Keep your eyes on Japan

Hi folks- I'm still here, and still very much want this blog to keep going.  I appreciate your sticking with me.

As I've mentioned in the past couple years, it has become a problem for me to find a topic I can write about without being depressing- when I don't think either you or I need that.

But now that it's no longer a question of "is climate change happening", nor "are world politics getting entirely out of hand" - I find it's actually a little easier to focus on what to say.

I want - if possible - to be one of those who survive.  As a lifelong student of evolution, opting out of survival is how you certainly "lose the game."  If there's a game.  If you can win or lose.

And I hope to bring family and community through, too.  Now the question is "how?"  Because there are no roadmaps; our species and planet are moving into completely unknown territory; we truly do not know what happens next.

One thing I know for certain today (I know something for certain!  How cool is that!) is that most of the world events generating headlines do not come from "new" phenomena, though they are virtually always spun that way by the sophomores in charge of the press.  Income disparity?  Has existed in all societies, in all eras back to Babylon and Sumer - literally.  And has always caused injustice, pain, and slaughter.  Slavery?  Same.  Corrupt officials/police?  Same.  Schools not teaching what students need?  You can find that complaint on clay tablets in cuneiform - really.  Unwelcome, unstoppable, migrants?  Ever heard of Romans?  Hittites/ Mongols/ Europeans? War/ Genocide?  It goes on.  Even climate change and sea level rise; take a look at Doggerland, called "Britain's Atlantis" in the popular press.  That happened so far back we remember as myth- although Australian Aborigines have re-told the story for 10,000 years without losing accuracy.

The point.  The point is that history, available to us all, contains myriad examples we should be learning from.  Mostly, of course humans refuse to learn from history.  I have 2 favorite quotes on that point, the first from Aldous Huxley, "That men do not learn very much from the lessons of history is the most important of all the lessons that history has to teach."  Stolen from many sources, usually less wordy, into antiquity.  And a currently popular version, cheerfully sent to me via Facebook, from Spice: "Some of us can learn from other people's mistakes; but most of us just have to piss on the electric fence."  That was stolen from Will Rogers, the earliest wise man with electric fence available for metaphors.

All of history, now that "the google" is here, is at your fingertips.  It's fascinating, highly educational, and tremendously entertaining.  Particularly all the mutually incompossible versions.  I recommend it.

Which finally brings us to Japan.

Japan is unique among "developed" nations, in many ways; but most importantly: A) It is an island- which I pointed out years back would be the first places to be forced to change.  B) It was the top economy on the planet- 20 years ago, and is in decline now.  C) Achieved the highest "standard of living" for the largest percentage of population ever.  D) Is losing population, around 1 million in the past 5 years.  And E) Emerged so recently and directly from feudalism that the people still actively remember most of their pre-industrial culture.  Oh, and lived through "The Atomic Age" - and are now struggling to leave it behind.

Japan is 10-30 years ahead of the curve for the rest of the industrialized countries, in politics and economics and every other aspect of our species I can identify.  They've been there, done that, got the t-shirt, and have worn the t-shirt into rags.

The populace is still stunningly wealthy by world standards; but the future is frightening, downhill tracks are everywhere.  Old and young are worried and depressed to the point of suicide and craziness.

We can see all those problems and tendencies in our own backyards.  But Japan is out in front.  If you want some hint of what is likely coming to the communities near you - watch Japan.

Remember it is what is written between the lines that is most important.  Always.

And keep the incredible variety of wildly enthusiastic Japanese festivals in mind.  They don't know what the future holds - so -

I do like the metaphors available in that photo.  It's dark, and it's cold.  But there are lights, with some warmth.  And people - tending them.  And these lights are facing in all different directions.

Burning my old friend's bones.

A year ago, at the end of that exceptionally hot, dry, summer, I lost a very old friend.

This friend was someone I'd watched, walked beside, touched, admired, and cheered for, for decades.

She was a very large, strong, and beautiful red elm.  I say "she", which is not biologically accurate, because she often shed large amounts of seed.  At least twice, I put down tarps beneath her, collected her seed, and planted it.

I'd watched her nearly die, and then fully recover, 20 years ago; so I'd been hoping she'd make it this time.  That year had been hot and dry, too.  This one was apparently too much.

Red elm is one of my favorite trees; I like their attitude and behavior.  They can grow very fast when they're where they belong, tend to make big strong logs that can be used in more ways than oak.  The wood is beautiful; almost as dark as freshly cut black walnut, with lovely grain; the wood is as strong as oak, tougher than oak, very rot resistant, often splits as easily as any wood can; burns hot, makes the best long lasting coals for holding fire overnight - and - it will dry out completely just standing in the woods for a year.  Oak will never- ever- dry out on the stump; not if dead for 2 decades.  Oak requires great foresight, and careful storing to dry for use as fuel.  And a lot of sweat, wrassling all that soaking wet, heavy as pig iron, oak biomass- at least twice.

Elms are more forgiving (our elms, anyway) - if you weren't able to get this winter's wood cut and stacked under a roof two years ago- you can just cut an elm that's been dead for a year- and burn it efficiently today.  (Well, the top.  The butt log will be wet enough it will need drying.)  Red elm is the same as "slippery" elm; humans have used the inner bark for food and medicine for millennia (which is one reason the tree is less common these days), but in addition to food from bark, the red elms in Canada produced such heavy seed crops that Ernest Seton reported the passenger pigeon flocks migrated specifically to gorge on slippery elm seed.

Probably part of why I like red elms is they are ignored, misunderstood, and undervalued.  Underdogs in the canopy.  If you look them up on the internet, you'll find the pharm pages usually calling them by a Latin name the botanists declare obsolete; and both sources say "the wood is of no commercial value" - therefore, it's fine when they die after all their bark is stripped.  No value?  The mind boggles.  Never mind all the creatures dependent on them in the ecosystem, in the early 1980's, many of my neighbors made a lot of money- selling their big red elms- to Italian wood buyers.  True, local loggers didn't want them.  But the Italians paid the same money as for black walnut.  They shipped the logs to Italy.  Where they were veneered, and the veneer used to make very expensive furniture.

And the freshly cut wood is fragrant.  For me, it's a scent associated with childhood- in an unusual way.  When I was 8 years old, or so, my family spent 3 weeks in Japan.  The shops that specialized in wood carvings all had the same strong, pleasing, fragrance as you walked in the door.  I was too young to ask which wood it was, but many of the boxes and figures of dark wood carried it.  I'm pretty sure, now, it was Cryptomeria wood, Japanese cedar.  The smell of red elm is identical, as far as I can tell, and when I split it, or handle it, it brings many bits of those years and that trip back.

When I first got here, in SE Minnesota, our farm woods had 3 (at least) species of elm; American elm (Ulmus americana) predominated, then red elm (U. rubra), then rock elm (U. thomasii), which I confused with American for years.  We had huge American elms; but 90% of them died in my first 10 years here, from Dutch Elm Disease (DED).  American elm trees are lovely to look at- but of very little use to humans otherwise.  The wood rots immediately; making it dangerous to fell a big tree dead more than a few months- they call them "widow-makers", because huge portions of the top can crack off in felling- and fall the opposite way.  On you.  The wood is pretty, distinctive, but very little used because it tends to crack as it dries, and warps like crazy. And when the wood burns- it stinks; the farmers in most of the midwest called it "piss-elm".  Dry American elm does make a hot fire, though, if stinky; apparently unlike English elm.  Most versions of the firewood rhyme from England say "Elmwood burns like churchyard mould; even the very flames are cold."  Ew.

Red and rock elm are just a little resistant to the DED fungus.  Part of the picture is that American elm is a tetraploid species- it has 4 copies of the chromosomes, which often makes a plant more vigorous.  And it was faster growing, and often bigger than red or rock- but they are diploids; and sometimes slower growing means tougher.  Sometimes, the diploids can get DED - and get over it.  My old friend did; in that previous hot dry year; I watched, afraid I was going to lose her.  The stress of the drought brought on a serious attack of DED- I watched the leaves in the crown wither and die.  And rejoiced, in the literal meaning of that word, when she recovered over the next few years.  I admire survivors.  That was when I started gathering and planting her seeds.

No, I never named her.  Though I knew her intimately.  She stood just beside the tractor road I made into our woods, which we immediately also used for walking and skiing.  There were very few times when I traveled that road, in any mode, when I did not pause and look up at her crown, to see how she was doing.  I watched hard in the spring of 2013.  But she was gone.

She was big.  By anyone's standards.  I felled her yesterday, and the stump where I cut is about 30 inches in diameter.  Very large, for this area; our Minnesota hardwoods are lovely- but smaller than those East and South.  The wood from the crown, fully dry after one year, will heat two households for several weeks.  Her crown was unusual.  Very broad; branching, rising, and spreading with curves that I can only describe as Art Nouveau.   And each branch sensible, individual, and functional.

The big trunk is blocking the road now- and will likely block it for a couple weeks, until we can get in through the deep snow and haul the log out with the tractor.  I have fantasies of getting one or two of the logs cut for boards.  We can use them.  And I'll try to get some of the top turned into a bowl or two; red elm is a favorite of wood turners, too.

How does it feel, to burn my old friend's bones?

Warm.  Decades of warm.

Long years of memory; long years of companionship.  She was my companion.

I don't know if she knew; the gulf between our species is very large; but I knew.  And it wouldn't surprise me at all, as either human or scientist, if she knew.  Most tree species are tens of millions of years older than our paltry 2 and half or so.  They are very sophisticated creatures- and survivors.  Their life-pulse is so slow, few humans can sense it; they live in an utterly different way, and time.  Right beside us.

She is my companion still.  With every chunk of her I put into the stove, I remember our lives.  I think she's glad.  Now she's warming two houses, full of my family.  Her stump is 4 feet tall, and will last for at least 20 years.  Big enough to sit children up on; big enough to host hundreds of smaller creatures yet, in that time.

She's taking care of my babies.  I'll take care of hers.  Some 20 or so of her seedlings are growing; I'll see to it they get a chance.

There is no goodbye here.  I looked at her crown so many thousands of times, I'll always see it when I look at her children.  Clear as clear.

"All circuits are busy."

Hi.  Haven't forgotten you.  Delighted so many are still here.

My repeated attempts to blog more frequently have not succeeded, as we all know.  Many, many reasons; one of them possibly being a "natural lifecycle" for bloggers and blogs.  I take some comfort from the fact that both Sharon Astyk, who was a hyper-maxi-turbo blogger for years, and Crunchy Chicken, likewise, both of whom became my good friends as we all blogged- have gone through this exact process- Crunch first, then me, then Sharon.

We're not any of us dead yet- but no question we've slowed down.  Have we run out of things to say?

I don't think so; I think it's more a matter of "iceberg fatigue" with the blogs.  I think the blogs make a difference- and help us all - but eventually it starts to feel like "this isn't enough"... and the energy necessary to keep going flags.

I am, of course, still pushing on icebergs; as are Sharon and Crunch.  That's part of the problem; for me and I know for them- the other icebergs have loomed up on us, and are taking more of our available time and energy.  My "other life" has gotten really busy, in my case.

And, as we accumulate a body of writing here, there's a desire to not repeat ourselves.  And, in my 350 posts here, I did talk about a bunch of different stuff.  Lots of it could use updating, etc.; but the fact is that kind of writing is just not as much fun for us writers; it's careful work; instead just ripping off a good rant.

But!  Still here. Still interested in Life, the Universe, and Everything (which hopefully won't just all vanish on us too soon).  And still cruising the internet sometimes, trying to track down things that interest me.

I found one, recently; which I can share with you.  A blogger much younger in the lifecycle, so hopefully she won't disappear on us soon.  She has two blogs; one is simply her dream journal (she has incredibly lucid and detailed dreams) which you can find at Dreampan (she works in the movie business; pretty sure that's a camera pan reference.)

And the other is her photographic journal of Life- and she has a wonderful eye, a good camera- and a genius for whimsy.  That would be at Thistrinket; and here is the specific post which cracked me up so thoroughly that I wanted to share her with you:

Not everyone who headed out West made it.

Brilliant, Shandra.  :-)  Thanks.

Autumn Fires

I lit the fire in the wood cookstove today.  Almost certainly, it will stay lit, until some time next May.

It's our third cookstove; I'm getting around to writing a review about it; soon; now that we've lived with if for 2 full winters and all the rest of the seasons.

This has been a very strange weather year.  Cold, dry, then floods, then over-hot and drought- now we've shifted into- normal weather for the Autumnal Equinox; cool, windy, cloudy- rainy.  Looks consistent enough to move the propane stove out, and we need the heat for comfort, when each night is dropping into the 40s°F.

I found poetry running through my brain, as it tends to when seasons shift.  In this case, a bit that used to be part of all children's education in the English speaking world: Sing a song of seasons! Something bright in all!  Flowers in the summer, Fires in the fall!

Robert Louis Stevenson, A Child's Garden of Verses.  I looked it up, thinking to comment on how spectacularly short he'd made that lovely poem; and discovered- it wasn't quite that short.  Of course.  At least one of my poetry professors would have railed at RLS for not chopping everything but that last bit; it works on its own.  Here in its entirety:

     Autumn Fires


   In the other gardens
   And all up the vale,
   From the autumn bonfires
   See the smoke trail!

   Pleasant summer over
   And all the summer flowers,
   The red fire blazes,
   The grey smoke towers.

   Sing a song of seasons!
   Something bright in all!
   Flowers in the summer,
   Fires in the fall!

It still made sense when I was a kid- we raked up the leaves, and everyone on the block burned them, in the street.  Not exactly bonfires- but still community- the fires were tended carefully; children watched; parents watched, talked; a marshmallow or two would get toasted.

Now of course leaf burning is banned- everywhere I know of.  Yes, it made a lot of smoke.  But.  Something else now gone.  And for me, the "fires in the fall" now are in the stove.  Still a rite of passage; but changed.

Changes.  We've lost two very dear people this past week; both unexpected; both far too soon.

Here's one of my own- for them.


     Forty eight  9/28/96

   Walking my paths
   alone

   There was one last
   blueberry

   dangling
   ready to drop

   fat and sweet
   as any blueberry ever

   simple to pick it
   simple to savor

   rain cleared blue sky above
   wind, bright leaves

   so why was it so painful
   just knowing
   that you love blueberries

   can you comprehend
   the pleasure it would have been

   for me to share
   one blueberry
   with you?

Pushing On Bergs- The Berg Moves...

One of the things about pushing on icebergs- when an iceberg you've been pushing on, hard, actually moves - and in the right direction- you're still never sure if your pushing is what moved it.

But.  Physics being what it is- it's entirely possible that without your push, it would still be sitting there.

A Berg just moved, and in the right direction.  It was a Bloomberg this time, not an iceberg- but the resemblance is actually considerable, and the Bloomberg had, in fact, been sitting immobile and unmovable for quite some time.

The basic story; the Mayor of New York City came out and endorsed Obama for re-election - because:

“Our climate is changing,” he wrote. “And while the increase in extreme weather we have experienced in New York City and around the world may or may not be the result of it, the risk that it may be — given the devastation it is wreaking — should be enough to compel all elected leaders to take immediate action.”

So; am I saying Bloomberg endorsed Obama - and climate change- because of my pushing?

I'd like to hope I'm not delusional, at least not more than other folks; (humor) but here's the thing; I WAS pushing- in exactly the right place and time- for my pushes to have added just that last bit.

Do you suppose the Mayor of New York City reads The New York Times?  To keep a handle on what his city is saying?  I would, in his shoes, I think- even though, yes, he kind of has his own news service (uh, you've heard of Bloomberg?)

If he was reading the NYT; the very first article they carried about a possible connection between Sandy and climate change - carried my blunt and rude comment (#9 out of 178, so...), and linked here, to We Told You So, which is even ruder and blunter.  Did Bloomberg read it?  We'll likely never know- but- the We Told You So post got 450 hits, the very first day - mostly from the NYT.

There are now quite a few voices saying "we told you so" - but as far as I know, they only started to speak up the next day...

And I kept pushing.  With what I intended to be readable- but tough- comments, in several places;

Here: "Warnings for Years", my comment has 58 "reader recommends"- putting it high on the list:


"Hurrah!. Thank you for the plain statement- scientists saw this coming, long ago- did their duty and warned the public about it- and nothing happened.

"Journalists, and the NYT, bear some responsibility for that lack of action- by insistently presenting these warnings as doubtful; when in fact they are as certain as the fact that the San Andreas Fault- WILL - slip again some day.

"So it's grand to see this. I'm hoping the Times as a matter of policy will start to bar climate change deniers from its pages- exactly as it now bars Holocaust deniers. Deceiving the public causes very great societal harm. You can see it today- all around you.

"For the non-scientific; there's another powerful fact here: in the practice of Science, everything is constantly doubted; even peer-reviewed "truth" always carries a 5% rating of "or, we could be wrong". (That's not supposed to cause paralysis.)

"But- in the long term testing of concepts; one of the most powerful pieces of evidence is the prediction- that comes true. Einstein's theories have been tested this way multiple times, just in the last decade- and his predictions, so far, are always correct. That's powerful evidence that he understood the universe.

"This storm, and its consequences, were predicted in detail; and it has all happened. That is, formally, a powerful piece of proof that the overarching concepts of global climate change- are correct."

Rude, huh?

Finally, ending with this one- directed to the Mayor; at which time the NYT top Science article was this horror - which has no opportunity for comment with it...  but did have big links on the front page...


"Hurrah for Bloomberg! Frankly, 3 words I did not ever expect to be coming out of my mouth- along with "This just makes Christie look like a bigger man!"

"Now- Mr. Mayor- can you put some pressure on the NYT editors to quit printing this "scientists aren't sure" malarky? Scientists ARE sure- it was predicted, in great detail, that such storms could happen, and how NYC would flood. And here we are- "proof" doesn't get any better than predictions that come true."

You know what?  That comment again got plenty of "likes"; lots of people saw it and agreed- and if you go to the NYT right now- you have to really dig to find that "scientists not sure" article; it's place at the top of everything has been given to articles on "prescient maps" and "preparing for next time."

Not only did the Bloom berg move- the NYT editorial policy seems to have moved; and there's an iceberg for sure.

My pushing?  Laughable.

Except- I did keep pushing; as hard as I could- and I was pushing at the right time, in the right place- for it just maybe maybe- to have made some difference.

It doesn't really get any better than that, when you push on an iceberg.  You'll never really know- if you made a difference.

But the fantasies are great!  And I'm going to keep pushing.  : - )

We Told You So.

Yeah, somebody needs to say it, I think; and as I peruse the international news today- nobody is.

A great measure of the effectiveness of the climate denial troops in squashing the dialogue.

That and the basic politeness of good people.  This would not be considered the best time to be getting all hoity-toity - about anything.  A whole lot of people are in a great deal of pain.  We should all just be quiet, and help each other out, right?

Except- that's what climate change warners (such as me) have been TRYING to do - for decades now. Prevent human anguish.

And here we are.  Yes, Hurricane Sandy is a direct result of human caused climate change, brought about by burning way too much fossil fuel, to power "economic growth".

Being silent about it- won't help either.

Big headline at the moment; Gov. Christie of New Jersey is cited by CNN as saying:


"Superstorm Sandy left wreckage in its wake 'beyond anything I thought I'd ever see,' New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie said at a news conference today.

'The level of devastation at the Jersey Shore is unthinkable,' he said."

Except - it isn't unthinkable, nor beyond what we expected- it's right smack in the middle of mainstream climate change predictions.  Hotter oceans cause bigger storms cause bigger storm surges- floods eastern coastal US cities.  Duh.

So.  Maybe we shouldn't be shy about saying "We told you so."

And maybe we should start saying "You're a goddamn liar." to the deniers; regularly.  Right out loud.

Just to soften my harsh message, a tiny bit- I'll point out I have a long track record of insisting on people hearing the "I told you so", when it's appropriate; this is Smidgen, age 5 (now 7.5) - after "being silly on the stairs" - one time too many.

You see- Smidgen was the one who insisted on my writing that on her cast; she was eager for it.  Because?  She'd already heard the story, many times, about my writing it on the cast her big brother Beelar had to have on his leg, years before...

Another maple dance.

Once again, conditions were not quite right this year for the amazing phenomenon I came to think was "normal"; 20 years ago.

We were watching; and were rewarded for that.  But the majority of the big compound leaves, walnuts, butternuts, hickories, and ash- were stripped off the trees by 30 mph winds in the two days before the frost.  So once again, we had a modest version, performed mostly by our sugar maples, with a few turns from the wild black cherries.

Attempts to take video have so far failed to capture anything vaguely resembling the experience; now I'd rather just see; watch.  But the end results can give you some idea:

Oh, hurray!  Blogger seems to have decided that this time it will let you click on the pic, and you can see it in its original, much bigger, format.  So far!  The photo, incidentally, is completely natural- I didn't touch or rearrange a single leaf.

It made quite a carpet, all lying flat as they fell in the calm.  Another change- this year our sugar maples had more red in their colors than I ever remember seeing; usually ours give us yellows, only.  Why?  You can find lots of educated answers- but keep in mind the educated guessers all thought our colors would be poor this year, because of the long drought and heat- but in fact the colors have been unusually bright.

Gone now, of course; they curl as they dry in the sun; fade and tumble when the wind comes up.

Lovely, while it lasts.

Mourning.

It's not like I have nothing else to think about; and I really prefer to not pass on depressing news these days. We all have enough of that.

But there was an event announced today which has been preying on my mind since I saw it; and which truly should not go unnoticed, unmarked.

We've lost another big animal. The "Javan" rhinoceros- which actually used to range from India and Burma throughout SE Asia- is now known to be extinct on the mainland, entirely. The last remaining Vietnamese rhino was poached.

For a long full story; a video from Vietnam is here. It works well at full screen. If you have children who can understand it, tolerate it, it would be great to share with them.

This is a bigger loss than the international press is recognizing, I'm pretty sure. The only remaining members of the species are the 50 or so in an isolated national park in Java. The island populations have been separated from the mainland animals for a very long time; while they were called just subspecies- I can guarantee they were genetically quite distinct.

The world is changing. Much of what we are losing is completely irreplaceable. The extinction of such a creature- so ancient- a species that has survived so many challenges over its existence- is sad beyond any words I can find.

I won't forget this day. But the truth is- the world has barely noticed; and this loss will change nothing about the way we do business. Maybe- time to boycott cashews. That seems to be the major factor in the loss of the rhinos' last Vietnamese forest. And- who knew? And what other species are vanishing, for a few luxury nuts, and a little money?

These are in Java, captured by camera trap. Palm oil may be the biggest real threat there. It's in everything processed in the US, these days.