Modernity has an ideal. Young, healthy, independent. Oh, it’s not a secret… the secret is the extent to which this ideal has overtaken. Let’s discuss the modern ideal, or as I call them, the arrow people. Physical youth is not necessary for an arrow person, but the trappings of youth are. Excellent health, adventurousness, and…
Author: hearthie
Today’s Fashion Has Nothing To Say
Fashion is not merely clothing, fashion is a way for the time and place you live in to identify itself through clothing. Today’s fashion has lost its ability to communicate, because today’s fashion has nothing to say. We exist on a merry-go-round of fashion, where one can wear a dress from the 1970s one day,…
Defining the Terms
To speak clearly, one must think clearly. To think clearly, one must know what one is speaking of. Defining the terms is important – especially as I’m going to turn some common use on its head. Community: A) A locale (e.g. town, neighborhood) B) A group of people in your local area with whom you…
The Blanket That Made Me Angry
This blanket makes me angry. It hasn’t done anything to me, there are no hidden agendas hiding in the scrollwork. But if you put a bloodpressure cuff on me and made me stare at this picture, you could watch it tick upward. Why? I’m affected by color. And apparently I really hate old-gold. The burgundy…
Living Systems Require Stewards, not Masters
Living things require stewards, not masters. Why? Because living things cannot be mastered wholly – and attempts that are semi-successful ruin their objects. It is time that we gave up the idea that we can be in complete control of that which lives. Land, animals, societies and ourselves – we are far too complex to…
The Need to be Known
The need to be known goes both ways. We need to know those around us, and we need them to know us. This need is social and emotional, it’s also extremely practical. Let me start with an example of the latter. The other day, as I was driving to the grocery store, I saw a…
Mearcstapas
I just finished reading a book by Makoto Fujimura, “Culture Care“. It’s one of those books chock full of things you were just about to say and hadn’t said yet. It’s also full of ideas and concepts that help shape how I think of myself and my role in the world. Fujimura is excellent at…
There Can Be Only One
We live in a culture where we focus our attention on a very few people, and only those people really “matter”. We gossip about their private lives, we envy their possessions, we sigh at their accomplishments, we strategize over their methodology, desperate to reproduce their success… and yet, they are strangers. They might as well…
Back to the Land
I grew up in the era of back to the land, and there was never a home that we rented when I was a child that didn’t end up with a greenhouse, extra tree (or three), and a garden space. As an adult, I stumbled upon the concepts of permaculture and regenerative agriculture and was…
New Ethics: Curiosity and the avoidance of Gossip
If we’re going to get back to being serious about community, we need to learn the lessons that have been taught – we need to learn about community killers and create new ethics. We’re going to need to make sure our communities have enough fresh air and sunlight, and we’re going to have to choke…