Earth thoughts 20-27

Earth thought 20 of 365: Beyond the ego, there is the vastness of the universe and the beautiful anonymity of life that exceeds anyone's identity.

Earth thought 21 of 365: As Bruce Sterling -and Norbert Elias- noted, we think pre-modern man was foul and dirty -unhygienic. But in the 23rd century, if civilization hasn't collapsed, people will look back and think us filthy. We wallow in our own, invisible pollution. Hide it. Ship it to poor countries. Let it float through air unseen.

Earth thought 22 of 365: The devastation in Haiti is a reminder of how the environment can exceed us and of how we can be tested to show common humanity when it does. So let us show common humanity.

Earth thought 23 of 365: "Next to [the] living are the dead. Covered in blankets, their ash-covered limbs poke from beneath makeshift shrouds." (Nick Davis, BBC, 14.1.10) Ashes to earthquakes, ashes. And in the middle, the chance to help others now and up ahead. The sobering interval of Earth life.

Earth thought 24 of 365: The paradox of cities. They are the most sustainable: services shared, density reducing transportation. Yet our mentality in them stands in the way of sustainability, living as if the Earth is invisible -finding our biggest problem by fashion, art, money, relationship, even tolerance. But none of these can be without the Earth. So we need cities. Yet their society absorbs us.

Earth thought 25 of 365: Knife fights in Haiti over food, water. Darfur broken open by desertification -genocide overlying scarce land. These worry me when I think of how climate change hits the world system. That some guy like me, somewhere even now, will think he must learn how to defend his family with a gun.

Earth thought 26 of 365: For all the talk of fear and disaster, perhaps the best way to focus ourselves on the future, and on goodness, is to cultivate our love for specific people now. For who would want her child to suffer, or her grandchild? And looking into someone you love erases vice better than terror.

Earth thought 27 of 365: I need a literature that speaks to me and makes me feel at home on Earth. Neither philosophy, which argues impersonally, nor poetry, which fantasizes, nor religion, which preaches. A voice like a family member's, reflective at the pace of Earth time, arising with the part of us that isn't destructive or blind.