The Day Winter Came To Northeast Wisconsin

The storm that brought tornadoes to the South this week finally made it to our neck of the woods last night, complete with wild winds, thunder and lightening plus over a foot of snow. Our record snowfall on December 28th was more than doubled...go figure. It is not completely unusual to have a snow free Solstice (or an X-mas for that matter) however, shirtsleeve temps and green grass is very strange. I understand statistics and the difference between climate and weather, but as we are all seeing the results of the largest El Nino ever recorded, there may be a way to begin to understand that, although they are different, they are linked.

All life is sacred, all life is connected! We are one, we are stardust!

The world oceans are taking the brunt of our abuse, however we just don't see it, because it is, for the most part uninhabited. We record the finest of details about temperature, humidity, winds and weather on land and we do it in tens of thousands of locations having done so for over one hundred years. At sea, it has only been recently that we have had recording stations at fixed points and they have primarily been recording water conditions, not what is going on weather-wise. It only makes sense that with oceans covering two thirds of the planet, two thirds of the climate change would take place there as well.

I have written in the past about the loss of soils, how they have silted in many of the spawning beds that act as fish nurseries and the acidification of the world's oceans. I have also written about the gyrae that exist around the planet, the large swirling features that collect our floating plastic wastes. There are

For my part. I started my day getting the snowblower out to the road, so I could idle down to the old lady around the corner. She's the elder in my neighborhood and getting her driveway clear is the beginning of my snow day ritual. The official amount of snow is a mere thirteen to fourteen inches, but the drifting routinely piles the snow higher than the front end of the snowblower. On the way back, I got the sidewalks of two friends and an acquaintance. The X-tians seem to have a strong young buck to shovel, so I left theirs alone. By mid afternoon I was sitting on about eighty percent of the snow removal done. I wouldn't normally be so anxious to get the garden path opened up, but the compost is full. I have religiously fed the soil since arriving here over ten years ago and have built over a foot of topsoil in most of my garden beds. Nature, unaided, would take about twelve thousand years to create a foot of living soil. Bioneer, shaman, geomancer, charmaster, whatever you call me, I'm turning the tide on ecological destruction, one handful of soil at a time. for those whgo are interested to know how to do this, in a sophisticated way, using dymaxion engineering principles to enhance the soil microbial community, please reach out to me. I teach classes on how to make biochar, and honor the cornucopia that is a healthy planet.

Each one teach one was the watchword of the true hippies. Like the dandelion, each of us presents a flower each petal being liked to a seed that is the relationships of all whom we encounter, of all our known associates and the folks required to get us our food, our energy, our "way of life". Making choices that affect sustainability for seven generations is the native way, the tribal expression of something economists and sociologists call the Pareto Optimum, a desirable state in which everyone is better off and no one is worse off. It seems in today's oligarchy, Pareto was an optimist. I offer my biochar classes at reasonable rates and am also available for consulting.

Jet Set

By the time the term was recognized, the golden age of air travel had become passe, eclipsed by mundane and impersonal mass transit. What originated as something to be romantic and elite turned into a process which today is demeaning and merely a function, or series of rites designed to feign "security". This is not the only time this has occurred. My parents were around at a time when noone had televisions, but because they were some of the first to ge ton, lots of people would come to visit just to see the tee vee. Something that seemed ultra-novel and almost magical has become something we are inundated with and now almost don't recognize as the brain sucking pariah that it has become. That is why I frequently remind people that the revolution is still not being televised.

Fourteen acres per handful. Typically on an acre of healthy soil, we find as much biomass in the form of microbes as would be contained in a cow and her calf. Char holds six times it's own weight in water and acts like a nutrient sponge, holding food for plants, rather than letting it wash away.

One of the difficulties that we have is to predict what the next big thing will be. It won't look like anything we can imagine. The people who will guide what it will look like have not yet found their voices. But, in pockets, across the globe there are bioneers, embarking on sustainable communities. There are geomancers, facilitating healthy relationships between humans and the environment, shamen, healing individuals and communities, curanderras working with the divine feminine to birth an evolved human community, and charmasters, devoted to healing the microbial communities that constitute soil. Evidence can be found worldwide, co-ops, schools, farms, neighborhoods and cities are working out a new way of living, one that takes a longer view of what constitutes a healthy relationship with the planet.

We continue to loosen the bonds of oligarchs. The more we learn about them, the easier it becomes to boycott them, divest from them and sanction them. We know that healing the Earth begins under our feet, at the level of soil. The process of becoming carbon neutral will not be enough. We need to actively rebuild soils and biochar will be the easiest way to do it. Especially those who routinely hang out around the campfire, making char is simple and crucial to fixing carbon in soils.

The Jet Set didn't understand that they were blowing carbon into the high atmosphere, however, the people rebuilding soils understand that they are incorporating atmospheric carbon, through dried plant material into living, healthy soils.

Digital Cascades

I have recently begun to think of these posts as a fluid. I act as tippler, dropping a few gallons of water here and a few gallons of water there, not really fuel, but transfer mechanism for other energies which heat, pressurize, and change the water to steam, where it can do the most good and then pass on again into the watersheds of the global knowledge base.

A digital cascade is a set of processes in which one person shares with another person the very same idea and they begin to talk about and think about it. this allows for virtually instant movement of ideas and virtually endless permutations of the idea through languages, cultures and locations. These in turn are multiplied and have cohesive force throughout society, instantly and worldwide, changing the nature of our future discussions, our ideation and descriptions of the world around us.

Permutations are endless, like a giant flowering fractile, memes can be given birth, rise throughout the digital-friendly world and provide fodder for next gen thinking and filial memes that drive conversation across continents, political systems and ecotones. The concept of island culture is nothing new and at this point in our understanding of the fact that the entire Earth is under pressure from the way we choose to treat her, understanding how to not only release that pressure, but heal and soothe the natural world. It is true that if humans were erased from the planet, within a few hundred thousand years, our creations would be barely recognizable. However, if we understand what has been lost and how to build it again, it is absolutely possible to recreate Eden and allow the ugly scars across the face, the heart and breast of Mother Earth to heal.

The crucible of creation requires that too much gets crammed in, into too small a space, vibrating against and around one another, everything that went in combines, explodes into and rearranges with all else that has gotten in there as well, this, when heated, becomes a fusion, a force to be reckoned with. A completely new entity. Creation cannot be kept down, it is. When all of our words flow out as torrents, fueling the fusion of ideas across nations, across devotees, across tribes, with one sentiment, That is when evolution of our species will occur.

This Solstice

At least in Wisconsin, we are averaging forty-five degrees above normal. This in a time when we have recently changed the definition of normal and rather than averaging temperatures since record keeping began we now only average the last thirty years of data. Still, nearly fifty degrees warmer than the thirty year average is pretty good. It certainly is not feeling like midwinter. Six weeks from now, the back of winter will break and if the past few years are any indication, we can begin planting cold tolerant crops around April first (six weeks after that). It has rained almost six inches in December alone, more than double our typical December moisture. The strongest El Nino seems to be combining with a warm Gulf of Mexico to bring us Spring weather in December. Perhaps there will be a January freeze this year, rather than a January thaw.

On the darkest days of the year, it helps to reinforce the return of the light.

There is no better time to re-post information about biochar. This single resource has a proven track record and is a viable way to build soil, sequester carbon and stabilize soil moisture. It also has the power to double crop yields.

Many people worry about the "end times" or even champion them as "god's will". These people are conspiring against all of humanity. When faced with truth, we often triumph over difficult odds in spite of our limitations. It is what humans do. This is the case for climate change. Building soil by adding biochar increases the stability of life within the root zone of plants. Bacteriologic balance, provides healthy habitat for both roots and critters whose "waste" can be utilized by plants. We have the power in our hands to make char whenever we sit around a bonfire, it is cheap and easy to make, just throw some dry organic matter in a cookie tin with a few holes poked through to let flammable gasses escape and viola'! You can make char.

I have always felt that the Rainbow Warrior was alive in me. Peace and justice drive me from my soul level. By making biochar, we heal the planet from the ground up. Those people who participate in building soils are transformed in ways that are hard to quantify, but living a life that leads to the transformation of soils has profound impacts on those who do. When I was a more avid brewer, I always wanted a shirt that said, Yeast Lord. Because of the throngs of billions of generations of those lowly yet exalted strains that I shepherded and gave rise to. There may still be remnant colonies of organisms that trace their history back to my brewing days.

Certainly there are colonies in and amongst the char that I have created that owe their existence to my handiwork, perhaps hundreds of trillions of discreet microscopic organisms. The areas that I have added biochar to are still far from frozen, yet the areas in our yard that have not been treated with char are holding the little snow that has fallen, showing that billions of microscopic organisms have enough metabolism to change the surface conditions. Under the mulch, there are thriving communities that have not yet stopped for the winter. Life wants to teem, what we have done, almost without understanding, has been to systematically sicken, poison and reduce the soils of the planet to dirt. This solstice, I am pledging to redouble my efforts to teach others the important skills needed to produce char and nurture it so it can become the most amazing soil.

All of the beds that I have enriched with biochar doubled their output. Growers, please share!

Fourteen acres of surface area per handful of char. On an acre of healthy soil, the microbial community alone, has as much biomass as a cow and her calf. Not only will the char harbor and hold six times its own weight in water, the bacteria, fungi, and other microbes hold even more moisture withing their cells. I frequently describe char as being like the condo complex, the pantries and refrigerators need to be stocked, but then the whole thing is ready to be inoculated with live soil microbes from healthy soil. When they are given optimal conditions, they reproduce rapidly and form life giving, healthy soil.

Please contact me for information about classes and consulting services.

Strange Days Indeed

This solstice falls very close to midnight tonight. Not only will the Sun be at the lowest point on the horizon, but at least here in Green Bay, it will occur in the middle of the night. On this, the longest night near the time our ancestors used to call all bells. The Pacific ocean is currently warmer than we have recorded at any time since record-keeping began and the warm air has so much intensity that we, in the Upper Midwest are experiencing the warmest late fall ever. Midwinter here used to be the time when rivers turned hard, there were days on end where even the weak Sun could not raise the temperatures above zero during the days. We occasionally had temperatures far below zero. This year, we are wondering if the ground will even freeze solid.

The days have become strange in so many other ways as well, it is difficult to explain them all, or even list them. The citizens of the rest of the world, and some on our territory as well as wondering if we have collectively lost our minds. We seem to be completely delusional, running a slate of Teathuglican candidates that reflect all of the worst features of the ugly American. We have liars, cheaters, connivers, despicable hate mongers ala Hitler and both ignorant and foolhardy candidates running their mouths about things they know absolutely nothing about. In place of a fourth estate, the media and news outlets, who are wholly owned subsidiaries of the oligarchy continue to hold out the Two Minutes of Hate first mentioned by George Orwell in his futuristic novel, 1984.

Our educators are deemed "responsible" when students, calloused by abuse and neglect are unable to learn. Bullies are allowed to buy their way into seats of power, exerting more and more control over the daily lives of "free" citizens and there are never shortages of people to blame. Just pick any of the victims and lay the blame on them. We blame old people, young mothers, unions, anyone who works for the rest of us. The people who actually produce the least are even labeled "makers" while they call the rest of us "takers". Pay no attention to the fact that the elderly gave their lives to keep our way of life viable, ignore the fact that without young mothers, there would be no generation of young people willing to be abused by their bosses and while you are at it, brand those who put in an honest day of labor so that billionaires can hide fortunes in foreign banks. In addition to sowing seeds of hate throughout our society, Fascists continue to claim the immigrants are the problem, even though only a tiny fraction of us can trace our ancestry to native people. Even the fact that the world-wide recession (I still say it is a depression) has done more to curb immigration across our Southern border than anything that policing and/or militarism has accomplished.

The media giants have the power to point their cameras in any direction they choose, yet from the looks of what gets "reported", we are becoming less and less tolerant, under more and more threats and they also love to show us images of people who have lost their humanity in favor of their isolated existence, hiding in the glow of their telescreens.

Fossil carbon is almost never mentioned in popular media, nor is the solution to the build up of carbon in both the atmosphere and the world oceans. The fossil energy resources we are reaping today are like a giant solar charged battery, that took hundreds of millions of years to put by natural gas, oil and coal. We have been burning through that million year old carbon like drunken sailors since we first found it. some say that world coal reserves could last another four hundred years at the rate we are burning it, but it took millions of years to form. This is like writing checks for many thousands of dollars, every couple hours, while only adding a dollar per day to our accounts. The organic matter that took that carbon out of the air and sequestered it millions of years ago seems to not even be on our radar, or part of our awareness. We seem to have collectively forgotten basic physics. Like the fox from the folk tale, carrying a mouthful of food, we are seeing our reflection in the  still pool, but we try to snatch the food reflected in the water, leading to not only the loss of our meal, but getting cold and wet as well.

Chasing the dream has only led to our estrangement.

It seems like the popular myth/reality of the witch hunt has come back in full force. Everyone is seeking to blame someone else so fervently, so intently, that their own actions have become invisible to them. This solstice, we could all be served by allowing a bit of awareness in to our lives. The vast, vast majority of the human race is compassionate, helpful and cooperative. We know from research and experience that the easiest way to change children from loving, caring individuals into hateful tyrants and sociopaths is to abuse and neglect them, so why are we taking a path that leads to less and less good parenting and more and more stress for families? Well, our fictional belief in the "golden rule of business", screw the other guy before hew gets a chance to screw you, has become the mantra of the well to do. Since the rest of us are getting used to thinking that we are just temporarily inconvenienced billionaires,  we also think that by following the same route they did to amass their wealth, we will "make it" someday. The more desperate we become, the more we seem to cling to the lies that we have been told by those who abuse and neglect us.

In the novel 1984, the proles were told, WAR IS PEACE, FREEDOM IS SLAVERY, IGNORANCE IS STRENGTH. The book was written as a warning, not an instruction manual. The truth is that no peace ever grew out of the end of a gun, nor can it be created by the elimination of the results of human effort, investment and capital, with its inherent mantra that it be done for the good of others, and for ages to come. The "work" that the death and fear merchants are summed up pretty well as Ozzie Osbourne testified in 1970, with Black Sabbath with the tune WAR PIGS! War can never be anything but mayhem and destruction. The concept of buying money on time has virtually created a race of slaves. Ask yourself, are you more free today than you would be without "interest" being paid to guys in suits who create nothing but false demand for a future that never comes. In case anyone forgets. Slavery will forever be inhumane, even if the slaveholders were to be proven benevolent. Those who keep over ninety percent of the rest of us as their pets are the ones who need to be put down, not the old ladies whose "benefits" are cut, or the child made to drink sugar water while her mom is away at her job. I am in the class that has lost the war, but continues to pick winnable battles in a corrupt and failing system. Recognizing your own wage slavery and understanding that the class war has been won for decades. I continue to write these words to help others hear/see/smell/feel/ taste/grasp  the truth.  The most ignorant thing we can do is not recognize that every single person you meet knows things you will never know. If you have not yet done so, read 1984. When the spookiness starts to become apparent, realize that we now do not need wires to be "hooked up" any more. Nor can we disappear anymore into darkness.

The only way is up and out into the light. I have resolved in this year to become more pro active, discuss what can be done to affect positive change across the planet and don't want to leave folks with a truth bomb so devastating that they know not where to go, so here I will leave a nugget of bliss that can be reproduced and shared amongst your friends, family and co-workers, even if they be unpersons (sorry for the one last 1984 reference). To lighten the mood as "Where do you find a turtle with no arms or legs?" wait a moment and answer..."Right where you left him!" May all your days reflect the honest twists and turns of phrases, the condensed meaning of a thought expressively contained in the tiniest of vessels of words. Take these brief collections of words to heart: Love is Peace, Freedom a Birthright, Awareness is Everything. It only costs our attention to invest in making the world substantially better. All we have is our brief time on the planet...how many of us have lost loved ones this year?...We know the results of tearing things and people down. Perhaps this year, we could try the opposite approach.

Gingerbread Manslaughter

The time has come, once again, to endure the commercial excesses of our materialistic culture. In our time and place, many will be having to put up with businesses trying to pull us in, attempting to tell us that their baubles and beads are something that will placate our loved ones and make up for the times we have missed being there when it could have provided comfort, or proven our love for them by simply being there. This is also the time of year that we are supposed to be celebrating the enduring qualities of family and forgiveness, feasting and fraternity. However, if the commercial interests are to survive, they need to sell us things. It is not supposed to matter that some stores collect 60% of their revenue for the year in the six weeks or so between Thanksgiving and Christmas. We are supposed to gloss over the fact that all year long, we go without so we can pack the area under the tree with presents for one night.We are also supposed to ignore the fact that the X-tian myth of three wise men visiting a manger would have turned out completely different had there been wise womyn in the story instead. The grandmothers would have brought blankets, food and compassionate care to the young family, not silver and gold or incense.

When I was preparing to write this, I thought that it would be primarily about the way families are taken down by corporate forces, perhaps not on purpose, but as a result of their attempting to survive. The more I thought about it and tried to write, the more I realized that the "reason for the season" has nothing to do with survival. It is completely about exploitation. Even asking people if they want to use cash or credit belies the thinly veiled fact that in our culture clerks and shopkeepers don't care one whit about whether you can afford to have a nice holiday or not...they are only interested in the money.

Lucky Sevens

Today, I checked my stats. So far, my humble blog has had 27,777 views. I wanted to see what sort of power four sevens times two would have and it was interesting what I found. Beyond the fact that there are seven deadly sins, lucky sevens, seven sisters and seven circles form the "seed of life". Japan boasts seven lucky gods, there are dozens of tie ins with the number seven. One of the many things that turn out to be interesting about the number seven is that in numerology, finding wisdom and sharing it with others...transformation of the gold of enlightenment through the ether and conveying it to another place, perhaps another time.

I have long believed that when authors speak across the ages and stir our present day soul, that part of the author becomes immortal. To have penned words that reverberate through history, or which as so sublime as to make future humans cry of shout out in joy, leads millions of authors on a quest into time. The likelihood that any of the many words will stir after hundreds of years remains to b seen, but with technology blossoming, more and more are willing to try. I hope that when my writings are looked at, today or ever after, they are at least cogent if not sublime.

This is a retort with way too small a fire under it.

When your true purpose, finding wisdom and sharing it, comes up out of the blue so to speak, yet has such a crescendo of causality, it has to make at least one reflect. So far, I have done a good job. I wish that each of my readers would, or could, go find a 522 page book and send me the price of that book. The work of a writer is filling in the spaces between ideas to crate a net of meaning in which to catch bigger fish. Perhaps, not sweat the small stuff.

As a digital format writer, I am not sure what it was about the half dozen or so most popular posts, but for some reason they must have been shared and caught the imaginations of those who read them. I look back from time to time and read the more popular and less popular posts and still don't know why they resonate differently. Five hundred twenty two posts at one per day would take a year and a half to read. Giving each one a week to be reflected upon, my material at this blog alone would provide ten years of reading material.