A curious reader recently approached Beautiful Swales with the photo posted here and a question. For the benefit of all, we're publishing the inquiry and our response:

Q: Dear Beautiful Swales, What would make this a bioswale? Seriously, I saw this pathetic 3-inch-wide median with a dead dwarf daffodil in it and thought, Whose bright idea was THIS?
Signed Swale Curious

A: Dear Swale Curious, Technically this 3-inch-wide median is a swale but a teeny, tiny swale. It’s a far cry from level earthworks swales that slow, spread and sink water. However, it does

• capture water that falls from the sky
• keep water from running downhill and away from it’s 3 inch self because of the edges
• allow rainwater to infiltrate into the 3 inches of ground below

I believe what is disturbing about this 3-inch-wide median is that the surrounding parking lot will have VAST amounts of water sheeting off during a storm and ALL of that water will be lost. None of that water will end up in this tiny 3 inch swale. Instead that water will end up in the gutter where it will flow to the ocean instead of to our thirsty underground aquifers. And that is a sad story.

Usually when you daydream about a beautiful swale there is some serious water capture going on. This photo shows the opposite.

Since these are still the early days of creating swales in Los Angeles, I think we need to develop some vocabulary about crazy swales like this “Not So Swale” 3-inch median.

In the meantime, how do we fix or improve this “Not So Swale”? Besides adding more swales, I would angle the parking lot so that water flows toward the swale instead of away from it. I would take out the concrete edges so that the water from the parking lot can enter the swale. I would enlarge and plant trees in the swale. With all of that extra water, the trees would quickly give shade to the cars parked in the parking lot, and everybody would be happy. And that would be a “Swell Swale” story.

Slow it, spread it, sink it!

We are a primarily secular society. Our society worships technology so much that technology is the new religion. People have abandoned traditional religion due to many nasty excesses of the church, priestly pedophilia being only the latest in a long history of excesses. Other notable examples include the Spanish Inquisition and the Crusades. Philosophy has also contributed to a turning away from God. In an existential worldview, we don't need God because we determine our own fate. Since our world isn't turning out so great, this existential view also leads to existential despair. 

In addition to secularization, the idea that we must always progress technologically has allowed scientific thinking to pervade almost every human endeavor. Human industrial society operates as if it can control everything. Anything that can't be controlled yet is just a matter of more scientific research. That is the central myth of our belief in progress. 

In 1637 Descartes wrote "I think therefore I am." In other writings, he clarifies that thinking is to be valued above the senses, feelings, beauty and nature. Since then, thinking became elevated above all else. Thinking, rationality and the scientific method have become the dominant forms in industrial society.

What if the dominant culture is wrong in its view of controlling nature? If life really is a mystery that can't be controlled? 

I've stated that the universe is progressing from simple to complex and doing so faster and faster. There's no good way to discuss this that doesn't sound vaguely religious or spiritual. When I keep in mind that indigenous people's worldview includes the idea that matter has spirit, it's not too big a leap to say that the universe is a more positive enterprise than currently appears and that something bigger than ourselves is going on here.

We have abandoned God, and our replacement religion (technology) is faltering. The underpinnings of human industrial culture, the energy that drives it, the environment where we dump the waste products can't be taken for granted anymore. 

I'm not suggesting we need more religion, nor am I saying let's dump science entirely. Both of these disciplines are useful and have their place. I am saying we need to remove science from the societal driver's seat. The scientific method has its place but decision making needs to be driven by a humanist approach steeped in the humanities. It is only with that focus that we can make decisions with long-term sustainability. Rational thinking is how we have created our current predicament. More rationality will not change the situation.

Albert Einstein in a 1941 radio broadcast said, "Perfection of means and confusion of goals seem, in my opinion, to characterize our age." In order to discover the hope I've been alluding to, we must let go of this dominant scientific culture that has developed over several centuries. We've become very good at getting things done, but the side of us that determines what goals we choose, where we are going, our humanist side — we've allowed it to atrophy. Reclaiming humanist ideals is a step toward a sense of hope.
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​—David Cutter

The term permaculture, growing as it did with my involvement with Transition Pasadena, has now a new grandeur. At first, the word for me related to the study and management of earth’s systems, conservancy and processes associated with earth’s functioning. But after reading Andrea Wulf’s “The Invention of Nature: Alexander von Humboldt’s New World," my horizons have broadened considerably.

Like many scientists, Humboldt (1769-1859), was unendingly curious about everything related to science. But the German was no mere collector of things scientific. He viewed the world — and nature — as one, as a whole with every tangible and non-tangible entity inextricably related. His “collecting” was an ongoing and earnest enterprise wherein he gathered evidence from every resource he could to make his point.

At the turn of the 1800s, the U.S. had purchased from France the Louisiana territory. President Thomas Jefferson and his Secretary of State, James Madison, were eager to learn what they could about the newly opened prospects to the south. No studies were available, however, until Alexander Humboldt, after exploring sections of South America and Cuba — his first major scientific journey —  shifted his return to Europe and stopped in America to meet with the third American President. The executives were astounded by the wealth of Humboldt’s information and perhaps, too, by the explorer’s accustomed rapid-fire delivery in accented English, German and Spanish. In return, they provided whatever information Alexander Humboldt wanted about this interesting and relatively new country. 

“Cosmos,” a many-volume compilation that extensively demonstrates the oneness of earth’s interrelated systems, was 20 years in the making and is his most popular work. Humboldt’s favorite, however, was “Views of Nature” in which he poetically describes landscapes accompanied by scientific information. Many of his works were unauthorized and published in so many different sets and volumes, the author himself did not know which ones were published and in what language.

Ms. Wulf said what was needed in her title, “The Invention of Nature.”  Heretofore, I had sensed nature all around us, like we all do, marveling at the unbounded green and floral beauty, the sunshine and rainfall, coral reefs and multitudes of living things dependent on them. Still, interrelatedness everywhere was not forefront, not proclaimed. I didn’t fully grasp the depth of nature’s intimate interdependence.

Alexander von Humboldt understood this oneness as an underlying principle of all things  (von is the German equivalent of the English Sir; a title bestowed upon honored citizens). Not only was he one of the first to call attention to the destruction man is directing toward Nature, but he is creating a fresh and invigorating view that gives me pause to admire and take in and be grateful. I understand nature today largely because of writers like Andrea Wulf and her New York Times bestseller (it was one of the 10 best books of 2015), and of course Humboldt, who is now more to me than a beneficial cold current welling up off the coast of South America or the name of a CA county. 
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​—Greg Marquez

At a recent Zocalo presentation, Magali Delmas discussed her book "The Green Bundle: Pairing the Market with the Planet." Ms. Delmas, a professor at the UCLA Institute for the Environment and Sustainability, described consumers as being on a spectrum from brown to dark green, with most of us being somewhere in the middle as “convenient consumers.” As long as there is no sacrifice involved, we want to choose the more sustainable option. 

Her goal was to find the most effective communication techniques to persuade people to make green choices. She has identified five motivators that drive people to make greener choices for sustainability, and she discovered that bundling the motivators was most effective in changing behavior.

The first motivator is Quality. Is the greener option better quality? People who buy a Tesla will state as the top reason for their decision the car's great performance, not that it’s eco-friendly. And so, Tesla chooses to bury the eco-friendly message and promote quality first.

Status is another driver. Prius sales were not so robust until the genius idea to have stars arrive at the Academy Awards red carpet by Prius. Suddenly star power boosted Prius’s cool factor. 

The third motivator is Health. We want to buy organic food because we know it is better for our health. This is not surprising since we know that the greatest number of people first choose to enter the sustainability movement through food: growing food, choosing organic, slow food cooking, preserving and sharing backyard produce. 

Money is the fourth motivator. Delmas shows that a tax is more motivating than a rebate. Remember when we got 10 cents deducted from our bill at the grocery store if we brought our own bag? That was not as effective as when it was switched to a 10 cent tax we had to pay for each bag; suddenly people remembered to bring bags from home. We learned that Starbucks will soon start charging 7 cents per paper cup. Let’s see if a caffeine-deficient crowd will BYOCup.

And finally there's Emotion. Tom’s Shoes is an example of the good feeling about buying a pair of Tom’s shoes knowing that a shoeless child will also get a pair. Dave’s Killer Bread was founded on the same idea: Buy a loaf, give a loaf. Dawn dish detergent had a boost in sales when marketing showed oil-blackened ducks being given new life with a Dawn shampoo.

It strikes me that our Repair Cafe has green bundling at its essence: Save money, do good, gain status, grow seedlings into tomatoes!

An unexpected bonus of our evening with the author and 100 plus other Zocalo followers was that Transition members and old friends from Culver City, Westchester and Whittier were also enjoying the free post-lecture Pinot Grigio. Zocalo, the Spanish word for the public square has a mission  to inspire connections and conversations. Mission accomplished!

—Therese Brummel