11/12/1998

Altered Harvest

The vegetables stopped coming last week. This year Adrienne and I bought a farm subscription and for a scandalously low price we received a half-bushel of organic vegetables, starting in late spring, running through summer and into autumn.

It’s a good deal for us, but hard work for the farmers. The words “organic farm” hold no magic for people who engage in organic agriculture and sweat out the warm months trying to outmaneuver bugs and blights without resorting to heavy doses of pesticides.
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By floegel | Posted in Commentary | Comments (0)
11/05/1998

But it’s a lot to me…

It was cold and rainy Monday. October was gone, November was here, time for winter in the north country. The furnace was broken, but a repairman from the gas company came out early and as the apartment is small, by 10:30 it was warming up nicely.

I went downtown around noon; the Democrats were holding a pre-election day rally on Church Street, in front of city hall. I’m not a Democrat, but as Chauncy Gardner said, “I like to watch.” I’d seen the Republican rally on Saturday and figured I may as well subject myself to the whole course of treatment.
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By floegel | Posted in Commentary | Comments (0)
11/03/1998

Not Necessarily Doing Anything

It’s late autumn in the north country. The leaves are off the trees and the tourists they attract have gone home. The woods are quiet; songbirds have headed south, geese and ducks are passing through as they do the same. Nights are cold, mornings are frosty and afternoons gloriously warm with the heat inversions of Indian Summer.

For me, these signs trigger a response so basic it could almost be called instinctual. It’s time to go camping. Not summer camp, that’s something altogether different. I mean camping — sleeping on the ground in tents, or if it’s fair, stretching out under the stars, cooking over a wood fire and not necessarily doing anything.
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By floegel | Posted in Commentary | Comments (0)
10/22/1998

A Change of Heart

There are a number of people who will tell you they never watch tee vee, then go on to qualify what they mean by “never.” I’m one of those people. I never watch tee vee, but the World Series is on this week. Last week it was the league championships. Because I live on the state line and because this is an election year, I see the political ads from New York State.

No wonder only 30 percent of the eligible voters are showing up. No wonder young people – 18 to 25 – aren’t even bothering to register to vote. These ads are exactly what democracy should not be about – nothing but mud-slinging distortions. If I had to award a prize for the worst commercials, it would go to New York State’s Republican Senator Al D’Amato and his leering henchman, Ed Koch. I suppose the fact that Ed Koch is – or was – a Democrat is intended to lend an air of credibility to the mudslinging. This illustrates how little politicians and their handlers understand about credibility. If you get Little Orphan Annie to go on tee vee and spew filth, it’s still filth.
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By floegel | Posted in Commentary | Comments (0)
10/15/1998

A Crime Against Nature

I’m calling you this week from the city jail in New London, Connecticut, where I’m currently under arrest. This is my one phone call. I’m here because of a crime that’s being committed in British Columbia, a continent away. Does that sound confusing? Bear with me.

Across the globe, we have less than 22 percent of our old-growth forests still standing. Most of those are in British Columbia and Brazil and we are cutting them down at a furious rate. Our old-growth forests are home to the densest concentrations of species on earth and as a result of our clear-cutting, we are now losing species at a greater rate than at any time since the environmental cataclysm that ended the age of the dinosaurs.
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By floegel | Posted in Commentary | Comments (0)
10/08/1998

Under the Influence

I’ve traveled extensively in America. I’ve driven across country four times and visited every state except Hawaii. I’m always amazed that all of this – the different landscapes and temperatures, the different attitudes and accents, are all part of one nation. I’ve traveled overseas, but I really enjoy seeing America first, like the billboards used to say. I can leave the near and familiar and wander among the strange and distant and still be on my home turf.

And I’m not the only one. There was a story in the paper last week about another wandering Vermonter, George Singleton, from down around Brattleboro. In a state full of white people, George Singleton is an African-American with dreadlocks. As I said, it’s our difference that makes us interesting. Mr. Singleton is a doer of good deeds. Six years ago, he was among the founders of a group that encourages teen-aged gang members to take up organic gardening. Needless, to say, Mr. Singleton is not one to shy away from a challenge. Now, we don’t have too many teen-aged gang members in Vermont and by saying that I don’t mean to imply any moral superiority as compared to other areas of the country. We just manifest our craziness in other ways, like cow tipping.
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By floegel | Posted in Commentary | Comments (1)
10/01/1998

Invalids of the Modern Era

As if I don’t already have enough to do, I lost control of my senses a while back and agreed to help put together a conference on nature and environmental writing. When organizing a conference, the easy part is lining up the tangible goods: rooms, chairs, lecterns, food. Or so I thought.

As it happens, two of our panelists are afflicted with Multiple Chemical Sensitivity, or MCS. Suddenly, organizing the tangibles was a daunting task. Multiple Chemical Sensitivity is the name given to the reaction sufferers have to low levels of many different chemicals. It is a syndrome whose onset is often related to an environmental exposure, most commonly a solvent or a pesticide. While each case is different, a victim is often exposed to a fairly high levels of a chemical and thereafter has symptoms triggered by slight exposure to any one of a number of chemicals.
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By floegel | Posted in Commentary | Comments (0)