New Leaf

My friend the Elm in the back yard in the rain. We're all so grateful for some rain!

There are, I am sure, some people in this country that are living right. Living in the right way for themselves, for Nature, and for other humans. I doubt there are very many of them though. I certainly haven't been one of them. 

You probably understand the rough outlines of the things that are going on in the world, so I'll make it brief. People are living lives that suck as a result of their function as tools of the corporate machine, and so they eat bad foods as an emotional crutch, which have been leeched of all their natural goodness by the production methods of other corporations. In turn, the animals and even plants raised by these corporations for food are treated like less than machines (they would probably treat their machines better) and so they are essentially tortured for our food (think about that the next time you bite that McNugget). These production methods also despoil the water and the air. People, even when their lives aren't that sucky, don't understand or believe in much else besides materialism. They want to have a good time and make money and that is the extent of their belief system pretty much. The previous spiritual tradition in this civilization, Christianity, is critically flawed and more or less in free-fall. Conditions of work tend to alienate people from each other and parents from their families, and mass media pretty much does the same. In the space of a few decades we went from the whole family gathering around the radio to each person lost in the world of their own private televisions or computer monitors. Computer technology of course has also allowed people to stay in contact with people and meet people in ways not previously possible, but these relationships are generally text relationships and are hence abstracted to some degree. Our reckless power and fuel use is warming the planet. Many people take drugs recreationally, and others have to take drugs in order to function psychologically. People are less secure in their way of making a living than ever before and that adds stress which accelerates the bad diet, smoking, alcohol, drugs and so on.

I of course have been no exception to this generalized state of decay, I've probably been the poster child of it. Prior to just recently, I have tended to eat about as poorly as possible. A steady diet of chicken fried steak and mac and cheese would have suited me just fine for most of my life. I've been smoking. I've not been exercising, like at all. I spend most of my time in front of the computer. I've been drinking Dr. Pepper in all its high-fructose-corn-syrup glory like it's water. I'm overweight. To top it all off, I've already had my first heart attack, back in 2008, which very nearly killed me. 

So it is time to take things seriously. I'm quitting smoking (I start today), I am going to start replacing the Dr. Peppers with green tea and cut my usual 3 teaspoons of sugar with my coffee and tea down to 1 for tea and 2 for coffee. I am going to start walking. I have started migrating sort of tentatively towards vegetarianism, partly because it is better for a person with a history of heart disease, but also because the conditions under which most of our food is raised is such a travesty and a violation of everything I believe. I would not necessarily have a problem with hunting for food, because the wild animals in that case have had the opportunity for something like a natural life, but I would really rather not support the sick way that food animals are treated in this society. This is going to be a very very hard transformation for me. My wonderful and lovely doctor has given me a lot of tools to use in this fight but it will be quite a fight.

Aside from the ethical and financial reasons for my various changes (cigarettes are insanely expensive for one), why do it when it will inevitably cause so much pain? The reason why most people quit smoking is because they are scared of KEELING OVER. The big C. Pushin Daisies. Ya, but we are all going to keel over sooner or later. Back when I had the heart attack, when I was in recovery I was certain that I would not live out the year and I was kinda okay with that. It's honestly kind of relaxing to know that you are sort of absolved of any further real responsibility for your life, seeing as how you are going to snuff it fairly soon. That is not the way it turned out though, and it's time to take that responsibility seriously.

One strong reason for the changes is that I feel that I like most of us have been digging ourselves a hole in our relationship with Nature, taking and taking and taking and not giving back. I want to balance that relationship more, and ultimately to do that it is going to help if I am not busy making myself sick, because if I am sick I can't do much. I also can't really take exception to what others do if I do those things myself. I have to start the very hard work of restoring myself and then work outwards from there. 

For 500 years or so one group of people or another has been fighting the good fight for a lost cause, the cause of instilling some reverence for nature in this crazy sick astonishing culture. And I fully believe that it is a lost cause, but just because something is a lost cause doesn't mean you don't fight. So maybe it is my turn to make the futile gesture of resistance, to shoot my arrows made of daisies and good thoughts at the giant oil-spewing mechanized tank of the 21st Century. To do that, I have to get off the tank myself and go pick those daisies. ;)

Wish me luck. Peace. :)