What are we thinking? Or Are we?

Browsing through the fashion literature in a San Francisco waiting room recently I was struck by the pervasive narcissism of so much of humanity. Pondering the superficiality of what is being offered as models for admiration made me long for fashion more down to earth.  Is high fashion truly cool?  Do these images represent values you respect or want your children to aspire to?  Beyond the obvious affectation and self-centeredness is a lack of modesty and an awareness that the world doesn’t really revolve around them…or any of the rest of us.

For us to live the high life, or even the not so high life, requires enormous systems of supply and refuse, the functionality of which depends on highly organized machine-like efficiency.  These are systems that are typically kept out of sight and out of mind…and for good reason: they can be deeply disturbing…and they are growing steadily as our unbridled population spreads out over the countryside.

 

Efforts like reducing carbon emissions or water usage, while perhaps commendable in their own right, are only treating symptoms of an underlying problem. Consider our endless efforts to control and conserve water while simultaneously accepting the growth of more people.  If we restrict water usage but allow population to grow the result is more and more people using less and less water.  Our feckless leaders, who probably don’t know any better, just keep kicking the can down the road.  But that is only the tip of the iceberg because providing water allows for additional human beings and this has far greater impact on earth’s resources than just water.  Consider the following, as I partially listed in “Footprints in Tomorrow’s Mud” (5-1-14), the average American in an average lifetime will:

Use 1.8 million gallons of water

Burn 31,350 gallons of gasoline

Discard 64 tons of garbage to landfills

Use 29,700 pounds of plastic

Use 43,371 aluminum cans

Eat 7000 animals

Etcetera, etcetera, etcetera

Multiply that by 340 million Americans and the impact on our planet’s resources, as well as our supply and refuse systems, becomes obvious.

When I see satellite images of our cities overrunning the natural landscape with asphalt, concrete, and lights I can’t help but draw parallels to medical images of viruses overrunning healthy tissue.  Cities will surely dominate our future, but I hope our cities can be restrained and be parts of the larger natural landscape rather than country or planet-wide megalopolises sprinkled with token parks and wildlife refuges.  We may be the dominant species, but we should nevertheless modestly remember that we are still just a species among species and that the planet belongs to all of us.  Doesn’t it?

 

 

 

 

Compassion

 

To be able to elevate our work and actions we need to know what we are doing and why:  Are we working for ourselves, our clients, mankind, God?  What is most important?  Along this line of inquiry I sometimes wonder which aspect of man’s legacy might be the most uniquely defining when viewed from a distant future.  Might it be our affinity for art like Beethoven’s Fifth?... or our technical acumen like the international space station?  both impressive to be sure.

But I think I would give serious consideration to man’s innate ability to show compassion.  The extent to which we are able to empathize must have evolved from initial compassion for other humans as a beneficial trait for our collective survival.  Today we can feel compassion both for one another and countless beasts as well, including those we do not actually know or see, but might only be aware of or might imagine.  As our numbers continue to overrun and displace so many of our fellow species they are now in ever growing need of our empathy and compassion.

An excerpt from a missive illustrating compassion:  “A female humpback whale had become entangled in a spider web of crab traps and lines.  She was weighted down by hundreds of pounds of traps that caused her to struggle to stay afloat.  She also had hundreds of yards of line rope wrapped around her body, her tail, her torso, a line tugging in her mouth.  This is her story of giving gratitude.  A fisherman spotted her just east of the Faralon Islands (outside the Golden Gate) and radioed for help.  Within a few hours, the rescue team arrived and determined she was so badly off, the only way to save her was to dive in and untangle her...a very dangerous proposition.  One slap of the tail could kill a rescuer.  They worked for hours with curved knives and eventually freed her.  When she was free, the divers say she swam in what seemed like joyous circles.  She then came back to each and every diver, one at a time, nudged them, and pushed gently, thanking them.  Some said it was the most incredibly beautiful experience of their lives.  The guy who cut the rope out of her mouth says her eye was following him the whole time, and he will never be the same.”

Compassion may not be a common trait throughout the universe, and may not continue to be a trait of our species in the future, although I like to think of us that way.  Some religions claim that the other beings on earth are here to serve our wants and needs.  I see us simply as a species among species and it is only by the luck of the draw that you and I are we rather than them, that, or it.  Compassion takes on a little different meaning once the point of view is changed and the old Mosaic adage applies as much or more appropriate than ever:  “Do unto others as you would have others do unto you.”

And I, Their Sister, Once Was As They                              And I, Their Brother, Once Was As They