Photo by: Mariane Khron - Unsplash

Reading the news, and thinking about topics like inequality and climate change, often leaves me feeling helpless and frustrated. But every other month, when I pack my sewing machine and supplies for Repair Cafe, I know that in my own small way, I’ll make a difference by helping others reuse items destined for the landfill. We’ve seen the statistics: in 2015, Americans threw almost 138 million tons of trash, including electronics, textiles, and other goods, in landfills.[1] Repair Café provides the strength our communities need to stand up to planned obsolescence and to Big Plastic and to build positive connections. 

I grew up in a “Repair Café” house, with creative parents who love to repair things and who watched their Depression-era parents save and reuse rather than throwing something away. I learned to sew when I was four and used my sewing skills to make and repair doll clothes and then as I became older, to repair my own thrift store finds for myself and my family. I visited the Repair Café in 2017 and was instantly hooked. I loved, and continue to love, the idea of giving a favorite clothing item a longer life. My first morning as a volunteer “Stitcher” was an exhilarating time that involved animated pleas from other volunteers for pins and scissors, laughs, and a lot of learning. I repaired pants hems, enlarged waistbands, and fixed holes in backpacks and bags. The day went by in a blur, but I remember feeling almost deliriously happy from all the positive energy and gratitude. I felt so lucky to be part of the volunteer teams.

The community-building part of the Repair Café is also meaningful. Not only do we volunteers experience endorphins that produce the “helper’s high,” but we also connect with other volunteers.[2] My fellow Stitchers recently met up for a skills workshop and even though I am in a different stage of life than the other volunteers, I felt welcomed and valued. Plus, I always learn new sewing techniques and tricks and will hopefully be a more efficient Stitcher next time.
I still feel helpless when I read the news, but thanks to the Repair Café, I have learned to immediately think, “And I’m doing something about it.” Join us! Our next Repair Café is on March 30th, 2019 http://www.repair-cafe-pasadena.org


-----Megan Knize

[1] https://www.epa.gov/sites/production/files/2018-07/documents/final_accessible_2018_infographic.pdf
[2] https://www.fsfreepressonline.com/news/2013/09/23/helpers-high-occurs-for-volunteers/

"The central purpose of the Work that Reconnects is to help people uncover and experience their innate connections with each other and with the systemic, self-healing powers of the web of life, so that they may be enlivened and motivated to play their part in creating a sustainable civilization." –Joanna Macy
 
The Work That Reconnects arises in direct response to the ecological, social and economic crises of our time. It helps people understand and meet these challenges with clear eyes and open heart, without letting emotional overwhelm induce psychic numbing, panic or scapegoating. 
 
Instead of giving sermons and pre-formulated analyses, the Work That Reconnects invites us simply to look at today's conditions and make our own choices. Indeed, we can and should choose the way we view the history unfolding in our day.
 
This course is for anyone but especially those engaged in activism around sustainability or feeling sadness because of environmental losses. Maybe you are somewhere between these two places or perhaps you have a different set of feelings entirely. Regardless of where you find yourself, this is a rare opportunity to experience the power of Joanna Macy's work personally. Joanna Macy will not be facilitating these sessions but will be facilitated by Tera Klein and David Cutter. The Work that Reconnects has evolved to help people process where we, as a civilization, are at in this current moment. Sessions will occur on four consecutive Monday evenings, each one from 7pm to 9pm, April 8th, 15th, 22nd and 29th. Please RSVP Tera at [email protected]
 
The Work that Reconnects is primarily a course of experiential activities that help us connect to each other and our human nature. There is some information but not a large quantity of facts. The Work That Reconnects identifies three stories or versions of reality that shape our perceptions, like a lens through which we see what’s happening: Business as Usual, the Great Unraveling, and the Great Turning. Taken together, these simplified stories can offer a useful perspective on the values and beliefs prevalent in the world today. Participants will come away with a stronger love of life and a clearer vision for themselves in the world.
 
 David Cutter
Pianist
Pasadena, CA
Free Book Excerpt: "Artistry and Piano Students: Inspiring a Lifetime of Enjoyment."
 
 

Photo source: unsplashed.

Is Recycling dead?  Recycling is now a word to file under Greenwashing. 
 
Have you noticed that 40% of local recycling centers have closed in the last two years? 
 
China’s Green Sword has sliced through our trans-oceanic barge routes putting a stop to US deliveries of mountains of plastic. It has also imposed tighter restrictions on contamination of our “recyclable” paper as well, accepting now only a third of what we previously delivered. Greasy pizza boxes for example, are no longer welcome. 
 
For me this is both happy and sad news. It is happy because it is JUST. Entitled Americans have become complacent in the comfort of knowing that another country far, far away is managing our waste. It’s painful to see the images of children in Developing Countries rummaging through giant heaps of OUR trash.  It is sad, because if our discards with the feel-good name, “recyclables “, are no longer being re-purposed, we must shift our language and call it by its true name, “WASTE“.
 
According to the Los Angeles Times, the scrap value of plastic dropped when oil prices fell. It became cheaper to make plastic products from all new material rather than recycled materials. Since the Green Sword slashed the welcome mat for our disposable-lifestyle habits, India is following suit locking the ports to our “recyclables “. 
 
In 2015, a paltry 9% of single-use plastic was recycled. In 2019, only 3%. According to Gabriel Silva, who oversees Recycling in the City of Pasadena, the City is struggling to keep curbside recycling alive. Other California cities are resorting to sending “recyclables’ to the landfill.  Silva says organic waste is now the focus in Pasadena with a new collaboration between the City of Pasadena and the Pasadena Unified School District. 301 Organics, proven waste managers of the Rose Bowl, has a new campaign, Zero Hunger, Zero Waste, and hopes to lead Pasadena to sustainable management of organics.
 
Plastic is merely fossil fuel in disguise. Every piece of plastic we use contributes to climate change.  We must integrate this fact into our consciousness and make the paradigm shift. In a few years 20% of our fossil fuel extraction will be dedicated to creating single-use plastics. 
 
Plastic never decomposes. It only breaks into tinier and tinier pieces in our soil and our oceans. Plastic is environmentally degrading from its extraction as crude fossil fuels leaking methane into the air, to its ingestion into the bodies of birds, sea life, and yes, ourselves. Most all humans now carry plastic chemicals in our blood streams and breast milk. We must humble ourselves as humans by respecting and protecting all life on the planet and begin to act on a clarified vision of a world without plastic. 
 
Greenpeace announced that Trader Joe’s will reduce the use of plastic clamshells on fresh produce. Give them feedback. And just say no to plastic. It’s easy. Start with “No Straw Please”.
 
-----Therese Brummel

Our biggest problems revolve around the question how can we create a just society that can sustain itself into the future over the long term? A considerable part of the answer will involve letting go of the "banana". In View From the Piano: Grief (Part Nine), the banana represented our techno-industrial civilization with its various "bells and whistles" of consumption. 
 
Not letting go is a primary cause of all the inaction and denial we see in government and large corporations. Consumption of resources has the biggest impact on our ability to live sustainably. Consumption has been a necessary part of our form of economy. At the level of the individual, getting people to shift away from consumption and many other societal norms will require shifts in each person's consciousness. This is not a technical challenge. It is a spiritual challenge and will require an inner and personal transition. These are not matters that better technology will solve. These are matters of the human heart and spirit.
 
We are really good at solving technical problems but the problems we face are of a different nature. As Einstein said, "Our age is characterized by a perfection of means and a confusion of goals." Technology has been and continues to proceed unabated. There is no design or plan for our evolution into our technology. We don't know where we are going but we're good at getting faster.
 
We have lost our connection to the natural world. A rediscovery is in order and might lead us to being more able to address the spiritual challenge. Before the rise of science and technology when religions presided over a much slower moving and easily managed world, great thinkers of all persuasions saw that man's journey was a journey from the demonic to the divine and that history was somehow the stage of human redemption. That view died with the rise of secular capitalism and industrial democracy. Part of the answer is a rediscovery of our place in the natural world. 
 
Hope is possible but I think hope is worse than useless if someone hasn't uncovered their sadness over the losses we are suffering. Many people will use hope to deny the reality of our predicament. Hope and hopelessness are two sides of the same coin. Both prevent you from dealing with your grief over the loss of 200 species a day becoming extinct, the loss of a clean and unpolluted environment. The loss of our bliss in thinking we had an infinite supply of energy to power the developed world. If you are not yet in grief over these losses, then you shouldn't be looking for hope. Start by examining something you have sadness over. 
 
For those who have dealt with some grief over what I've described above then I think it is a good thing to talk about hope. I choose hope over hopelessness because it feels better and I think there are reasons for hope.

 -----David Cutter
 

Photo by Jordan Whitt on Unsplash
 
Arriving at age twelve was momentous. It was capped by a surprise party that was not just among friends and family, but in an auditorium in front of cub scout buddies receiving awards, parents, and friends and family. I was to receive the webelos (we be loyal scouts) badge, an honor at the time since it meant having earned all the previous badges and levels of cub scouting and signaled entry into the next stage of my life, the boy scouts.
 
Experiencing the outdoors, earning different skills of merit badges leading to Eagle Scout, that was scouting. But also, spending time at Boy Haven summer camp, hiking, swimming, helping in the kitchen, washing dishes after each meal, giving my finger a nasty cut, and whistling at the girls from a nearby camp who drove by in vans on Sunday morning when we guys were hiking to church, that was scouting too. The highlight at Boy Haven though was being selected to the secret Order of the Arrow.
 
Every two weeks, several boys were voted by ballot to be outstanding scouts. No one knew of the voting outcome until that night when scouts were aligned in front of a blazing camp fire, and an older scout dressed in breechclout and one or two feathers tied to his hair - typical warrior/brave attire – jogged the line in his moccasins, once, than on the second pass stopped abruptly in front of a chosen candidate, and swept his hand down hard on the candidate’s shoulder. Initiates were then led to a select area outdoors, where instructions were given. There would be no talking for the rest of the night and the following two days. Hard labor was the order of the day, with drinking water only until the evening meal of the third night, when they we were accepted as new members of the Order of the Arrow.
 
The imprint of scouting lies deep, as if ingrained and connected to an evolutionary process stretching far back in time. There’s a need to take back the hold of land, of air, of the water and relationships to all living and non-living things and to cultivate these connections that so nurtures our humanity. When waves of people disrupted by disorder, separation, and self-serving agendas are looking for guidance, for trustworthy sources, President Obama points to the importance indigenous tribes play as vital allies in re-establishing community, cohesion, and above all closeness with nature.
 
Scouting, energy giving as it may have been in my day, may not be the leading driver of this needed change. Contemporaries - understandably - shy away from, or out-rightly reject organizations. They are felt to taint integrity or sincerity of purpose.  Perhaps what is needed is a kind of Order of the Arrow, a society of like-minded individuals counseled by elders and respected members of established councils that operate on principles tested by generations of hard won experience. Nothing, no one, is excluded. Living and non-living things, Order of the Arrow and non-members alike are included.
 
-----Greg Marquez