Posts filed under ‘Living Green’
Vashon Island Events: Vision for Vashon Public Forum / Reweaving the Fabric of Community ~ Vashon Island Real Estate
On Saturday, April 25, from 1:30 to 6 PM, the Vision for Vashon will hold a public forum on the topic of Reweaving the Fabric of Community. The event will be held at the “O” Open Space for Arts and Community at 18870 103d Avenue SW, Vashon.
This ambitious program is intended to address the issues of the development of affordable housing for working poor on Vashon; building networks of organic growers, food activists and concerned citizens to create a system of food security; expanding access to affordable health care; the creation of a viable local exchange currency; taking advantage of funding for renewable energy projects to establish solar energy installations on the island; and developing Vashon’s potential as a model for sustainable practices.
The intent of this Forum is to stimulate a grass-roots, action oriented agenda to improve the quality of Island life, particularly for the working poor. The organizers hope to strengthen existing organizations and connections between active organizations on the Island, rather than to build a new organization.
The tentative schedule:
1:30 – 2:00 Arrival, enjoy tea/coffee, visit organizations’ display tables, welcome talk / orientation
2:00 – 3:30 Forum presentations and small group discussions on affordable housing, renewable energy and transportation, and sustainability projects on Vashon
3:30 – 3:50 Break
4:00 – 5:30 Forum presentations and small group doiscussions on health / wellness, local exchange currency and food security
5:30 – 6:00 Wrap-up
The forum will be followed by a dinner provided by Vision for Vashon and music with dancing by Bob Krinsky and Friends.
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Vashon Island Events: Introducing the Vashon Green Map~ Vashon Island Real Estate
Vashon’s Social Ecology Education and Demonstration School (SEEDS) has completed its work on the online Vashon Green Map, identifying community natural resources, cultural resources and green living resources. The Green Map System uses a set of universally recognized icons that have been developed collaboratively since 1995 and are active in 475 cities and 54 countries. SEEDS begain its first phase of the program at the Vashon Farmers Market on the Village Green on August 23, 2008.
The online maps are interactive and open to an array of uses. Bob Spivey, a member of the developing committee, notes that one idea has been to create a sub-map of land available for farming / gardening on Vashon for residents who may otherwise not have access to land. A key feature of the map is that site visitors may nominate sites that do not yet appear on the map, as well as sites they may wish to see on Vashon in the future.
Developers will be at the Farmers Market in early May to collect suggestions for the future development of the map. Donations to off set printing costs are appreciated.
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Vashon Island Events:Community Solar Options – Vashon Island Real Estate
An Informational
Forum on
Community Options
10 am – Noon
at the “O” Space
Hosted by Sustainable Vashon
• What are various models for
Community Solar Projects?
• Where are they?
• How do they work?
• Who benefi ts?
• Do we have enough sunshine on
Vashon?
• How will we pay for it?
• Why would we want one on Vashon?
• How do we get started?
Open Space for Arts and Community – 18870 103rd Avenue SW (off 188th, behind the Sheffi eld Building and Sawbones)
For more information, contact JENNIFER WILLIAMS at jwfarm@centurytel.net or (206) 463-9264.
PANELISTS
HEATHER MULLIGAN, Market Manager,
Green Power PSE
ROB HARMON, Chief Innovation Offi cer & Senior Vice
President, The Bonneville Environmental Foundation
HEATHER RHOADS-WEAVER, Director, eFormative
Options and Founder, NW SEED
GARY NYSTEDT, Resource Manager, City of Ellensburg
(Community Solar Project)
JOE DEETS, Executive Director, Community Energy
Solutions, Bainbridge Island
Doors will open at 9:30
GET ANSWERS TO YOUR QUESTIONS!
Letter from Vashon Island: Community, Activism and Glacier Mining
Blessings All
These thoughts are especially directed towards those who reside on Vashon.
We are in the midst of very serious times and i do ponder daily how the community will rise to deflect harm from those we know and love. Ours is a most apathetic country where those still getting by with remnants of privilege are stymied. Is it fear? It can’t happen here? Am i the only one feeling isolated in the face of what unfolds locally and globally?
For two years, my child and i have found sanctuary on Vashon. In that time, each of us shaped a niche participating in a progressive and unique culture. We came and remain due to family ties and magical connections, otherwise it would be impossible to continue. Perhaps we would be experiencing homelessness which happened in the past when my oldest 2 were small.
In the late ’80′s we traveled the peace path in our homey van parking it along the way in yards of friends or parks for a night or two. Now i would fear much more for our well being as the desperation level escalates and the simmering undercurrent of violence strikes down the most vulnerable, invisible, marginalized. The frontline destinations are crumbling as people resist in isolation or leave traditional lands, disappear into the grind, die, or become addicts. Now all facets of class are impacted. Millions join the ranks of the voiceless. Millions.
Recently i participated in civil disobedience with a group of courageous people opposing the Glacier Sand and Gravel Mine. How inspiring to work with so many people of my children’s generation who display such fearless nonviolence and commitment! My prayer is that thousands of Vashonites will participate fully in the call of Gandhian nonviolence with conscious intent and resolve. Our Earth and her inhabitants so need this spirit of life, truth and love. Essential.
Activism has been central to my existence for close to 30 years. As i age in a privileged white male dominated culture, i have been witness to who continues to be heard or silenced. The template laid out by over educated white males is what one is pressured to replicate in order to attain “respectability”. One must conform to a standard that has been the hallmark of death and destruction all over the planet, tho supposedly more benign. The men in suits display the uniform appearance of what is supposed to open doors to success. I always wondered when i saw photos of Nelson Mandela in a suit and tie. My heart sang when i saw him in traditional clothing. Tho a suit may not be necessarily preferred garb, the attitude of superiority in knowledge and experience excludes. The preferred cliques tend to be overwhelmingly white, male and those who can meet certain standards of behavior, style, and articulation.
When will the all inclusive rhetoric be actually activated?
The more roots radical people become, the less such standards matter. Hence the longtime young activists devoted to supporting Black Mesa are more along anarchist lines, more broadly inclusive with a studied commitment to dismantling oppressive behaviors. Yet the struggle of the “isms” that divide us rise to the surface everywhere a frontline of struggle exists. Similar dominator models emerge regardless of political or social persuasion. The struggle to change behaviors is one of life’s hardest.
In 1986, i drove Pauline Whitesinger and her daughter Bonnie, who translated, in the van to the northwest to speak about the impending threats of forced relocation being resisted by her traditional Dine people along with traditional Hopis. Pulling into a remote truck stop in Utah or Idaho, we walked inside to use the restroom. Beefy men stared at her with hostility and she muttered defiantly in Dine Bizaad under her breath.
In Seattle, an educated Indigenous film maker asked Pauline if she wasn’t afraid that her use of the term “Mother Earth” might turn her listeners off. Pauline turned away from that woman and would not talk to her again. To this day, Pauline speaks little english and never deviated from her traditional clothing other than boarding school in the ’30′s and in jail once for defending the Sundance grounds at Big Mountain in 2002. She has never boarded a plane and her first step onto a boat was the Tahlequah ferry when i brought her out to Vashon in ’86. Her ways are of the high desert Black Mesa of northeastern Arizona, where she remains one of the few resisters to corporate driven forced relocation.
All too often, conformity is not the path of conscience, peace and justice. I feel it is an issue deserving of our close examination due to how easily one can slip into the rut of exclusion.
So that brings me to the words spoken to those of us preparing for the blockade by the lawyer. The phone was put on speaker while propped on the floor while he told us the importance of being well groomed, “no piercings, no beards”, not looking like dirty hippies when appearing in court. I found his spiel insulting and addressed it after wards, but few agreed. Most felt his words of value. Many feel the need to fit in order to be heard. Again, if success is attained, such moves are seen as what worked. What does that say for the struggles that are unceasing where people cannot possibly appear any other way than how they always are? Privilege is at play….
I have never taken a lawyer in doing civil disobedience, even when facing felony charges for blocking a bulldozer threatening a burial site at Big Mountain in 1989. I represent myself and will continue to do so. It is the Gandhian way. Tho i do not necessarily adhere to all of Gandhi’s ways, i certainly do to much of his philosophy. Look at his attire when doing civil disobedience. Tho trained as a lawyer himself, his clothing reflected his Hindu roots. There is no shame in claiming one’s culture.
I wish to honor those who do take on the legislators, Representatives and other bureaucrats in the tireless efforts to educate those who have power. I do not judge those who strive to be as effective as they can according to their own hearts. I plea that those of us who are not called to groom ourselves in a certain way are also honored. It is the elevation of one approach over another that must be examined.
All my life i have taken a stand for my own unique way of being in the face of family disregard and social bigotry. I do claim my culture as Hippie and have been living the principles of simplicity, creativity, nonviolence, organic planet for 40 years. It is precisely this way of life that made me useful to the traditional Dine and Hopi people i have known for so many years. Working with those whose way of life is the ongoing struggle to demand an end to genocidal policies has been my greatest inspiration.
As i became closer to the struggle of Pauline and her relatives, i also became aware of how totally silenced such traditional people are all over the Americas. It is a lifetime commitment to be of service to their ongoing stands for sacred lands.
Early drive around the back lanes hugging the hills above the west facing island the other morning brought many scattered realizations into a bouquet of reality; each critical experience a separate flower. So i assess relationships and what is silenced in a setting such as this treasure of the Puget Sound. Each human has hidden gems of wisdom and inspiration to contribute to solution in these potentially terminal times. What unfolds as trust is nurtured defies the control of agendas. We must find the time to deeply hear each other. This is critical to success. We now have everything to lose. The old growth is dying; dead zones spread in the seas; genocide has infected humanity, unkindness eats away in small, yet deadly ways and we seem blinded by reality’s toll upon fragile portals for the future.
Several Native American friends were visiting the other night, including my best friend, LisaNa. She was picking her dog up i cared for the preceding week while she had installed her art at the WSU gallery in Pullman and gave a lecture about her philosophy and work.
LisaNa’s good friend is a Nisqually man, who has told me about the operation Glacier has in the Nisqually Delta and in the town of Dupont. He also told me about the connection of the Muckleshoot people, then Nisquallys, to the Chinook of Vashon and the area where Glacier is doing it’s damage. He said what Glacier has already destroyed and plans to destroy can never be replicated.
He told me how the fish hatchery on the Nisqually reservation carefully places the salmon eggs in boxes with water from a particular stream that is used all along as the hatchlings grow big enough to be released into the stream itself. He said that hardly any of those fish return, becoming lost because what has happened to them is not natural. It just is not working.
My friend calls himself a “renegade” Indian. He knows all about his people, the fish, the corruption of the allowed voices, the Tribal Council. He knows few care to hear what he has to say about the destruction of land, life, water and the fish. He gave the name to me of a man who is “qualified” to speak of these things. I called that man, but he has yet to return my call, tho i will try again and again.
I wonder if in calling to the Indians of these waters who care deeply about the Chinook, we could form a critical, unprecedented alliance in defending this fragile region. The people i feel will be most supportive will not fit into any neat category. They will fully be themselves. We need them as much as we need the Orcas, the herring, the smelt, the sand lance, and the Chinook salmon.
In peaceful struggle,
swaneagle harijan
A Common Mother and Grandmother
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Letter from Vashon Island: Community Service in Troubled Times
On Sunday, February 1, more than 50 Vashon Islanders convened at the Vashon Presbyterian Church for a Stone Soup discussion of meeting the needs of our neighbors during these difficult economic times. The gathering was organized by Vision for Vashon as part of their continuing efforts to organize and create resources for the community.
Inspired by the story of Stone Soup, Vashon Islanders each brought a contribution to the evening’s meal. The organizers then created two delicious pots of soup to enjoy while we discussed the ways in which the “Deep Recession” has affected us, what our fears for the future might be, and what we might do as a community to buffer the ill winds that blow over the Island.
As the organizers emphasized, the economic crisis is like a wildfire on a windy day . . . there is no way to know which way the wind will carry the fire. Therefore, those impacted by the economic crisis should avoid feelings of guilt about their situation. In view of the non-responsiveness of the economy to the Federal Bailout up to this point, the wildfire analogy is particularly apt.
The community forum was extremely successful in creating a venue that allowed neighbors to overcome traditional cultural inhibitions about discussing their financial situations. Perhaps this is the most important step in creating an opportunity for the community to pull together to find local solutions to the global problem. Neighbors related their experiences with humor, honesty and integrity. There appeared to be a commonly shared deep appreciation for the opportunity to tell individual stories.
This writer found the discussion among neighbors fascinating. There appears to be a consciousness that a fundamental change is afoot in our consumer-based economy. One member at our table, who lost his home to a medical crisis several years ago, offered that he had learned “just how little” he needs to get by. Others in our discussion group shared their real fears that they may lose their homes to missed mortgage payments, or the lack of health insurance, or increasing difficulties finding work in the area due to a more stringent ferry schedule.
Despite the vivid description of shared hardships, there was a strong sense of optismism arising from the shared commitment to community solutions to the problems people were facing. Perhaps the most important contribution made Sunday was the willingness of people to offer information to their neighbors on resources that are available. Vision for Vashon is working to publicize those resources.
While we at Go Vashon have established links on this site to several of the resources that exist to provide food and shelter, we have decided to take another step and use the power of this website to link people with specific needs to people who have the resources or knowledge to contribute. For example, if a person needs to have some work done on their car, we will publish that need under our Living Green category and search for a contributor on that topic. Think of it as a Good Samaritan’s Craig’s List. Eventually we hope to develop a deep reservoir of resources for our community which will sustain our lives independently of the faltering economy.
As always, remember that subscriptions to Go Vashon are free. We encourage our readers to write in with skills, knowledge or other resources they might offer or to describe specific needs they may have. And tell your friends about this service!
Chip Lamason, February 2, 2009
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Vashon Island Events: “Stone Soup – A Discussion about Hard Times and Hope”
Vision for Vashon Island will host “Stone Soup: A Discussion about Hard Times and Hope”from 4-6:30 PM on Sunday, February 1 at the Vashon Presbyterian Church. Guests are invited to bring a contribution for the vegetarian or meat-based (“meat-a-tarian”?) soups. Salad and bread will be provided.
The gathering is intended to provide an opportunity for the community to tell their stories of how the economic downturn has affected them or may affect them in the future. It is hoped that the process of sharing and deep listening will break down the sense of aloneness that permeates personal crisis.
This is the first in a series of community education programs which will include presentations on political advocacy, organizing and fundraising, as well as breakout sessions in food security, transportation, housing, health care, local exchange currency, the “greening” of Vashon Island and community-based funding sources such as revolving loan funds.
Vision for Vashon is a new Vashon Island resource for Island residents to explore means to deal with the economic crisis locally. The organization has distributed information by flyer which identifies sources for food and shelter.
For more information contact visionforvashon@gmail.com.
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Vashon Island Events: Miscellaneous — Forest Tour, Garden and Chicken Farming Tips, Drum and Dance Class
A tour of several Vashon Island properties that have undergone ecological thinning operations last year will be led by Derek Churchill, Vashon Forest Stewards forester along with Bill Loeber, King County forester and Jean Shaffer with the Forest Guild on Saturday, January 31 at 9:15 AM. The group will meet at the coffee stand in Burton. Participants should bring a bag lunch. The size of the tour is limited: Call David Warren at 463-9405 to reserve a place and for further details.
Vashon Island Growers Association is offering two classes on “Raising Our Own Food.” “Starting a Vegetable Garden” is offered from 10 to Noon on Saturday, January 31 and Saturday February 7. The course will cover choosing a location, soil building, garden planning, how to plant, frugal gardening, watering, protecting a crop, and more.
VIGA is also offering “Raising Chickens for Eggs or Meat” held from 3-5 PM on Sunday, February 8. The course will cover ordering chicks, housing, feeding, managing a laying flock and raising chicken for meat. The group will also discuss how to sell eggs at the Farmers Market.
Both classes will be held at the Vashon Lutheran Church and are free and open to the public. Pre-register by contacting Cathy Fulton at cathy@capturingmemories.com or call 463-5652.
Afro-Brazilian Drum and Dance Classes
RhythmJoycommences a new session of Afro-Brazilian drum instruction and dancing on Monday, February 2 at 6:30 pm. Drum students are given an opportunity to apply what they have learned to the dance portion of the program. Students may bring a friend for free for the first class. Dance classes start at 7:30. The cost is $64 for the four week session or $18 to drop in. No experience is needed and instruments are provided. The drum class is taught by Geoff Johns and the dance class by Carol Lutra Johns.
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Vashon Island Lunvision: Who Killed the Electric Car?
Lunavision and Peter Ray Present
Thursday, January 22, 7:00pm
Free
Writer/Director Chris Paine’s documentary feature film Who Killed the Electric Car? premiered at the Sundance Film Festival in 2006 before its release by Sony Pictures to critical acclaim in 100 U.S. markets. The film was the third highest-grossing theatrical documentary of 2006 and screened with An Inconvenient Truth in many markets.
Currently in wide DVD release, Paine’s film investigates the events leading to the quiet destruction of thousands of new, radically efficient electric vehicles. Through interviews and narrative, the film paints a picture of an industrial culture whose aversion to change and reliance on oil may be deeper then its ability to embrace ready solutions.
Who Killed the Electric Car? and Chris Paine were nominated by the Writer’s Guild for Best Documentary of 2006. The film also received nominations from The Broadcast Critics Awards and The Environmental Media Awards for Best Documentary of 2006. The film won the audience award at the Canberra International Film Festival and won a special jury prize at the Mountain Film Festival.
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Letter from Vashon Island: Glacier Mining and Civil Disobedience (cont’d.)
GoVashon has received a number of interesting responses to our essay on Civil Disobedience and the blockade of the Glacier Mining site several weeks ago on Vashon Island. Today we received the following post from Swaneagle a.k.a. FrontlineMom and reprint it with permission. We hope that other interested members of the community will take the opportunity to write in and express their views on this important issue. This dialogue underlines the unique value of the Blogosphere as an unfiltered forum for free speech in the community!
“Along with an inspiring group of mostly young people, I was part of the road blockade (. . . at the entrance to the Glacier Mining site . . . ). I feel it was a sacrifice to lock down from 5:45 am to 10:30 am even tho we were not arrested. Personally, I prayed for the relief of arrest due to the pain of being locked down so long in steel tubes. Once work started, we decided our point had been made. It is important to bring attention to what we face out here on Vashon.
THIS IS A WORLD CLASS ISSUE OF DESTRUCTION FOR PROFIT THAT MUST BE ADDRESSED AS SUCH. THE PROPOSED MINE MAY BECOME THE LARGEST SAND AND GRAVEL EXTRACTION OPERATION ON EARTH.
For many years I have been working on the human rights of traditional Dine (Navajo) and Hopi impacted by the largest coal strip mine in the US. Over 16,000 people have been forcibly relocated with over half of relocatees already dying. The land is dead, barren and useless. The Dine people have not benefited from this fiasco, only corrupt officials and Peabody have profited.
Many other similar issues have been part of my work. I am willing to do all I can to stop this insane destruction. It is undisputed that our future is grim and our children will be left with a hideous situation. How can we ignore this and keep ourselves safe when they will be left with a nightmare beyond our comprehension?
Voting works for those content to live in a rapidly eroding illusion. Oh, many voted for Obama, but he supports the death penalty and as well as “clean” coal and nuclear power. If one is marginalized and voiceless in this country, no visible representation is permitted.
The Native American voices who have vested interest in the health of the Chinook salmon have not been included. Too many are ignorant of the first peoples who still have heart and spirit invested into these lands taken. Such missing perspectives must be included if we hope for any kind of real solution.
Finally, I wish to say that i am willing to do all in my power to stop Glacier’s insane destruction. Devoted to deep nonviolence, I have exercised that several times already including on the water with courageous youth and other true-hearted activists. Some of us face felony charges if we kayak into the work perimeter again. How easy it is to become a felon in these times of well protected corporations.
We must hear our hearts and act accordingly. All over the earth people are losing their lives, land, community in the name of resource extraction greed. This cannot go on. We have much more freedom to resist on Vashon than the people of the Congo, in Chiapas, Mexico and certainly those remaining resisters at Big Mountain/Black Mesa in Arizona.
Nothing less that soul force courage will do justice to the highly endangered future our children are being handed. We must do our very best to do so much better than that. It is our sacred duty.
Vashon Island Homeowners’ Seminar: Sludge
“Care and Feeding of Your Septic System” a workshop at the Land Trust Building from 7-9 PM on Thursday, January 29, will discuss septic systems as an integral part of home design and the benefits of good maintenance. Teri King will teach the workshop and explore how your septic system works, how to keep it well maintained, and when to call a professional for help. This may be the last event funded by the Waterworks Grant on homeowner education. Register with Susie Kalhorn at 463-4006 or burnhorn@earthlink.net.
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Vashon Island Event: A Winter Feast for the Soul
A Winter Feast for the Soul is a 40-day worldwide event to practice peace for 40 minutes a day from January 15 to February 23, 2009. 
There is an active group on Vashon whose organizers are supporting this event with a series of seven events, each on Monday evening from 7 to 9 pm at the Land Trust Building, where five different spiritual practices will be featured. The opening celebration will be on January 12th from 7 to 9 pm. Further information can be found at www.winterfeastforthesoul.com
Think Green: Starting anew with COMPASSION
When you look back at the preceding year, it’s easy to allow your mind to begin assessing what you accomplished or failed to accomplish; what you did right and what you vow to never, ever repeat. The following question is one that I know will be relevant to each and every one of you. The question is “What lives between right and wrong?” The short answer to that is one you may not have considered. The answer is REALITY.
Reality represents those infinite shades of gray that will ALWAYS exist between right and wrong. Actually, there’s an even more provocative question to consider. And that is: What would it take for you to be happy with the REALITY of your present life? How is it that you could embrace your current experience with both arms; the life that is flawed but true and firmly nestled between where you’ve been and where you’re going?
If you’re waiting for the pressing realities of life to evaporate, then I invite you to simply accept that they won’t. If you’re straining to cross everything off your list, then just know that lists never end. This means that happiness is INSIDE of you, free from the uncontrollable life OUTSIDE of you. In other words, being happy with your life right now is about being at choice in life instead of having command over it. With such heavy influences affecting us globally and individually, I’m suggesting that you allow the desire to EVALUATE, FIX, or CHANGE to give way to the power of compassion.
As you consider that, I want to highlight an underlying paradigm that likely affects your thinking without you even being aware of it. By that I mean that we live in an “Either/Or” consciousness. And the more aware of either/or thinking you become, the more you’ll notice how that pattern shows up again and again. It’s right or wrong, good or bad, rich or poor, ally or enemy. The pervasiveness of that pattern didn’t happen in a vacuum. It’s everywhere you look and with very good reason.
The purpose of that paradigm in our society is plain; its effect is to polarize individuals, communities, and even countries. But either/or thinking isn’t necessarily the result of harmful intent. It continues on in each of us that have fallen under the spell of scarcity. Either/or thinking is the spawn of scarcity consciousness because it maintains the myth that resources are finite and that your very survival depends on getting your piece of the pie.
That way of thinking is to imply that the world is a place of HAVE or HAVE NOT and that competition is the best, or even the only, solution. Think about it… how does the either/or paradigm influence foreign policy? How does it affect your personal policy? You see, there is a third way. It’s the path of compassion. Compassion exists beyond competition for it’s rooted in your heart.
Choosing from and acting upon compassion means to engage the most evolved part of your mind. That part of your brain is called the neocortex which is most highly developed in humankind. It’s beyond the limbic or primitive part of your brain which is concerned with life and death. Life and death is the quintessential indicator that someone is operating from scarcity and from either/or consciousness.
And here’s the really beautiful part: because you’re capable of conscious thought, you ultimately decide which part of your brain you’d like to live from. YOU get to choose the road you take in life. At each new intersection there are three possibilities. To the left of you is prejudice and judgment. To the right of you is tolerance and forgiveness. And then there’s a third way of compassion, community and communication.
It’s a lovely experience to remain centered in your heart where there’s no need for blame. Compassion is the essence of creation. Without it, you will not heal yourself or your relationships. Without compassion, you will not transform your reverie into reality.
It’s the words of Dan Millman:
“The universe does not judge us; it only provides consequences and lessons and opportunities to balance and learn through the law of cause and effect. Compassion is the recognition that we are each doing the best we can within the limits of our current beliefs and capacities.”
My challenge to you is to begin noticing where either/or thinking is showing up in your life. See if you can find its source. And most importantly, use your creativity to explore the third path so that the road of compassion is the one you travel most.
Coming Events on Vashon Island…
The Vashon Computer Club will meet tat the Senior Center at 7:30 pm on Wednesday, January 14th. The focus for the session will be on image sizing and how to handle various images for emailing, printing and so forth. Admission: FREE
Grief Support group forming… if you’re coping with a death and need support in your journey, a grief specialist from the Providence Hospice of Seatle will offer a six week session from 6-8 p.m. on Wednesday evenings starting on January 7th. The meetings are located at the JG Commons complex. For more information or to register call Jane Fleming at 206.749.7704
Want to write or illustrate children’s books? Books By The Way invites authors and artists to meet on Thursday, January 8th at 7 p.m. For details call 463.5255
“The Sound of Human Longing: Field Notes for an Environmental Ethic of Care” will be the topic of a public speach given by naturalist and writer Kathleen Moore on Tuesday Jan. 13th at 7 pm at the United Methodist Church.
Letter from Vashon: The Vashon Maury Community Food Bank
I have always preferred to live in a small community where, if I did not know a neighbor’s name, I knew their face, and always felt comfortable starting a conversation. Perhaps this is due to growing up in a small town where neighbors were treated as part of an extended family. Perhaps it is also due to my parents’ efforts to bring our community together several times a year to share stories and keep in touch.
Today, December 31, the Beachcomber, our weekly paper, reports that the Vashon Maury Community Food Bank’s shelves are fully stocked again, after a precipitous drop in their supplies several weeks ago, apparently directly related to the economic turmoil the region and country is facing. The paper reports that support has been “creative and community-wide.”
The recovery of the Food Bank is one of the reasons I am so proud of this community. There is a shared culture here of taking care of our neighbors in need, and despite the economic pinch we are all feeling, the willingness to give is uplifting.
I write business articles on the state of the economy and particularly the housing market. A continuing theme has been the pandemic of fear that permeates the country, resulting in consumers hoarding assets even when they have the means to participate in our consumer-based economy. The health of the Food Bank belies that emotional fear and gives me hope that these troubled economic times will be met with determination and compassion.
Chip Lamason
Think Green: Despair or Dream for the New Year?
As we enter a new year in the shadows of global economic upheaval and wide-spread political violence, it may seem a rather difficult time in which to consider your own, deeply-held dreams and how you might go about realizing those aspirations amidst so much discord and doubt. What will it take to have you allow yourself to entertain your dreams?
Are you waiting for world peace or the end of the financial crisis? The reality is that NOW is the perfect time to carefully imagine the life you’ve truly been waiting to live and the person you’ve longed to become. Indeed, this is not the time for despairing but for dreaming… and dreaming BIG! Without first conceiving what you want mentally, how will it ever become reality? I believe that it is, in fact, our collective duty to dream ourselves into something better, something more authentic and lasting. It’s a matter of recognizing that as a civilization, we can no longer afford to go about living our lives while our dreams may be dying in the process. So, what can you do to give your dreams the life-giving energy they require if they are ever to become a reality?
Well, if you’re like most people, you may already be running full speed ahead and the thought of doing more in hopes of reaching your goal only lends itself to your sense of overwhelm. That scenario is typical of the cycle of negative thinking that’s common in our mutli-tasking society.
Such cycles begin with a feeling of OVERWHELM which is a symptom of scarcity consciousness that expresses itself as “I cannot do enough, be enough, or accomplish enough”. The busyness of life perpetuates the belief that, when you have satisfied others and when you have completed your endless incompletions, that your energy and focus will be redirected toward your dreams. It begins with recognizing that that is not so, and never will be.
If what I’m describing to you rings a bell, it suggests that you have a significant chance to prevent discouragement from turning into the hopelessness related to our growing epidemic of depression. This is an opportunity you definitely do NOT want to miss. Feeling hopeless is just that, a feeling based on your interpretation of circumstances. It’s not to say that HOPE doesn’t exist for you, but only that your awareness is out of alignment with what’s actually possible for your life.
In fact, optimism is a perspective which is critical to keep in mind once you understand that your dreams will either live or die by your own choosing. So, why choose hopelessness when it has such grave consequences?
A study by the American Heart Association shows the direct effects of psychological well-being on our bodies. It identifies hopelessness as “a strong, independent predictor of cardiovascular disease morbidity and mortality in American populations”. Heart disease, as you know, is a leading cause of death in the U.S. Having said that, you can see that keeping your dreams alive may indeed keep YOU alive!
So, you ask, what medicine will cure the dying dream? Imagination of course! It’s time to return to envisioning your future. Dreams have been described as Sleeping Visions. But dreaming is best accomplished not in a passive way, as while sleeping, but in an active and proactive fashion. It’s what I call Dynamic Dreaming.
So, let’s do some dynamic dreaming right here and now by taking the following quiz:
1. “Where have your dreams gone?”
Begin by considering the distinction between vacancy and dormancy. That dreams die altogether is an illusion. In other words, you may have allowed them to fade into the invisible realm yet there remain countless opportunities to re-vive your dreams by breathing them back to life. Breathing life into anything is the definition of inspiration. It’s a matter of identifying and incorporating those inspirational sources, such a people, books, poetry and art, that literally energize you and your dreams.
2. “How have you been willing to compromise your dreams?”
What priorities have you been living by? And how have those priorities served you? When answering these questions, it may be helpful to hold your wish list against a list of what you deeply value and notice if there are any apparent contradictions.
3. “What dream do you now choose to resurrect?”
Start with a single dream. If you’re unclear, think first about what you presently desire as old dreams may no longer be valid in your current life. Make certain these dreams originate from you, and not from others whom you wish to please.
4. “Where does your desire come from?”
Understanding the origin of your aspirations will provide you a stronger grasp of how to bring them to fruition. In truth, it’s about getting really intimate with what you desire in a way that forms a never-ending relationship between you and the future experiences you long for. The origins of the word desire (to “long for or wish for”) are inspiring all by themselves. They point to an 11th century Latin phrase meaning “to await what the stars will bring”. What a beautiful image to hold as you look skyward and reconnect with what longs to be alive in you.
5. “Will you let yourself DESIRE again?”
Desire is the quiet song of hope that never completely fades. It’s an underlying yet powerful force that motivates you day after day, even when your actions don’t answer that desire directly. It’s that sound you hear at night, lying in the dark; the voice that, when ignored, begins to hassle and haunt you to take action towards conceiving and eventually birthing what will never be if you don’t first choose to it to be.
In the words of former U.S. president Theodore Roosevelt:
“Far better it is to dare mighty things, to win glorious triumphs, even though checkered with failure, than to take rank with those poor spirits who neither enjoy much nor suffer much, because they live in the gray twilight that knows not victory or defeat.”
Until next time, I wish a very Happy 2009!
Think Green: Vashon Holiday Greetings
As temperatures plummet and our typically temperate shores are dusted in snow, it is that time of year to draw close, go within and really do some green thinking. What I mean to say is that to ‘think green’ is an ever-present opportunity to reflect upon, and thereby magnify, the riches that exist within you as well as the riches that surround you in the form of a warm house, a gift, a loved one or a loving intention. Yes… living green is as much an attitude or perspective as it is something you do.
We find ourselves confronting truly challenging economic conditions in the world which may cause you to alter the ways in which you typically observe Christmas and New Year. Yet you have an opportunity to be still, breathe deeply and know that you have the ability to give your SELF the greatest gift of all this holiday; the gift of creating an abundant, grateful and gracious condition WITHIN regardless of those circumstances that exist outside of you daily. Think about the jewels of your life as precious ornaments to wear within. There is much to celebrate! It’s a matter of being responsible for creating a succulent, healthy, prosperious internal environment as well as the external environment we share.
Take a break from your work or worry. Grab something warm to battle the chill, look out to our perfectly clear, blue skies and see the snow-capped mountains in all directions. Connect to something bigger than yourself and know that, while it may often appear that adversity and uncertainty will not be resolved in the near term, you may exercise your freedom to choose what is, embrace it, and just be with it and your self. Know that you are NOT alone. We are in this together and together we will continue to think green until greener conditions appear in the tangible world.
Here’s a wonderful poem written by my friend Bob Mendoza that beautifully illustrates the warm wishes I send you and yours this holiday season…
“Regardless of what’s happened to you,
Regardless of what you’ve been given,
Regardless of who’s misheld you,
Regardless of what’s been ripped from you,
Here is something that is alive…..and will not die;
And if we can rest in the love of that certainty,
Then we can become breathtakingly generous………..
Because we have everything!
Even though we’ve been hurt,
Even though it’s been difficult,
Even though we’ve lost precious, lovely, beautiful things,
………Still we remember who WE ARE!
REMEMBER THAT YOU ARE THE LIGHT OF THE WORLD,
………and THAT can never be taken from you.
And if you can walk on the earth feeling the truth
that when your foot touches the soil……….
every gesture will be kind,
every gesture will be love,
……….because that is what you are!
You are Love—-with the Inextinguishible Flame!
So am I———So WE ARE!”
Vashon Real Estate: Going Green with Paperwork
Twenty years ago a house sales transaction required three sheets of paper. Today a sale takes 25 sheets of paper (at a minimum). Changes in state and local laws, the increased sophistication of the parties to a transaction, and the need to spell out in detail all of the items that might end up in a lawsuit are driving the blizzard of documents that surrounds a home sale, according to the Northwest Multiple Listing Service. This ream of paperwork also involves a significant increase in the amount of energy consumes by the parties to a transaction, their agents and brokers.
In a recent transaction handled by Keller WIlliams, the complexity of the transaction multiplied the paperwork exponentially, as the buyers wrestled with financing issues, multiple offers, sought extensions for deadlines, made an offer on a bank-owned house which was declined by the bank, and mismanaged exchanges of faxes.
Is this waste of resources and energy really necessary? Many parties do not even read the fine print presented to them by their agents, instead relying on the expertise of their agents to steer them through the boilerplate.
What do the forms accomplish? A Purchase and Sale Agreement, along with customized addendums, is the instrument defining the offer that a potential buyer makes on a home and the the terms of sale are negotiated. This document is subject to back and forth negotiations by the parties. Eventually, in a successful negotiation, one P&S Agreement emerges with the agreed terms to the deal.
The Purchase and Sale Agreement is accompanied by a Financing Addendum, Identification of Utilities, an Optional Clauses Addendum, Inspection Addendum, Inspection Notice, Title Contingency Addendum, Addendum/Amendment to Purchase and Sale, Seller Disclosure Statement, Disclosure of Information on Lead-based Paint and Lead-based Paint Hazards, Agency Disclosure, Commission Disbursement Form, and a Northwest Multiple Listing Service Status Change.
Go! Real Estate has recognized the need to reduce paperwork in housing transactions and has implemented policies to promote the electronic exchange of documents. These documents are legally valid and can be exchanged via the internet rather through an exchange of paper and the delay of mail delivery. This is just one way that Go! has embraced the internet to create a greener real estate practice.
Vashon Island Growers Association: Pumpkin Pie Contest
The Vashon Island Growers Association will hold its third annual Pumpkin Pie Contest on Saturday, November 22. The winner will receive a hand-quilted apron to wear for a year made by 2006 winner Rebecca Wittman., a $25 Vashon Farmers’ Market Gift Certificate, and an etched glass pie pan. Pies will be given extra points by the judges if pie-makers use Vashon Island grown ingredients.
Pies should be brought to the market at 10 am, November 22, and VIGA requests that all pie bakers be present for the awards ceremony at noon. Beginning at noon, slices of pie will be sold for $1 to benefit the Vashon-Maury Island Food Bank.
For more information, call Market Manager Joanne Jewell at 267-8146 or click here.
Bragging rights attach for one year!
“Fall for Orcas” at Vashon Theater
The Vashon Theater will show “Fall for Orcas” on Sunday, November 2, at 2 p.m. The Vashon Hydrophone Project for Puget Sound whale research will discuss local research and conservation issues, including the loss of 7 whales from the Puget Sound population this year. Admission is $5 and proceeds benefit the VHP.
The presentation will include almost 100 slides of Orcas around Vashon and Maury Islands. The event marks a rare return, the first in three years, for Mark Sears to Vashon, and will include many of his images.
For more information contact Orca Annie Stateler at 463-9041. Also, see Vashon Orcas.
Vashon’s Granny’s Attic: A Treasure Trove
“You never know what you’ll find at Granny’s!”
An extraordinary thrift store that supports our Vashon Health Center. Health Center Volunteers recycle donations of clothing, housewares, furniture, electronics and much more, to make them available to the community at bargain prices. Profits directly support the Health Center and other medical-related needs. For information on donations, volunteering, events, donating a car, click here Granny’s Attic.
Granny’s Attic is located at Sunrise Ridge off of the Vashon Highway, across from the Blue Heron. Call (206) 463-3161.
