Picture this … Sisley, 1943 … okay, wrong memory…

When I was growing up in St. Thomas, religion was a bit tricky for me. I was quite involved in our church (which went bust some years ago and is now a dance school – who knew such a thing could happen?). I was a member of the choir and the youth group, a cub and scout. But there never seemed to be a middle-ground – it was like you were either a God or a sinner and I was neither.

I think I mostly loved the “idea” of church; a sense of community, respect for all, the concept of a Good Samaritan. I even lived by most of the Ten Commandments. But I knew I wouldn’t be getting married, seeing my kids christened, or having a family pew, so I eventually withdrew, sadly feeling like an outsider and a fake.

Flash forward three decades or so, to a couple of Sundays ago. With our friend Sherry in town from Toronto, we attended my Mom’s church, now Knox Presbyterian, for their annual Kirkan of the Tartan. It was a combination of worship, Scottish music and pageantry, and included a wee parade, two bag pipe bands and a whole lot of tartan. Robin is from Scotland (a place called Saltcoats, which makes Coronation Street look sunny and bright) so he was at home with everyone in their kilts and Celtic-speak.

Doing the course of this, our first taste of 21^st century church-life in St. Thomas, I realized just how times have changed; my mom re-introduced me to many folks I knew 25 years ago, and introduced “his partner Robin”. She is now asking, possibly simply expecting, of her church what the church has asked of her all these years; “so in everything, do to others what you would have them do to you” (Matthew 7:12).

And you know what? So far, so good. Maybe we’ll drop in again.

Street design

Am I insane, or we still designing streets they way they did when fresh sewage flowed alongside pedestrian walkways?
Since we have to get in and out of vehicles, walk, cycle, load babies into car seats, empty our trunks, stop to chat or cross the street, all at the curb side, why not design streets so that the gutter is in the middle? Why is all the water, oil and filth, drainage grills and debris directed to the only part of the street where people are on-foot?

Hawks Cliff Weekend

The cycle of nature is in constant flux; the seasons change; the numbers of predator and prey vary; organic population controls such as disease are turned on and off; the tide advances and recedes.

Water will always level itself, and the earth has evolved to find equilibrium. Of course, that was prehuman and things have changed ever since we dammed our first river.

As we have struggled to understand and predict, often attempting to prevent, earth's inevitable progress, we've begun to realize that nothing happens in isolation; everything that happens in Nature, ripples outward with reactions.
Our world is populated with concerned individuals and organizations, working silently, attempting to monitor these reactions.

Hawks Cliff is located along the coast of Lake Erie, east of Port Stanley, and the Hawk Cliff Foundation is one of those organizations; their science is the banding and tracking of migratory birds. The Hawk Cliff Foundation (HCF) was incorporated in 1996 as a non-profit organization of volunteers dedicated to the conservation of migratory raptors, passerines and Monarch butterflies of North America through scientific study, public education and appreciation of their fall migrations. Hawks Cliff Weekend is an annual open-house of sorts, giving the public an opportunity to see some birds-of-prey up close, observe the tagging of monarchs and generally learn first hand, from the pros. The more we learn, the more respectful we can be.

Quaker Meeting House

Last evening, Robin, Dana and I attended a fund-raising Harvest Dinner and Silent Auction at the Quaker Meeting-House in Sparta. We learned of the evening through our friends at Orchard Hill Farm, and it had the warm, honest feeling I want every community gathering to have, though they seldom do.
The Meeting-House is magically situated in a forest clearing, surrounded by tall, sentinel-like trees; you could see something beautiful wherever you looked and it was the kind of evening where every door and window were open. As we began our meal, sharing our long table with new friends, we instinctively set-about discovering who-knew-who, reminding us all how small the world is (Robin reluctantly allowed us to taste his slice of Martha’s raspberry pie; I had a slice of hard to find raisin). At one point in the evening, both the tables and benches inside, and those outside on the large front porch, were filled with people chatting, eating, and laughing. It is only our fourth month in town and there we were having another amazing, glad that we moved back home moment. Of course, being the guys that we are, we stopped at Shaw’s Ice Cream on the way home, for one scoop of strawberry cheesecake and one of peanut butter cup round-up for me, and two scoops of strawberry for Robin.

Peak Saver

When we were last in Austin, TX visiting our friend Janet, we learned of a program by which the local energy provider would install in your home, free of charge, a programmable thermostat allowing the energy provider remote-access control to your air-conditioning. During a peak energy-use period, the provider could cycle-down specific A/C systems, reducing the strain on the grid and potentially avoiding brown-outs. We recently received a similar offer from St. Thomas Eneregy called Peak Saver and on Tuesday we had our programmable thermostat installed, free of charge. Apart from helping out during the hot summer days, the device will enable us to micro-manage our heat use during the winter, as it allows us to program 4 temperature settings a day (#1 - cool over-night, #2 - warm in the morning, #3 - cool during the day, #4 - warm during the evening and #1 - cool at night). The remote access A/C program is home-owner driven, and I believe that we likely won’t notice the temperature difference. If we do, it’ll just remind us that we’re doing our bit to help our friends, neighbours, and the next generations.

... and another thing ...

.... further to my Sunday rant about caring for our earth, in the September issue of Prevention Magazine there is an article noting a connection between the bacteria found in healthy soil and increased brain function. Researchers at the University of Bristol found mice who had inhaled the bacteria were better problem solvers. Perhaps they can figure a way to get a better job! A couple of pages earlier in the same issue there's an unpleasant prediction from the Harvard School of Public Health, warning to expect a 55% increase in pollen over the next fifty years, due to global warming. Interestingly, I'd also heard the increase in pollen is also the result of city planning. Apparently, many cities have decided to limit their planting to only one gender of trees, to eliminate cross-pollination which, naturally, results in messy fruitfulness.

Our nest

In Stephanie Donaldson's prologue to The Elements of organic Gardening, by HRH The Prince of Whales, she says "an organic gardener's focus is on the soil, while a conventional gardener's focus is on the plant".
Similar to using the word "smog" instead of "pollution", "conventional" in this context is a polite way of saying "short sighted". We're no longer so naive as to think that what we are doing to the planet is not affecting our health and we've got to stop wondering why our roses have no fragrance, if we've killed all the organisms in our gardens.
As Marjorie Harris wrote recently in Gardening Life, "we've done a fine job of fouling our own nest". She writes of ways to deal with our climate change, the first of which is to face the realities of it; the increase in storms (frequency and force), droughts and flooding, and bugs and disease which, as with our own mammalian viruses and diseases, have been strengthened by our chemical use
(stronger bugs = fewer predators).
The good news is that Nature is an amazing force - that's why there is a plant growing in the middle of our paved driveway! We just need to stop working against it and become part of the solution.
Stuff spinning around in my head (for today, at least) ...
1) Zeriscaping
2) Biodiversity
3) Indigenous, drought resistant perennials
4) Our rain barrels and push mower
5) Non-grass lawn (clover, thyme, periwinkle, moss)
6) Break up the sidewalk leading to our front door
7) Pruning the dead bits from our trees before the next storm