Spring always causes me to contemplate life. It presents a chance to think about the mysteries of new growth, continuity and what the future may hold. Passing from a difficult and humbling season to a time where life bursts up from under our feet and each new day holds the promise of improving upon the last. This natural cycle reminds me that a winter of depression will always blossom into an uplifting spring. In many cultures there are celebrations at this time of year for the increasing amount of light and the potential to grow more sustenance.

Shifts and changes are often described as painful or awkward, but their flipsides are the positive benefits that result from a transformation. Balance comes to mind when I stop to consider it all: even distribution of weight, stability, elements in proportion, comparing values, opposition, moderation, peace.

I come from a lineage of oppressed peoples. My family was persecuted and murdered in many countries; this prompted them to flee and is ultimately why I was born in such a place of privilege as Canada. Today my life is one of freedom, filled with choices. But slavery and abuse are still rampant on our planet. We need to take stock of our blessings and do something to change the dynamics that allow others to suffer under non-sustaining circumstances. Balance does not mean that we have it good so then others must have to have it bad. Our prosperity and freedom can exist without the expense to others on the wrong end of the “free” market construct.

As a society we need to delve profoundly into solutions that work. There are no band-aid tricks for the challenges that face us. Converting food-producing land into biofuel developments while people starve is incongruous. As greenwashing becomes fashionable we must think and determine the value and realities of the terms we encounter. I don’t claim to have all the answers but I do know that we must live purposefully to manifest the conditions under which all beings have dignity, safety and a clean planet to raise their family. Offer your ideas and actions to our community as you are able. We are the solution or the problem depending on how we use this opportunity today.
P.S. Please, please, please, everyone go find a copy of Harper’s May issue and read Wendell Berry’s Essay “Faustian Economics: Hell hath no limits.” It speaks to so many issues that are entirely current and direly important for each of us to consider.

Quotes

The past is our definition. We may strive, with good reason, to escape it, or to escape what is bad in it, but we will escape it only by adding something better to it.
- Wendell Berry

Two problems confront us: social inequality and environmental destruction. Both problems are reaching crisis points. We act as if they are separate. But they are linked – economically, politically, and morally. The solutions and strategies for each must, therefore, be one.
- Van Jones

We learn from our gardens to deal with the most urgent question of the time: How much is enough?
- Wendell Berry

Films

There Will Be Blood
Broken English

Making the Net Work

www.thesunmagazine.org/issues/387/bridging_the_green_divide
www.en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Environmental_Justice

Ishi graduated from Emily Carr Institute of Art and Design in 2001, with a BFA major in photography. He makes films, collects cacti, and ponders many things. Currently he is doing what he can for himself and the planet. contactishi@yahoo.ca. Waiting to hear echoes back…