hopefully a more elevated discussion.  So when the religious pastor says that he was a leading, vocal proponent of Prop 8 because "children deserve to have one parent of each sex," why didn't you ask him if he was going to create a constitutional amendment banning parental divorce? Or encourage abortions for any fetus about to be born into a single parent home? Why didn't you ask him if it was okay for same sex couples who don't want children to tie the knot? When the listener called up and bitched that "those people" harping on that one word, marriage, are tying up the courts in California while there are more important issues that need to be addressed, why didn't you point out that those people are not the ones passing the propositions and amendments, that those people would be perfectly happy to get married just like everyone else with no more legal pain than you get signing a marriage certificate at city hall? Wtf, Neil Conan?
And you're not off the hook, Minnesota.  There have been on the street interviews on MPR for the last few weeks, asking whether the Hausers should get chemo for their son. That's not the damn question.  The question is whether the state has the right to force them to get chemo for their son.

I know there are a lot of journalists out of work right now.  Those who have jobs should earn their pay.  And I'm sick of softball.  People ought to be challenged.  It's the only way we're ever going to learn anything.  Or is education just too radical an idea for the media?

um, z? are you sure you're not a libertarian? (part 8)

File this under the same category as the "California Uber Alles" posts.

Minnesota is threatening to take custody of a 13 year old who is refusing traditional cancer treatment. Some time after being diagnosed with Hodgkin's lymphoma, he did go through one round of chemotherapy treatment.  With the side effects and their religious beliefs, they have decided to pursue alternative therapies ever since.  The parents have said that if the tumor grows, they will consider chemo and radiation again. The boy appeared in court last week, firm in his resolve, well-spoken, and looking healthy. 

I'm no fan of religion, but I do support religious freedom, to a point.  The fact that the Hausers are white people following a Native American religion doesn't make me any more sympathetic to their cause.  Neither does the evidence that Hodgkin's lymphoma is a highly treatable form of cancer.  That is, I find it easier to sympathize with someone seeking alternative treatment when the most likely outcome from chemo & radiation is increased sickness before an untimely death than I do someone who might fully recover with traditional medical treatment.  I am also no stranger to the powerful influence of parents' beliefs on their wards. And I don't think parents should have unrestricted authority over their children.  There are absolutely times when children should be taken out of the home. 

Nonetheless, I think the state should back the fuck off.  No one has attempted to argue that these parents don't care about their kid (kids, actually; they have many).  The state simply believes that their form of medicine is best, and that, since it is best, the Hausers have to use it.  Beyond the scientific ignorance and arrogance of that belief (what if every sick child had been ordered to have leech treatments?), is the apparently prevailing medical view that existence is the only part of life worth defending. I have similar feelings about the extremists in the pro-life movement.  

I don't doubt that the doctors and the judge are trying to do the right thing.  But it's not their job to make medical decisions for the citizens of this country.  Ironically, of course, our government does not financially support medical treatment for a huge portion of Americans, but they'll force unwanted treatment on others.

Back. The fuck. Off.

(I started writing this last week, and got distracted.  The boy has since been ordered to get chemo by the court.  Today the news reports that the boy and his mother have gone AWOL.  Yep. They're on the run.  Good idea? No. Inevitable? Nope.  Still not the state's fucking business? Check.

jesus says, "shut the fuck up"

So you may have heard about the book My Stroke of Genius. I was introduced to it almost a year ago on Fresh Air.  If you'd like to go right to the source, you can just click on over.
But here's my take.
So this neurologist had a massive stroke and, with the help of her mother et al, is now completely recovered.  That's the least interesting part of the story.  Her stroke attacked the language center of her brain, and most of her recovery was centered on communication skills, speech, etc.  But before the rehabilitation started, while her right brain was utterly dominant, even exclusive, she experienced a state that most would describe as enlightenment.  Without language, there was no delineation.  Without the power to name things, the recognition of the uniqueness of things vanished.  Without the other, she had no self, no ego.  She experienced, continually, her connection to the world and everything in it.  She was in a state of utter bliss.  So much so that she fought rehabilitation and reconciled her return to the world of intellect only if she could hang onto the ability to return to that place of peace, oneness, and selflessness. Astonishingly, she managed to do it.  She returned to her career, wrote this book, and continued her investigations of the workings of the human brain, as well as participating in the myriad petty concerns and stresses of the quotidian, but says that whenever she wants or needs it, she can simply turn off her right hemisphere.  She can tell her brain to shut the fuck up and be truly present and aware and part of the world. 

Religion is a right hemisphere story.  Enlightenment, nirvana, being saved, seeing the light, whatever your religion calls it - these are just different ways of describing the same thing: letting go of the analytical part of the brain.  For me, this is more proof that our higher power is simply our connection to everyone and everything, and our ability to transcend is simply our ability to let go.  I'm sure some religious people might find her experience disheartening.  The possibility that deep, spiritual peace is simply the deactivation of neurons or receptors or whatever might seem unglamorous, dull, utterly technical and lacking in magic.  To me, it is one of the most hopeful, inspiring things I've ever heard.  I don't do religion.  I'm not a scientist, but I'm a big fan of logic (too much so, in fact, ironically contributing to my resistance to achieving the non-magical, elevated state I seek).  And knowing that peace, happiness, presence is simply a matter of stopping the words, as difficult as that has proven to be, thrills me.  I do love the philosophy of secular Buddhism, and it has helped me more than I can express, but when it comes down to it, the understanding that suffering comes from grasping and clinging, that we are all connected, etc, etc, pales in comparison to feeling it.  I have, for a few seconds at a time, on good days, or at least I've come close.  But I want more. I want the non-wanting. I want it like I want 77 degrees, an ocean, and sunshine.  I want it like I want true, passionate, everlasting love. And I like the idea that I don't have to be special, or devoted, or a believer of any kind, to achieve that. Right now, I'd be happy to give up my reliable, supportive, destructive brain to get it.  Fortunately, I won't have to.  I just have to teach it how to listen when I tell it to shut the fuck up.  Or get hit with the perfect stroke, which, in all honesty, is probably just as likely.

Stiffed

Susan Faludi's exhaustive examination of the desperate state of the American man, Stiffed, connected, surprisingly, to one of my favorite recent topics: obsessive self-disclosure.  Her conclusion, in large part, is that without a common purpose, a sense of community, a shared goal, men are left with the dregs society has provided as a replacement: consumption.  In the absence of something to create, we consume.  Fame, beauty, money become goals rather than pleasant by-products and are, necessarily, unfulfilling. 
And here we are back at facebook, where commenting on one's life, displaying pictures of oneself and one's activities, in short showing, becomes more important than doing.   Kids are more likely to say they want to be famous than describe what they might do to become so.  Yahoo "news" and the tabloids are full of information about people who are famous for being famous.  While I am optimistic about the work that was put into Obama's campaign (however I feel about the blind sycophancy that sometimes accompanied it), and the moves toward local food, abstaining from the purchase of new products, and active environmental responsibility, the culture at large pushes us toward filling the hole with stuff and image.  What we look like, how we describe ourselves, what we are "a fan of" or how we feel is more important than what we do.  Even non-doing, meditating, sitting, isn't real unless it's in a facebook update.  I'm condemning myself as much as anyone with this; when bored at work I seek continual validation of my clever statements on that goddamn "social networking" site.  I'm just struck by how everything I've been investigating lately, everything that annoys me, excites me, scares me - it all connects.  And the solution, again and again, seems to be putting the wallet away, digging in the dirt, paying attention to what I do, engaging with the world, and, maybe just a little bit of shutting the fuck up.  Hey-yo.

heavy baggage

The topic on Midmorning this King memorial/pre-first-African-American-presidential-inauguration day was The end of a struggle, or just a step in the journey?  I don't doubt that most thinking people would agree on the answer to that question, and I was glad to hear both guests, Jack White and Michael Fauntroy, dismiss the concept of a post-racial America and both recognize and place a value on difference.  But the English Master (or would that be Mistress?  oh, yes), excuse me, the English Mistress in me took umbrage at their aggressive dismissal of the Obama supporter's much-quoted statement, "Obama doesn't come with the baggage of the civil-rights movement." 

My problem comes from their failure to disect the metaphor the young man chose to use.  He didn't say burden; he didn't say curse; more importantly he didn't imply that Obama was free of the lessons or the legacy: he said baggage.  I know the Civil Rights movement is a sacred cow, but it was born out of, and cannot be separated from, bigotry, murder, beatings, and all-too-human cruelty, and that's a lot of baggage.  I won't claim to know exactly what this supporter meant by this statement, and I can't find his blog to get more detail or explication, so I'll just deal with the words as I have them. 

To me, being able to approach the campaign and the presidency without the baggage of the civil rights movement allows Obama to view the world with fresher, more welcoming eyes.  I find it hard to believe that most black Southerners (and others) who lived through the conditions that necessitated the passage of the Voting Rights Act and Civil Rights Act can see this country as colorblind or racially equal, or that the treatment they receive on a day to day basis is necessarily fair.  I don't think I could.  After the Rodney King riots in LA, I felt racial hatred being directed at me in a way I had never experienced before, and I saw the world in a different way after that.  (This from a girl who was raised in a racially mixed inner-city neighborhood and spent 3 years in a high school that was predominantly black.)  I don't see any benefit in my change of perspective, and it was years before I could tone down my presumptions to something close to my pre-riot levels.  This was nothing compared to what blacks suffered in the South in this country, so I would imagine that most people that lived through that time approach race with a certain, understandable, prejudice.  While it's probably accurate that they are often not treated the same as their lighter-skinned fellows, the treatment is, probably far more often than not, subtle, ignorant, unintentional, and totally legal.  Thus it closes doors for the person who carries the baggage to assume they are being treated poorly, and that assumption can often, in fact, contribute to destructive, if still subtle, changes in the people they're dealing with. Negativity breeds negativity. I know this from my own experience, spending some time assuming that all black people hated me, after having been attacked on the street both directly and indirectly after the spring of 1992.  It made me more frightened, more angry, and less open to the people I came in contact with.  It hurt, in fact, no one but me, and didn't protect me at all from those who actually did hate me based solely on my oliveish skin. 

If Barack Obama is free of the baggage of the Civil Rights movement then he is free of the assumptions, the negative, predetermined, kneejerk emotional reactions that get in the way of so many of us being receptive to the love and support that could be available to us.  Hopefully, and by all appearances it seems to be true, he is free of the assumption I still, ashamedly, carry, that most white Southerners are racists. This comes from my dad, a Southerner, talking regularly about being beaten by white cops and banned from his father's funeral because he played an instrumental part in the march from Selma to Montgomery.  The Civil Rights movement was a part of the everyday dialogue in my household, growing up.  It is part of my baggage, even though I was born after the movement ended.

I know President-Elect Obama has experienced racism, and I know he's aware of that, but he doesn't seem to have let it effect, at least superficially, his feeling of entitlement.  Normally I'm opposed people carrying that birthright, but for a black man in America, one who does not come from wealth and privilege, one who's worked his ass off, and one with a brain like Barack, I'm kinda okay with it.  Better the assumption that you have the right to hop on any train, than be slowed down by the bitterness or fear that running alongside the track with baggage can often bring.

oh, hello. I didn't see you there.

The thought of writing about myself is boring the hell out of me, and I question my motivations for doing so in this forum, so I think I'm going to stop for the foreseeable future.  Still may do some writing, but I'm tired of logging my journey here.  Until I'm not.

Anyway, here's a little personal zoe to round things up, for the few of you who like hearing about her hackneyed crap (I mean that with all due respect; we like zoe, we just don't need to indulge her, do we?)

40 Questions about 2008: An End-of-the-year meme

1. What did you do in 2008 that you’d never done before?

went to Nicaragua; memorized a lead role in a week, and performed it with one rehearsal; climbed a volcano; gave up refined sugar; bought myself my own damn home

    2.     Did you keep your New Years’ resolutions, and will you make more for next year?

sort of. sort of.

    3.     Did anyone close to you give birth?

physically close? no. emotionally close? yes.

    4.     Did anyone close to you die?

My former father-in-law died.  I was less close to him than any of the other adults in my former family, mostly because he's been less than his full self for so many years.  I felt a little like I knew him, through the stories of my formers, but mostly I just wished that I truly had. 

up and away

I am, admittedly, a bit buzzed on 2 glasses of wine (cheap date), but why not revel in it? The best drinking leaves me a little less guarded and a little more enthusiastic.  By the time you read this I may be soaking up the sun in Nicaragua courtesy of my accidental sophomore year roommate, Nancy.  Which brings me to the point of this missive.  This next year is unchartered territory.  I've got nothing planned except my day job and at the moment that has me awfully excited (not my day job, the unknown other).  I've got 6 weeks vacation time and a world at my feet.  I have some vague plans for the free time, but am expectant and unanticipatory about 2009.  The only desires I have at the moment are warmth and foreignness. 
My wish for the new year?  I hope for you all what I hope for myself: an open heart, eyes wide open, spirit rejuvenated, expectations shunned.  I have had so many wonderful moments this year, it feels unfair to even acknowledge them.  I wish blessings on you all, in the tradional meaning: more life.  More life, more love, more fun, more grace.  A glorious year end and a truly beautiful new year to you all.  And thank you for everything.  Really, everything.
At the risk of sounding cheesy:
We are the Wonders of the World.

radio silence begins ...

now

Where is the CIA when you need them?

Will someone just kill Robert Mugabe?  Please?  For the good of Zimbabwe?  While there are still people alive in Zimbabwe?

shout out

to everyone in pain right now.  Physical, romantic, psychological, familial, whatever it may be.  It is all valid and it is all shared.  You are not alone.  You are worthy of the best you've ever had.  You are loved.

hibernation prep

Hey kids!

Imagine this entire post in an upbeat, kindergarten teacher tone of voice! with lots of upward inflection! i can't succumb to the exclamation point demon for the whole post, so help a girl out!

god, that's exhausting

speaking of exhausting

Winter has, finally, unequivocally, come.  But it has come without brutality.  It's 16 degrees and sunny - brisk but beautiful.  We had our first real snowstorm last night, and now the streets are clean and white and pure.  It won't last.  It will get grey and colder and cruel (update - Sunday - 5 degrees and gray - yes I changed the spelling).  I like planning, and winter requires some hardcore planning, especially if you fear cold and the absence of sun-on-skin as I do. 

1) Put on some makeup, pile up your hair, and at least try to do somethin with what you got there.

I know you feel like a slug, and you've gained (insert weight here) pounds since the first day the thermometer dropped below freezing, but suck it up.  I have learned, from watching What Not to Wear (the British version, years ago, I was maybe a wee bit addicted; this may be why I gave up television) that looking good makes you feel good!  Many of you (can you call a fraction of 7 readers "many"?) may not need this superficial boost.  Maybe your outward appearance has no influence on your inward exuberance, and fuck you very much Mr/Ms Spirituallyadvanced C. Perfect.  But we all know I have issues, in this case body image issues, so I can speak from personal experience.  Seriously, folks, if I go more than a week solid in bulky jeans and a bulky sweater I start to feel like a middle-aged midwestern woman (wait...).  If you're a woman (or a man) who shaves your legs, pick up that razor at least twice a month, even if you're the only one who'll know.  Hide a sexy dress under those layers.  Put some color on those painful, chapped lips.  Find an excuse to dress up, even if it's just for a play at the militantly grungy Bedlam, a drink a the BLB or a kitchen-based birthday party. 

And while we're on socializing...

Bi-den-Clin-ton-Ri-chard-son ho!

Lincoln put all of his Republican party rivals into prominent positions after his election as well.  I dragged myself through the entire Modern Library collection of his writings to find that out.  That and his belief that blacks and whites could never live peacefully together.  And the war seemed to knock out his depression, or at least the time to dwell on it.  A few other little tidbits.  Something about "the better angels of our nature" and "four scored"...?