Monterey Green Action

I've learned to pay attention to inklings. That's how come I was at the UCSC Earth Summit 2008, got to meet Melinda and Peggy, came home and logged into WiserEarth.

Have attended Bioneers almost every year since the beginning but not this past one. Long-time Ecological Farming Association volunteer, served on the board of Sustainable Cotton Project, planted Peace Poles, taught English to Mexican rancho families here on the California Central coast, helped design and orchestrate all the industrial hemp expos in Santa Cruz and the one in San Francisco, Helped craft the inaugural WomenRise for Global Peace 11:11 event in 2002 (Purple Poppies for a passionate proactive peace), remain one of the happy lights in the Santa Cruz hub, we all took part in the historical San Francisco Gather the Women Congress.. I'm a long-time member of International Womens Writing Guild (IWWG.org), one-time podcaster for Worldwithoutoil.org (WWO); Peak Oil Alternate Reality Game (ARG) for the public good.

Zaadz  (now Gaia) has been my favorite online forum prior to finding WiserEarth (Zaadz profile is TimetoShine). Posted my "Fibroid Fable: Guest At The Mouth Of The Womb" story there - a womb that must be immediately surgically removed along with a tumor the size of a 6-month fetus is instead the means by which the deep wounding of a lineage is addressed, traced back to the Scottish Highlands, where I walk the land with my mother, my sister, my brother...to listen, cry, sing, speak. Tumor dissolves, womb rejoices. Medical intuitives say fibroid is something on ice, frozen in time (needs thawing for life to flood back in). Fibroids are classified as 'benign' tumors yet are now the primary reason for emergency hysterectomies in both USA and UK.

The Highland folk are fey
and have always been that way
though we with sheep may fall asleep
forever and a day...

Forever's gone
A day has passed
And we with wonder wake
The house was raised, the sheep have grazed
(it really takes the cake)
And yet and yet
and yet and yet..
the Land breathed in and out
through sidewalk cracks and concrete slabs
through walls of crumbling grout

we're nationalized and categorized
and formalized to boot
yet nothing ever jeopardized
the Highland's deepest root

In jeopardy we play the game
in jeopardy we dare
and outcomes all depend upon
how deeply we all care

How deeply we can all step in
how brightly we show up
to dance to laugh to dream to drink
this overflowing cup


This Highland thread now being en-livened...


*~*~~*~*~*~~*~*~~**~
Next thread...
Yinka was doing an M.A. at the Centre for Human Ecology in Edinburgh, Scotland, 5 years ago when she broke her neck (hit the bottom of a swimming pool). My sister was a fellow student and became one of Yinka's first caregivers after she was sent home from the hospital with a drear prognosis (C5 quadriplegic). We, my love Ryan and I, evolved into her intrepid adventure caregiver crew, facilitating travel and sojourns to far-flung backwaters ranging from Yulunga Reforestation project in Australia, to Burning Man, to Italy's Damanhur, to California dreaming (times under our roof with Bioneers, Green Festival, and Earth Dance in the mix). Yinka has also been part of our sustainable home building with Lakota on the Pine Ridge Indian Reservation at Wounded Knee (initially a WomenRise response to Lakota come knocking). Yinka directed a film of our building. Her footage has been showing on Santa Cruz Community TV and is up on Youtube. We are also members of tribewanted.com (Fiji Vorovoro eco-experiment); we got to be there in 2006 and ended up in the BBC documentary (Paradise or Bust), now being aired in Britain. Oh, and we all went to Punta Mona Permaculture jungle farm/education center in Costa Rica after connecting with those guys at Bioneers.

Next scintillating thread...
Freddie was born nearly 11 years ago. In his latest school report his teachers commended his 'deep empathy for his peers' (oh joy) and recorded too their appreciation for his 'comical outlook on life'. His laughter is entirely infectious, he makes my bed with a hot water bottle on cold nights, we are well-matched on Wii sports. He lives in England but comes back and forth to California as an unaccompanied minor. He was the first one to call me 'grelf'. He is the only child of my younger (second and last) daughter. I am watching the evolution of the species in both my offspring and their wholly heartening children..

Off  to England I must go
off to see my Freddie Jo
he's the best in all the land
not least of all because I'm 'grand':
grelf * is what he made of me
proud as proud as proud can be..

* grelf = grandmother elf

So 2008; biggest (challenge) last... (because what follows necessarily requires a chunk of change, a lot of m*o*n*e*y, not all of which I see from here (!):

My mum's 80th bash is taking place in 'the big hoose' in Scotland (Ross Priory) where she was a little maid during World War II. She is thrilled and we, her offspring (6 of us) are very excited to bring her back as Lady-of-the-House for the celebration of her life.

Then, in September, I will attend my eldest daughter at the birth of her second child (I am currently apprenticed to her 16-month-old firstborn) in Nottingham, England. Also, with this daughter, we are currently launching a Fair Trade, Fair Made children's clothing line from the heart of the first greenwood (Sherwood) and talking with Bioregional UK to include threads grown, spun, milled, dyed, sewn, all in the British Isles (hemp, etc). And if we can use a hydro-mill near West Yorkshire Pennine's Hebden Bridge for our textile manufacturing, all the better (ever brighter little threads...)

Then (besides and!) provided we pull off all the facets of the plan we are hatching after 10 years in long term storage and temporary rentals, we will commence building a little (600 sq ft) eco-home 'granny unit' in a back yard, in the City of Santa Cruz, supported and guided by the City's visionary green building program for the 21st century.


Breathe....


Oh, about the image in case it is unfamiliar to you. It's the Chalice Well cover in Galstonbury, England (Isle of Aavalon), the Vesica Piscis symbol, perfect spheres (complete unto itself) overlapping for perfect union/collaboration.