The Census

Well, I guess any geographer worth their salt was pretty excited yesterday to see the first of the 2010 Census numbers. As as expected, Michigan lost population. It was the only state to lose population. Thank you GM and cronies. It will also lose a congressional seat making it that much harder to renew its engines and energy.

(Sorry about the map. I don't know how to make it fit in this box. Suggestions?)

The Mango and the Snow: A Tale of Moderation

It is really cold here now, and we finally have snow. I think we haven't been out of the teens for several days now, pretty cold for December, but at least now it is wrapped in the peaceful white blanket of winter. Better than cold and just brown ground, which we had a few days ago.

I purchased a couple of hard mangoes several days ago. Each day I have been checking them to see if they are ready to eat. Today one was ready. It is not a local mango. They do not grow them here in Michigan, even in hoop houses! I guess it is a good thing that I was born after technology had gone far enough to bring mangoes to my Ypsilanti door, and any other citrusy fruit that saves us from scurvy!!! in the middle of winter.

I say this because I am, of course, known for my support of local food. And I do support the movement. I just made the first winter veggie roast the other day. It is so satisfying to have the heft of the root vegetables in a balsamic glaze when the weather is frigid. I even added some sweetness with maple syrup this time. All the veggies were local, either from the Ypsi Food Co-op or the AA farmer's market. I even make an effort to buy it from the farmer who IS growing it in hoop houses in Riga, Michigan.

But citrus, or mangoes are not on his or any other farmer's list.

So am I being bad?

I suppose to some die hards I am. That is okay. No one is perfect, and few if any are totally sustainable. I am okay with that. Here is the reason why.

Back in the day when i lived in LA I remember that everyone had their own "correct" and "healthy" diet, and few were tolerant of any one elses definition of healthy.

"What? you are serving meat?" I don't think anyone I knew when I left was still eating meat. when the average American eats nearly 200 pounds of meat annually, the vegetarian stance can be pretty radical to the rest of America.
"OMG how can you have dairy items that have rennet?"
"Tell me please that you aren't serving fruits mixed with your vegetables?"
"What no Soy milk for my coffee?"

It was getting so that I was afraid to cook anything. I was going to offend someone. Give me a break! (but of course they didn't). So I decided that this high than thou attitude had to end. I was going to serve what I was going to serve. nothing wrong with some moderation.(Can't we all get along?) If you don't like it, then don't come. Fortunately I had help.

My dissertation topic was hog CAFOs (concentrated animal feeding operations). Hard to be writing on that when you were a vegetarian. And the Oklahoma farmers where i was doing my research were very aware when I came to call. A woman from LA? Working on CAFOs? They (rightly) feared I was a member of PETA, and would slice through their world with a cleaver that is very specific to their milieu. But I was coming from that place I mentioned earlier in this missive. I believe in moderation in all things. i had to see the world through their eyes. their world was just a little bit different than the soy milk world of LA. And it was a good thing had had that attitude because the farmers were no fools.

The first thing they would do when we started to know one another is invite me to lunch. while I appreciated sharing the meal, what they really wanted to know was: DID I EAT MEAT?

I was newly recovered from a bout of vegetarianism. One had a hard time not being vegetarian as some point in their life while living in LA, but i was never hard core. Even in the depths of one of my bouts, if I found myself near some BBQ ribs, I was in trouble. Moderation.

So when I moved to Michigan to teach at EMU, I came as a moderate in my food concerns. I am even now pretty radical for Michigan, (the other day I was trying to find some barley to make a barley soup and the grocery clerks at the market didn't even know what barley was. "Is is a fruit?" It turned out this big box market had NO barley. What is this world coming to? I should have purchased it at the coop) but I am sure that unless LA has changed radically itself (I don't think so) I am a moderate.

Good. I should be moderate in some ways. It is not a bad thing. And it allows me to eat mangoes in the snow.

Sometimes it is okay to be a moderate.

The Sins of Omission (not doing something you should have done)

Dr. Russell Ackoff died last year at 90. He was a wise man who understood the problems as they are currently addressed (analytical) and brought a synthetic mindset to the table.

In my continued studying of sustainability and how we get there, I am getting much deeper into systems thinking. I will be attending some workshops on same over the next month. Systems thinking is a team effort. I do not have a lot of community for this effort, so I am going out there to find it and then bring it home. I do have a small still loosely connected community of faculty and students who are beginning to think sustainably, but not enough to push me into my uncomfortable zones. that is why i am going to these workshops. they are where I am weakest and I need to gain confidence and experience in those areas.

Ackoff begins the above interview with 5 types of content in the brain. Each level is built on the preceding level.

Data, information, knowledge, understanding, wisdom.

I buy into that and hope someday to attain the heights of that hierarchy, but for now, I want to ask, where are we in our general education today? We are BIG on data. We call ourselves the information age. Undoubtedly there are many with a lot of knowledge, but I think the drop off begins at understanding.

One of my repeatable quotes (Einstein, Ben Franklin?) is: "The definition of insanity is doing the same thing over and over and expecting different results."

I see our society as insane for these reasons. I see the education system as insane. We have to take a chance FAIL to find the right way.

The path to success is paved with failure.

We have a broken system in so many ways and yet as Ackoff says: we aren't rewarded for our failures, we are penalized. The way to success today is through NOT taking chances.

The sins of omission. Don't address the problem but sweep it under the rug. Do nothing- not do something you should have done (like a population policy?).

I find what he had to say in this interview very wise. He got to the top of the hierarchy. He took chances to do it (he was kicked out of several schools along the say), but his understanding of the problems and his willingness to address them, made him wise.

I look forward to taking the chances in the coming months. I hope to succeed, but expect to fail along the way.