Too Little Too Late or For Whom the Bell Tolls

I just posted a 2008 interview with James Lovelock. (1)  Despite my own feelings on the subject I found the interview rather confronting and unnerving.  It said things that I have often thought. It said things that I too believe. But that doesn't make it comfortable to hear someone who is considered an expert, albeit a rebel expert, say what I would like to avoid even thinking.

If my close friends know anything of the way I think they will tell you that I'm a rather skeptical existentialist.  It will therefore not come as any surprise to my reader to learn that I'm not exactly impressed with nor a big fan of my own species. I can, with references and footnotes, make the case that we are the worst invasive species the world has ever experienced.  We make the biblical plague of locust look like a summer picnic with a few ants. I could go on and on about the world wide plague of the homo sapiens but that isn't the purpose of this blog.

The point is that people like James Lovelock - and there are many of them - have attempted to warn the arrogant homo sapiens for decades and now, throwing up their hands in surrender, tell us the Paris Agreement may be too little too late. Their advice?  Eat, drink and be merry for tomorrow we die.

Despite my disgust with humanity and admitting that the world would be much better off without us, I can not accept that. Firstly I cannot accept such hedonism.  It is like saying if we're going to die we're going to leave the world in the worst possible condition for those species that might survive because we don't care. Secondly, we should not die without struggling to make right what we have destroyed.

Ironically the first source to whom I turn to explain myself is the early 17th century cleric and metaphysical poet, John Donne. More specifically my mind was immediately drawn to the famous two lines from his Meditation XVII -

"No man is an island, entire of itself; every man is a piece of the continent, a part of the main. If a clod be washed away by the sea, Europe is the less, as well as if a promontory were, as well as if a moanor of thy friend's or of thine own were; any man's death diminishes me, because I am involved in mankind, and therefore never send to know for whom the bells tolls; it tolls for thee."

Like it or not I am a part of humanity.  Whether or not I have committed any specific and personal environmental sin, I am a part of the problem because I am a part of humanity and therefore I must not only accept responsibility but fight to the end to correct what we have done. ...therefore never send to know for whom the bells tolls; it tolls for thee. 

I am not going to argue with those who say climate change is a myth until they pull their heads out of the sand and start looking at facts. We can measure the fact that we put 33.4 billion metric tons of CO2 in the atmosphere with our use of fossil fuels and cement in 2010, and added an additional 3.3 billion metric tons from land use change. In 2015 we're on target to add 40 billion metric tons from human activity.  We can measure the amount of garbage we produce and how much of it ends up in our lakes, streams and oceans. We can measure the extent of damage that garbage does.  We can measure the amount of harmful chemicals we produce and ultimately add to our food, water and environment in general. We can measure the amount of oxygen produced by the various plants - most from the ocean and rain forests - and from that we can calculate how much oxygen is produced by an acre of rain forest. If we know that we can know how much oxygen we lose when we cut down that rain forest.

Now if you want to argue with me that there is no absolute proof that such environmental destruction is causing climate change, I'll ignore your total disregard for the majority of the world's scientist.  I'll ignore it and counter with, 'even if you're right, does that justify us continuing to destroy the environment?'

But in this blog I'm not going to argue with such people. I'm speaking to the rational individual who is concerned and, like the rest of us, is struggling with the question 'what can I/we do?'

Obviously we don't have the space in a simple blog to do more than suggest an idea or two. That's what I propose to do. Therefore I propose the hypothesis that if we leave solving the problems we have created and/or finding the solutions to the future of humanity to politicians and large corporations we are definitely doomed and James Lovelock's 20 years is an exaggeration. We, as fellow homo sapiens for whom the bells tolls, must be the decision makers and actors.

Why would I say this?  I dare say most of you know the answer, but for those who still have a naive faith in the system, I must continue.  If you are one of those whom I am calling naive, please do not be insulted. My father was a highly respected historian whose PhD was in US Constitution and he died still having full faith in the system.  I never attempted to shake that faith but at this point in history I feel obligated to be the bad guy who proposes that it isn't the perfect system we'd like to believe. It is still politics.

It was during my generation that I would identify the 'professional politician'. I believe that the 1960s was the first time we actually witnessed people going to college and majoring in Political Science because they planned to be professional politicians. Be that as it may, suffice it to say such creatures have evolved and their sole purpose is getting re-elected.  Case in point. Today I heard that a member of a particular state's legislature changed from Democrat to Republican. Why? He gave a very transparent and lame excuse. In reality? He wants to get re-elected and his state is slowly turning Republican. It had nothing to do with values, beliefs, or political platform. It had to do with keeping his job. If he will sell out the party that had supported and paid for his election for many years, you know that he'll sell you for a vote.

In the 1990s I was the president of a state organization that represented, among others, psychotherapists. A law had been passed that required the services of a psychotherapist in certain circumstances but unintentionally left out a means for psychotherapists to get paid. I was at a meeting in Washington D.C. where we met with the iconic Teddy Kennedy and Newt Gingrich. They agreed that the issue was just a mistake, non-partisan and would be correct. A politician attached a partisan rider to the bill correcting the mistake. The bill was killed by the Republicans. It's been over 20 years and the mistake has still not been corrected. So much for integrity.  The law still requires a psychotherapist but doesn't provide a way to pay them.

Enough about politicians. I think a brief look at the political gridlock in Washington and what our last few Congressional sessions did not accomplish answers the question 'why can we not expect our Congress to help with this crisis?'

Corporations are a problem most people do not understanding. During a little know period of my life I was burned out and decided to turn my psychotherapeutic skills to business counseling skills. I was actually licensed with the Security and Exchange Commission and held their second highest level of licensure. The first thing I learned in doing all of that study was that a corporation is a legal entity that is almost impossible to kill and which, by law, is required to do everything for profit and the shareholder. A corporation will only be philanthropic if it improves their bottom line. So when companies like Exxon try to convince you that they have suddenly discovered a social conscience, don't believe it. It is against the law and they legally exist to make a profit for their stockholders.

As Prof. Stephen Bainbridge writes, "As I explain therein, however, while the business judgment rule has the effect of giving directors latitude to make decisions that deviate from the shareholder wealth maximization norm, that is not the purpose of the rule.  The fact that corporate law does not intend to propmote corporate social responsibility, but rather merely allows it to exist behind the shield of the business judgment rule becomes significant in - and is comfirmed by - cases where the business judgment rule does not apply." (2)  Underlines are mine.

Our bottom line is that their bottom line is more important than anything else in the world including human existence.  They can say or do anything they want to get you to buy, for example, Exxon gasoline, but if it means actual loss of profit then it will not happen. Our US corporate law gave them such an existence. The people who work in a corporation may have consciences but the corporation is without a conscience. To make the situation worse, to be able to run such a callous and heartless organization takes a special type of person. I'm not even going to try to reference all of the studies and papers, I'll leave it to you to look up, but top executives have four times the incidence of psychopathy than the average community. The personality characteristics are manipulation, callousness, impulsivity, aggressiveness and lack of emotion.  Aren't these the same characteristics that make most of you hate insurance companies which are just gigantic profit corporations. The only thing you can trust is that whatever they do will somehow return to them in the form of profit.  Now do you want to trust the future of humanity to a large corporation?

I'm a skeptic.  I have very strong doubts that humanity can get its act together in time to avoid total disaster. Will it be within a few years one side or the other of Dr. Lovelock's 20 years? I don't know. I do know that I personally dare not ask for whom the bell tolls.  I'm old but I still have a responsibility. I have a responsibility because no matter how hard I might try, I'm still a part of the problem. Therefore I must work to the end to try to help save humanity by working to save our environment, the nature I so dearly and passionately love.  


FOOTNOTE:

(1)   Address of the interview with Dr. James Lovelock.  http://www.theguardian.com/theguardian/2008/mar/01/scienceofclimatechange.climatechange?CMP=share_btn_fb

(2)  http://www.professorbainbridge.com/professorbainbridgecom/2010/07/shareholder-wealth-maximization-and-the-business-judgment-rule.html

Walden Pond Full-timer Revisited

Campground in Bridger-Teton
National Forest. There was a
well for water. $5/night.

Those of you who have visited my blog site before know that it had been called the Musings of an Old Conservationist.  In fact, the address is still  www.oldconservationist.blogspot.com, but I realized that I was doing more than just conservationist/environmental posts. That's when I thought about my Nov 3rd post entitled Walden Pond Full-timers.  While most of what we do as Walden Ponders is conservation, environmentalism, or wilderness exploration there is a lot more of our life that I like to share. Hence Walden Pond Full-timer Revisited.  But I don't want to forget those of you who are new to my blog site and wonder about the name Walden Pond Full-timer.

If you are familiar with the American philosopher Henry David Thoreau you will remember that he left the village to live in a cabin he built himself by a small lake called Walden Pond. In his book entitled Walden Pond: Or , Life in the Woods Thoreau writes,

“I went to the woods because I wished to live deliberately, to front only the essential facts of life, and see if I could not learn what it had to teach, and not, when I came to die, discover that I had not lived. I did not wish to live what was not life, living is so dear; nor did I wish to practise resignation, unless it was quite necessary. I wanted to live deep and suck out all the marrow of life, to live so sturdily and Spartan-like as to put to rout all that was not life, to cut a broad swath and shave close, to drive life into a corner, and reduce it to its lowest terms.”

Home at Glacier National Park where we work as volunteers.

This is so descriptive of the attitude toward life that Pamela and I share that it gave birth to the term "Walden Pond Full-timer" or "Walden Ponder". Couple this with our love of nature, volunteering at national parks, hiking, kayaking, bicycling and scuba diving, you have a snippet not only of our lives but of the life of the Walden Ponder.
Pamela and I are far from unique in this group. This is why we do not claim the term as self-descriptive but include ourselves in the group. We have many friends, mostly volunteers in the National Park Service, who can be described as Walden Ponders. They live their lives in everything from camper trailers to large recreation vehicles. Despite the wide variety of trailers and RVs the first point of description is that we spend all or the vast majority of the year living in our trailers/RVs. Many of us will spend some weeks of the year visiting our children. This is one of the basic definitions of a 'full-timer' and therefore what makes a Walden Ponder a full-timer by definition. The second point of description is that you will rarely see any of us in one of the ubiquitous RV parks - KOA and the like. When we are on the road moving between long-term locations, you will usually find us boondocking (1) at a Pilot/FlyingJ, Walmart or other public parking area where we're allowed to stop overnight. If we are lucky we find a lovely little national or state forest campground which is out-of-the-way. Most such places are actually US Forest Service sites just off of two-lane highways but well out into the country like the Bridger-Teton campground pictured above. Our long-term places tend not to be the RV cities but campground host sites in national parks and similar more remote and secluded places.

The third point of description is that a significant percentage of us will avoid interstates. Our trailer, whose name is 'Willy', has tires rated for 65 miles per hour. This is very common. Why would we want to drive down an interstate where the speed limit is 70-80 miles per hour being constantly passed by traffic and seeing the same thing mile after mile?  If a state or federal highway has a 55-60 mph speed limit and passes through beautiful country and interesting towns, why wouldn't one want to go that route if time wasn't an issue?  Since most of us are retired, time generally isn't an issue. 

Ready to roll. 

The ubiquitous RV park.  

The fourth point of description is that most Walden Ponders are more self-contained than the standard full-timer. Looking at the picture to the left where we are ready to pull out, the truck is packed with all of our toys - two kayaks, two bicycles, scuba gear in a special locker, and extra camping equipment. Willy has everything he needs to run for 5-7 days without any outside utilities or water.  That is probably the greatest and least observable distinction.  The standard full-timer generally moves from full-hookup (all utilities including wifi, TV, etc.) to full-hookup with paved pull-through spots, sometimes paved patios, in a treeless city of RVs like the one to the left.  These are great if that's where you want to stay. When you stay at such campgrounds there is no need to have any more water or power than necessary for your time on the road. 

To be a Walden Pond Full-timer is to not only to accept the challenges of life on the road, but to seek out remote, relatively uninhabited, often wilderness areas where you, like Henry David Thoreau, want to "live deep and suck out all the marrow of life," seeking a life-style surrounded by nature such that we learn all that our species has forgotten and, when our days are over, die knowing that we have indeed lived.   

Out our door at a NFS campground

NOTE: Question are encouraged if you are interested in being a Walden Pond Full-timer as well as stories and comments from Walden Ponders that I can share. 

FOOTNOTES. 
(1) Boondocking - this is where one camps where there are no utilities; e.g. no electricity or water.  Often, when one boondocks, there are no toilet facilities either, but most of us have those in our campers.  Pamela and I have boondocked for almost an entire week at one time.  We had battery for lights and to power the pump which pumped water from a holding tank to the sinks and toilet. You will notice that camper trailers generally have one or more propane tanks up front.  This is used for cooking, hot water and furnace.  

Mais vin est mon préféré

I confess, I'm a sipper. I'm the one who always seems to have a partial cup of very cold coffee or tea nearby that, when you offer to get rid of it, I say “No, thank you. I'm still drinking that.” Granted, my first cup of coffee is about 16-20 oz. but I brew it between 6 and 7am and I'm usually still sipping it around 11am. Be that good, bad or otherwise, when my eyes are brown . . . from too much coffee, and tea is beginning to float my kidneys, I begin to look for something else to sip.

I also have to admit to not being a soda fan. I do like the taste of some, but a soda every couple of weeks is usually more than adequate to satisfy any urges.

Beer comes to mind. Yes, beer is a great drink and I love beer. I especially like Guinness (what can I say, I'm Irish), Moose Drool (a brown ale made in Missoula, MT) and Pacifico (a lager from Manzanillo, Mexico). There are a number that I really enjoy and are at the top of my list, and I have to admit that I can appreciate almost any beer. The problem is that beer is not a sipping drink. I still probably drink my beer slower than the average person, but it's not a sipper.  It's great with a meal, at a sporting event, cook-out, after mowing the grass on a hot day, after climbing a mountain, etc., but not sipping as you read or write a blog.

Now I can make a shot of whiskey, bourbon, scotch, etc., last an amazingly long time and I enjoy doing so, but it isn't really what I'm wanting.   As you might guess, Irish whiskey (only 80 proof compared to its American cousin) is as smooth as any scotch out there, and nothing beats an Irish single malt.  Granted these are sipping drinks, but, for me, these are meant to be consumed when you're sitting or standing around and more focused on talking to family and friends at some sort of get-together, or when you're winding down and want something really warm and soothing as you read or do whatever before retiring for the night.  Naw, hard liquors aren't the sipper I want to be enjoying from the time I start fixing supper until well into the evening.

This leaves wine, and those drinks that fall into the general category like sherry and port. After having experienced the difficult decision of what to drink for many years, I finally came to the realization that my all-time favorite is wine.  Le vin est mon préféré.  I prefer a dry wine, especially a dry red wine.  Some years ago I was on a cruise. The wine steward for our table was the son of Australian vintners. He introduced me to Australian shiraz. It quickly became my wine of preference, but there are always times when the crisp taste of a nice pinot grigio or  sauvignon blanc is in order. My father made the best sauvignon blanc in the world.  I remember having to prove this to the owner of a wine shop near our home in Dublin back in the early 70s. But red or white, wine goes with everything from a fancy diner to the most humble peanut butter sandwich.

P.S.  If you're interested in being a sipper . . . consider always drinking your wine, whiskey, or beer in good Irish crystal. It makes it even more fun.

I'm a vegetarian.

I'm a vegetarian.  Did that sound like some sort of confession? It's funny, a lot of vegetarians feel like we are somehow imposing on society or that we are treated as some sort of un-American, shame ridden subgroup of society. Sound outlandish and exaggerated? Maybe. I would say that I've been made to feel that way but since I know that I have the ultimate control over how I feel; i.e. I can't blame it on someone else; I will just say that when I first publicly stated that I was a vegetarian I felt like a child at her/his first confession.  

The movie "My Big Fat Greek Wedding" very aptly describes most people's understanding of the vegetarian when the bride told her parents that the groom and his family were vegetarians and they replied, "that's okay, we'll have lamb."

Pamela started becoming vegetarian when we first started going together. Over the past two years she has become predominantly vegetarian. That could be because I love to cook and she doesn't.   She thought that the Ted Talk by Dr Carl Safina on what animals feel and think had settled the matter and she was a confirmed vegetarian, but her desire for meat has come out from time to time.  (Usually she eats a few bites and decides that she didn't really want meat, but . . . .)

She had both of her knees replaced less than two weeks ago, so she's not out running around. She asked me a big favor this morning . . . . buy a chuck roast for my daughter, daughter's husband, husband's brother and her for Christmas Eve dinner. It's supposed to be a surprise for my daughter, so I'm going to have to wait to post this blog to avoid spoiling the surprise.

Over the years I have very successfully avoided meat counters in super-markets. Hunters' trophy pictures really, really upset me.  I understand that animals kill other animals for food. That doesn't mean that I have to like it or participate. Other animals don't take out their neighbor with a high powered rifle, pose for a picture and then discard the carcass. I bet humans would eat less meat if they had to take an animal down like a Mountain Lion; viz. chase it down or jump it from hiding and then kill it with their bare hands.(1) Like brother bear we are omnivores and can live without meat, and as humans we have choices that other animals don't have - viz. I can select my food and avoid eating other animals.

I didn't think that a trip to the meat counter would be all that difficult.  After all, I had spent almost 50 years in health care where I witnessed autopsies, surgeries, an unfortunately significant amount of death, worked in an ER and witnessed more than my fair share of grotesque traumatic injuries from six years on a rescue squad.  I had no idea what a chuck roast looked like, so Pamela showed me a picture on the internet. I should have known then that this wasn't going to be easy. I found that even just the picture made me very uncomfortable.

I did psychotherapy for 47 years so I recognized the signs and symptoms of anxiety as I parked outside the supermarket. I don't think I had a half dozen items on my shopping list but I took at least ten minutes or more in the produce department. Another man and I picked over the brussel sprouts and shared recipes. Those were the most scrutinized brussel sprouts you've ever seen. From there I moved through the bread aisle. Generally I can pick up a loaf of bread without even slowing down. Today I stood and compared breads. Yeah, sure!  I went through my list and successfully avoided the meat counter until there was nothing else on my list.

I felt a gripping in my stomach as I emerged from the bakery aisle into the area with the long rows of meat coolers.  I can't remember the last time that I actually walked up to the open coolers and looked at the contents nevertheless actually picking something up.  I walked past rows of pork, wishing that I didn't have to read all the labels. This is one time that I wish that they had big overhead signs - "Beef", "Pork", etc.  I finally found the chuck roast. Thankfully I had the choice of two packages both about the same weight and price. I picked one up and put it in my basket and promptly covered it so that it was out of my sight.

I know that there are Buddhist as well as others who focus on the term "sentient" and argue that fish are not sentient. Octupi, known on the menu as calamari, actually work together with eels to catch food. But I'm not going to get involved in such hair-splitting. I don't want to kill and eat sentient creatures - creatures that think - so I just don't eat any of them regardless of the extent of their cognition.  The Buddhist monk will never turn down food offered to him  even if it is meat. I'm not a monk, but I'm not only very conscious of waste but of the feelings of others who might have fixed meat for me without knowing. Thankfully I've only been in that position a couple of times in all these years.

Very honestly, I don't think anyone wants to hear the story of how I came to take the last step to being vegetarian. I do believe that there are three issues that keep around 75% of North Americans carnivorous: (1) the erroneous belief that one must have meat in the diet to have the proper nutrients. We are omnivores and therefore we can get sufficient nutrition without meat. Actually our intestines are specially designed for this task. Before the recent studies that showed red meat less than a desirable part of the diet, we have known that the vegetarian has a much lower rate of colon and related cancers because we do not have animal carcass rotting in our guts. We have very clean digestive systems. I also did my own long-term study, keeping track of every gram of protein, carbs, potassium, sodium, etc., I consumed. In the two plus years I kept this running log I found that I actually have a superior protein intake to almost any carnivore. In fact, my diet proves to be nutritionally far superior to my carnivorous family members.  (2) The Abrahemic religious teaching that other animals were purposely made for our pleasure and consumption removes any guilt that we are destroying another living creature that has an equal right to life.  Such an idea, to me, is absolutely absurd and only further exposes the homo spapien's extreme egocentricity. There are predators and carrion animals that are naturally designed to eat flesh. But you don't find them using some deity as an excuse for what they are. They serve a purpose. Humans are omnivores. We don't need to eat flesh. If we do, we need to own up to the fact that we are killing another sentient being that has just as much "right" to life as we do and not be wasteful. I know there are some extreme vegetarians who think meat-eaters are somehow "bad" but I'm not one of them. Just don't make an excuse for it. Many North American indigenous people, whose religion teaches that all animals have an equal right live, put a gift on the spot where they kill an animal as a thank-offering to the animal's spirit and make sure they use absolutely all of the carcass. (3) The third thing is the absolute fallacy that we are at the top of the food chain. We're only at the top of the food chain when we are in large numbers with weapons or staying in a town or city. In the wild, as we were for most of our history, there are a number of animals who are quite capable of killing and eating us. The ironic part of this is not only our unjustifiable arrogance but that those animals capable of killing and eating us really don't seem to like the taste of human flesh. That can, at times, be comforting.  I have found only two predatory animals who will kill a human and actually fed on and/or store the carcass and they are the alligator and crocodile.

I'm a vegetarian because I elect not to kill other sentient beings.  Some are vegetarians because it is a healthier diet. The end result is the same.  As a post script let me let you in on a little secret . . . we don't just eat mashed potatoes, green beans and salad.  We really like to have an entree with our meal. There are actually many more vegetarian entrees than carnivorous. The Indians are the undisputed world masters of vegetarian entrees and other cuisine. I went to an Indian restaurant when Pamela was in the hospital. They had two pages, small print on an 18x24" menu with nothing but vegetarian entrees. Surprisingly, Montana is the only state in the United States where I feel confident of finding a choice of vegetarian entrees on the menu. The Northern Lights Saloon is a 5 table restaurant in a 102 year old log cabin in Polebridge, Montana. Polebridge is a village of 15 people miles from the nearest paved road and totally off the grid - literally.  There are no telephone or power lines. It gets electricity from solar panels and has gas lamps for backup. The nearest town of any size, which is a small town of 3,000 is almost 50 miles away. Nevertheless, the Northern Lights Saloon always has at least two outstanding vegetarian offerings.  Knowing this you must admit it being a bit enigmatic that so many restaurants have no idea what to do with vegetarian guests.

The number of vegetarians in the US is rapidly pushing 30% of the population.  Almost none of us want our food to look or taste like meat.  And if you want to experience some of the most delectable medley of spices and flavors with a tantalizing  mixture of textures, join a vegetarian for dinner. But please don't ask "don't you eat chicken?"

===============    
FOOTNOTES:
(1)  Actually there are very, very few homo sapiens alive who can run an animal to ground and kill it with their bare hands. That is probably why Dr. Yusal Noah Harari; professor of history at Hebrew University, Jerusalem. TED Talk 7/24/2015; hypothesizes that the homo sapiens would have gone extinct quickly had we not learned to work together in large groups.  There are few other animals we could kill bare handed. 

Turning my Kuerig Green

 On January 29th of last year I wrote a blog entitled "But I love my Keurig".  In it I confronted the horrible truth of this marvelous coffee maker - it dumps tons of plastic into our landfills. But there were tricks that I didn't know back then.  

To start, you have to understand that I was a coffee snob.  I didn't use a coffee make before my Keurig.  I had a ceramic funnel with a gold filter into which I put an unbleached filter with freshly ground coffee that was weighed, not measured.  My carefully measured water was heated to a boil and then allowed to stand for exactly 11 seconds before I started slowly pouring the water through the grounds.  This process provided great coffee and was a labor of love. Then I learned that I could get a good cup of coffee - perhaps not quite as good - but a very good cup of coffee with this new machine called a Keurig.  Even though we have a small Keurig for Willy (our 16' camper home) I still carry the ceramic funnel with me.

Again today I was confronted by the reality of the wastefulness of the Keurig when someone posted the cartoon to the right. This time, however, I knew what had to be done.  I had to share with you a trick that I learned to use the "Keurig Gourmet Single Cup Home Brewing System My K-Cup Reusable Coffee Filter Box" and still get a good cup of coffee.

Let me tell you about what I learned about their reusable filters.  I don't know if they did it on purpose, but there is no way that the reusable filter is going to make a descent cup of coffee as it comes out of the box.  If you look down through the tubular portion you will notice a large opening at the bottom. If you look in a k-cup you will notice a pin hole. That's the difference. The water goes through the grounds too quickly with the reusable filter.  Here's how to correct that.

Step 1.  Take a used k-cup (be sure it's been used) and remove the foil top and dump as much of the grounds as possible. You don't have to worry about getting it empty. This is just to make the next step easier.
Step 2.  Cut off the top rim with a pair of kitchen shears and remove the filter and any remaining grounds. Discard the filter material and grounds. Rinse the remaining plastic cup.

Notice the large opening

Step 3.  Put the plastic cup inside the grey tubular portion of your new reusable filter system and make sure that it seats as far down as possible.

You are now ready to make coffee.

STEP 1

Step 4.  Remove the k-cup holder.  You may find it necessary to push up from the bottom but be careful. There is a sharp pin inside this holder.
Step 5.  Put 2 rounded tablespoons of coffee in the reusable filter basket. When you tap the side of the filter the coffee grounds will come up to about 1/4 inch of the top.   We like our coffee bold. We also use French roast.

I prefer a large mug which holds both a Keurig large and medium brew. I can do a large brew, leave the same grounds in the machine, and then do a medium brew, and still have a very good cup of coffee.

By not using the k-cup you do your part in keeping a tremendous amount of plastic out of our landfills and you can still have an excellent cup of coffee. A secondary benefit is that there are no limits on the type of coffee you use.  Make your Keurig green!

STEP 2

STEP 3

STEP 4

STEP 5

 

Reusable filter in place

Ómahkapi'si, Kiááyo and the Animal Spirit

Although I have never been good at languages I have always found them fascinating. I have been doing some reading in North American indigenous peoples' language. The ones I've encountered have such melodic sounds to lots of words.  I mean, ómahkapi'si just sounds nicer than wolf.  Of course all of the tribes with which I'm familiar have a great affinity to animals. I can easily relate to that. For example, some indigenous people in North America leave a gift where they kill an animal to thank the animal for feeding and clothing them. Out of respect they use every part of the animal and will often wear pieces of the animal or totems to show their respect for the animal. This long-standing relationship with nature - which my European ancestors sadly relinquished millennium ago - obviously found me reading about tribal religions. The metaphysics and social structure surrounding the animal guide and animal totem is as complex as any western religion and is likely older.

This all lead me to take several of the so-called "tests" to determine my spirit animal. Each of them had very different questions and approaches nevertheless they all determined that the Wolf was my spirit animal.  I have a tremendous admiration for the Wolf (ómahkapi'si) and would be proud for it to be my spirit guide but this manifestation was not only a bit unnerving it made me feel like I was being unfaithful to my beloved Bear (kiááyo).  You can imagine how unsettling it is to have 100% of the tests taken come to the same conclusion when your confidence level in all of them was zero. 

Our first Grizzly encounter

You have to understand, since I was first introduced to the bear it has held a special place in my heart.  I wear a bear totem on a daily basis. I have studied the bear and I talked the powers-that-be into letting a mere volunteer attend Bear School II - the advanced wildlife management program. 

Being the existentialist/skeptic one has the right to ask me how I can consider the indigenous American concept of spirit animal when I have trouble with just about everything religious. Religions, including those of North American indigenous people, started as a way of explaining the unexplainable which, at that time, was just about everything from rain to fire to seasons to life and death. Now that we know why it rains, why the seasons change, and more about life and death than ever before, religion seems not only superfluous but detrimental.  But that, I propose, is different from a spiritual connection. I firmly believe that religion is not a requirement for spirituality.

Two cubs Mom ran up a tree so she could nap.
She was sleeping a few feet below. 

I know that 'spirit' is used in religion, but let's consider it in a non-religious, non-metaphysical context. One definition of spirit from this perspective is "An incorporeal but ubiquitous, non-quantifiable substance or energy present individually in all living things."  (Wikipedia)  It is as good as any definition because none of them really work well. Of course, I can't do any better, so I can't be too critical.  The great psychologist, C.G. Jung, said“The connection between spirit and life is one of those problems involving factors of such complexity that we have to be on our guard lest we ourselves get caught in the net of words in which we seek to ensnare these great enigmas." (1)   

So, do I have any idea what I'm talking about?  At least I have an idea what I mean. It may only be relevant to me, but I can't help but believe that when I use the term 'spiritual connection' I'm referring to a manifestation of the oneness which I believe binds us all.  If quantum physics is right, spirit might not be incorporeal but ubiquitous and perhaps even quantifiable.  Perhaps the connection I feel with animals is spiritual in a quantum way.  As the writer of the Spirit Walk Ministry web-site writes, "The people who can not hear the rocks and trees may be the ones with the problem." (2)

Native Americans teach that one does not pick their spirit animal or animal totem but are picked by the animal. With all due respect, I believe that this is a convenient way of dealing with the fact that not all people feel connected to or are visited by an animal spirit. Perhaps, in light of all the criteria the "tests" used to determine that the Wolf is my spirit animal, were I to know the Wolf more personally we would have the same strong spiritual bond as I feel with the Bear.  But I know the Bear.  I have been near the Bear. Sometimes I've been closer than I should have been, but that was never because I planned to be or out of disrespect for her/his space. It was always the result of unexpected circumstances and ended with us going our own way in peace. Yet for a moment our worlds had collided in the space-time continuum, like two sub-atomic particles observed by the quantum physicist going off in different directions yet partially or totally changed by their encounter. Neither of us will be the same again.  

FOOTNOTES:

(1) Hull, R. F. C. (1960). THE COLLECTED WORKS OF C. G. JUNG Vol 8 Chapter "Spirit and Life". New York, New York: Pantheon Books for Bollinger Series XX. pp. 319, 320.
(2) http://www.spiritwalkministry.com/spirit_guides

Where have all the flowers gone?

'Where have all the flowers gone?' is not just the title of a Peter, Paul and Mary song. It was a profound question for which a generation sought an answer. Today we still do not have the answer and it is just as relevant.

Pamela wanted to watch her "50 Years with Peter, Paul and Mary" DVD this evening. I don't know about you, but I don't think anyone can just watch Peter, Paul and Mary.  As I watched the true meaning of their long and illustrious career became evident and I was shamed into writing this blog. They were more than a social conscience. They were ambassadors of change and hope.

As I listened and watched I relived those days in my mind.  There was a bitter-sweetness to the memory.  While most "younger" generations tend to be rebellious to identify themselves apart from their parents and the previous generation, unlike any generation before or since I have to say that we shook the gates of hell.  What happened?

I think the reality was presented to me at Trinity College, University of Dublin when I was doing graduate studies even though it didn't become clear to me until later. Unlike the USA, other countries have communist parties and think nothing of it. We had a small band of communist students and I knew a few personally. What didn't strike me until later was that they wore jeans and t-shirts with slogans until the day of graduation. After that it was the three-piece grey suit with waistcoat.

Without getting into a long philosophical discussion or sociological study,  I would venture to say that at graduation they were no longer free to express themselves and were expected to present themselves to their first post-graduation employer as the person they dreaded, hated and feared to become.

How many of us, in my generation, continued the fight? We thought we were going to change the world, but like the TCD communists, we were put in the position of survival. The corporate and political powers that dominate and define our society and dominate our lives had won. I know that is my own story. As I sit here writing with my sholder length hair, ear-ring and casual attire I realize that I can be myself now because I'm retired and I don't have to present myself in a socially acceptable manner as defined by the religious/political/corporate establishment we hated. And there will be younger people who will say that I'm just a crazy old man but who, deep down inside, envy me because they would like to be who they really are.  Etant precede essence. Every young generation attempts to be the rebel until it finds itself sucked into the misery and reality of “adult life” - the existence which we finally accept as “the norm”.  And the corporate, religious and political powers sit and smile. They've won again.

In my generation - those of us who were young adults in the 60s - we struggled against bigotry, racism, hatred and war. These were the things of our parents not because our parents were bad people, far from it, but because they had been taught by the "establishment" (that was our term for the corporate-religious-political power that tells people what they are to like, believe and , think). Whether we lost the struggle or we conceded because, like the Communist students at TCD, we were forced to strike our colors to survive, we did make an impact.

What caused a wave of almost unbearable fear to sweep over me as I listened to an aging Peter, Paul and Mary sing "Where have all the flowers gone?" was the reality that today bigotry, racism, hatred and everything we fought and struggled against 50 years ago is now being worn like a badge of honor.  A political party proudly makes bigotry, racism and hatred the foundation of its political platform. And what is more frightening is that they not only win elections but control our Congress.

Fifty years ago we sang "we shall overcome" bigotry and hatred.  We loved what America had represented to the world - freedom, peace, opportunity.

Have all of my generation - those of us born during and just after WWII - forgotten what it was like? Even if you didn't get to go to the largest protest rally the world has ever known in Washington DC in 1969, I bet most of you would have loved to have gone.  Have we so totally sold our souls to the political and corporate establishment that we can't remember?  Damn it, we were the generation that were going to make the world right.  You can be totally conservative but that, by definition, doesn't mean that you must accept bigotry, hatred, racism, etc.  I know you, like me, are old, have arthritis that hurts like hell or maybe a heart condition . . . or both. But we're not dead yet.  Give the f***** establishment the finger like you did 50 years ago and show our grandchildren that there is still hope for a peaceful, loving and healthy future.

Who are you trying to be?

I walked into a rather preppy Starbucks in an upscale town just outside Indianapolis, Indiana. I guess calling a Starbucks preppy is rather redundant, isn't it?  In any case, I was standing there waiting for my coffee when the man, sitting on the stool also waiting, looked at me.

"Who are you trying to be?" he asked.  Actually he said it in such a nice and jovial manner that I couldn't take offense.  I looked at my reflection in the window. I was wearing cargo pants and a flannel shirt. Well, then there's my Tilley Montana hat. Oh, yeah, my pony tail, earring and bear choker.  But other than that I wondered why he asked.  Then I looked at him. He was wearing a $200 jogging suit which, if I could be allowed to make assumptions from basic appearance, had probably never seen anything more than a fast walk. Well, maybe not even that. I looked back at my own reflection.

"Russell Vance, " I said very matter-of-factly.

"Who the hell is he?" the man almost shook as he laughed.

"Me," I said.

"Oh." The man turned to the counter picked up his coffee. "See yuh."

"Have a great day." I replied with a smiled. He lifted his cup in salute and walked away.

Recycle a mattress?

I bet if you've had a home for more than 10 years you've faced disposing of a worn out mattress. Perhaps you're like me and have had a home for 47 years and have faced this problem more than once. Previously I was fortunate enough to find them homes.  Perhaps you are a relatively young couple and you're trying to replace the old bed a relative gave you to get you started. In either case disposing of an inner-spring mattress is a major headache.  Well, fret no more.

It is hard enough to find a home for a good full-size, queen or king size mattress, but it is down right impossible to find a home for an odd-sized mattress that was specially made for an antique bed at least 25 years ago.  This one measured 71 inches by 50 inches.

I did some research on the internet and found that 90% of an inner-spring mattress can be recycled. The one article listed a couple of non-profit organizations that recycle mattresses to make money - St Vincent de Paul and Goodwill. I called the local chapter of those organizations in Evansville only to learn that they don't do that in Evansville.  Too bad.  Not sure how much money they would get for the materials, but it isn't as daunting a project as one would expect and an experience individual could do a number of mattresses in a single day.

Stripping the padding.

Obviously, if you noticed the name of my blog site, I could not face the idea of taking the mattress to the dump and leaving it in a landfill. I had no idea what I was doing but that wasn't going to stop me. Worst case scenario . . . I would make a big mess that would have to be carted off to the landfill. That didn't happen.

If you want to recycle responsibly here's how to do it.

The inner-spring mattress I had special made over 25 years ago had four layers over the spring system. I quickly appreciated why a good inner-spring mattress costs so much.  Of course the first layer you will encounter is the cover.  Mine was a heavy fabric made out of cotton, so it was 100% recyclable. A box knife around the edge and it was off.  I used it to bundle the next layer.

Under the cover is the padding. Again, mine was a natural material which meant that it was 100% recyclable.  It was quite dense and 3-4 inches thick.  The mattress buttons are each attached to a corresponding button on the other side of the mattress via a strong cord. You will eventually get to the point where you have to cut the cords. Otherwise the padding strips off easily, can be tied up in the fabric cover.

Removing the protective cover
from the springs. 

Over the metal portion of the mattress is a layer of material which reminds me of the packing blankets sold by U-Haul. This was a thick and substantial material that was obviously designed to buffer the padding and cover from the metal system interior. It was attached to the spring system by metal hooks.  Once detached this material was easily folded and dropped into the recycling bin.

I don't know if it is common with all inner-spring mattresses but this one had a layer of thin wire over the springs. The wires were attached to heavy hemp cord that was attached to the spring system with metal hooks. The wires were about 4 inches apart - maybe less. I can only guess that this layer was intended to keep materials from being pushed into the spring system by the weight of the sleeper. The worst part of this layer was getting the metal hooks open.

Now all that's left is the spring system. I took one look at that and knew that I wasn't going to dismantle this puppy any further.  There was too much heavy twisted wire. I figure that I'll just take that to a metal recycling center as a whole.  If you don't have a truck, you may need to go at it with a good heavy pair of wire cutters.

The spring system

In well under an hour I had reduced the mattress to a bag of stuffing, two folded sheets of heavy spring protection cover, and a bare wire/spring skeleton.  I put everything but the wire in the recycling bin and set the springs aside. I'll toss them in the back of the truck one of these days and go to the metal recycling center.

Everything in the recycling bin

I think it would be a good service and a profitable endeavor for a non-profit organization to recycle old inner-spring mattresses.  If you have a mattress but no one to do it for you, don't worry. Do it yourself and be proud of the waste you kept out of the landfill.  

I see smoke

The first of each May Pamela and I head toward Glacier National Park tucked away in the far northwestern corner of Montana.  It is like going home for us so it is a time of anticipation and excitement. Our first glimpse of the Rocky Mountains as we approach Denver starts us singing Rocky Mountain High and Oh, Montana.  The excitement really starts building as we turn north at Missoula, Montana and start up US 93.  When we get to the south end of Flathead Lake we usually turn off onto a secondary road that goes up the east side of the lake and intersects US 2 just east of Columbia Falls. Columbia Falls is our closest larger town about 45 miles from where we live in the park. It has almost 3,600 people.  Once on US 2 it is hard to contain our excitement. This is the last leg of our annual 2,004 mile migration.  Now it's just Hungry Horse, Coram, West Glacier and then we're home.

Last May (2015) we were as excited as ever but we were also a bit concerned. It was warmer than usual and many of the lower mountains were already losing their snow. Things didn't look like May in Montana and that had us worried. After checking in with old friends and colleagues we learned from those who live at Glacier year round that it had been a very mild winter with little snow. The Big Drift was still 80 feet deep, but it's always 80 feet deep.

We have certain things that we do as soon upon arrival as possible. We'd do them all on the same day but that would be impossible. We always go to Polebridge, hike to Avalanche Lake and listen to the avalanches, and ride our bikes as far up the Going-to-the-Sun road as the snow removal crews will allow.

Robert fire of 2003 directly across from where we live.
The heat was so intense that you could not stand it
a mile away across the lake. 

Over the winter we had made some new friends through Tin Can Tourist - a vintage trailer club - whom we ended up talking into taking a post as hosts at Apgar Campground.  We included them in our ritualistic activity.  We were anxious to make the 2.5 mile hike up to Avalanche Lake. We told our friends, Terry and Beth, how there would be snow starting about 2/3 the way to the lake and you could sit at the lake and hear the thunderous sound of two or three avalanches every hour. I had on my high winter gaiters. We got to the lake. No snow except high up the mountains. No sounds of avalanches. There just hadn't been enough snow and it hadn't been cold enough. That was the beginning of our worries.

The weather situation seemed to go from bad to worse. We could make the trip all the way to Logan Pass by June 6th.  Normally May and June are wet and on the cold side. We have been known to have as much as 30 inches of snow in the pass in late June. This year it rained only two days in May and three days in June. The Going-to-the-Sun Road, which had not been cleared of snow until July 2nd the year before, was open by mid-June.  I saw bare earth on mountains where I'd never seen the ground before.  Streams that are normally swollen and thunderous to the point that you can't stand next to them and talk were little more than trickles and McDonald Lake was so low that there were beaches where there had never been beaches before.

I saw Mountain Goats panting and looking for patches of snow to get cool. We had one bear in the campground this year. It was a young bear that wandered through a picnic area and down an access stairway to the lake. He saw people to his right so he went left. He appeared to be dragging as he walked along the water looking for a place away from people to lay in the water. I was following him from a short distance so I could protect his privacy. When he did start back up the mountain he came to a fallen tree. Normally a bear his size would hop over such a tree. He climbed up one side, paused and jumped off the other side. The heat was almost more than he could tolerate.

By the end of June I must admit that I was beyond worry.  I was frightened every time a camper insisted upon having a campfire when the wind was blowing. Most places around us had fire bans. In fact we were the only place in the northwest US and Canada that didn't have a fire ban.  By June there were countless fires in almost every state and province west and north of us. We would actually have days where the smoke from a fire(s) in another state reduced our visibility.  I never did figure out why Glacier didn't ban fires. Even the campers and visitors were surprised that we were permitting fires.

Robert Fire, Glacier National Park, 2003. 

I know I should not have been so fearful, but there were extenuating circumstances. Forest fires are not only natural but they are natures way of cleaning house and enriching life. Not only is fire good for the soil but there are actually trees which depend upon forest fires to germinate. Forest fires are a part of the cycle of life.  Why then was I fearful?  Because government agencies are playing with nature. In truth all of the agencies involved mean well and have the forest's best interest at heart. The problem is that much of the damage has been done by previous generations and none of them can agree on how to deal with fires around developed areas. At that point buildings become more important than the preservation of nature. The National Park Service insists that, to comply with the mandates of the Wilderness Act of 1964, fallen wood must be left where it falls. That's fine if you permit natural fires. When you avoid fires and have gone for decades longer than the normal cycle of fires, you get an accumulation of flammables on the ground that makes a fire many times hotter than normal. That can cause trees that are capable of surviving a normal fire to burn and die. The heat can cause combustion across fire breaks. And studies have been shown that it takes much longer for a forest to recover from an excessively hot fire. In short, it is a disastrous situation. But the fire management debate between agencies isn't the purpose of this story. I only share it because we were living and working eleven miles into a tinder box with only one road out. But worse than that I was worried about what a major fire would do to the park we love.

Reynold's Creek Fire just minutes after I reported it to dispatch.

July 21st was our day off.  Pamela had decided that she was tired of not being able to go on hikes and climb mountains because of her bone-on-bone arthritis in both knees. She decided that this day she was going to climb Mt Oberlin.  It was a beautiful day.  Much warmer than normal, but we were growing accustomed to that after almost three months.  Even though it was our day off we ended up being involved in finding a fallen climber and we were standing at about 7,500 feet on the side of Mt Oberlin.  I was on the radio with a ranger about a mile or so down the mountain. That's when we saw the smoke.

It appeared like a thin grey line rising from the valley floor several thousand feet below us. That shouldn't be there was my first thought.  I asked the ranger below me if he could see the smoke. He couldn't see it as well as we could but he saw enough. "Call it in!"

Reynold's Creek fire burning eastward down the St Mary Valley

It was a sickening feeling and I had trouble getting the words out as I keyed the radio. By the time I had reported the smoke to dispatch it had gone from a fine ribbon to a thick band of smoke rising. I knew the area. There was a back-country campsite, known as Reynold's Creek, right about where the smoke was rising. Within minutes the valley below us was filled with smoke. Glacier had a major forest fire. By the time we got off the mountain hundreds of visitors were stranded in the high mountain pass while many hundreds more were be evacuated from campgrounds and hotels in the St Mary valley down which the fire was roaring.

When the fire was finally out over 4,000 acres - over 6.25 square miles - of forest was burned. They had actively fought the fire because of the number of campgrounds, hotels and other buildings and dwellings in the fire's path. It had been contained naturally by the mountains on each side.

Throughout the summer it seemed that the west was burning. Smoke poured into western Montana from Oregon, Washington, Idaho and Canada.  There were times that it was so hazy that it appeared like smog.

Four and a half months after this fire the west is still burning. Today 9.8 million acres have burned. 9.8 million acres is 15,312 square miles and is the equivalent of burning all of the States of Massachusetts, Connecticut, Rhode Island and some of New Hampshire.  It is the worst fire year in recorded history.

We can deny reality and scientific fact.  We can pretend it isn't happening or that we can't do anything about it because it is just some deity who's really pissed at us. Regardless, if we don't try to do something it is only going to get worse. You can't drink oil and there are no nutrients in coal. If you don't want to burn or starve or drown I would suggest that we not only hold our government to the COP21 agreement but insist upon doing better.  FEEL THE HEAT.

Friendship

Great friends and colleagues, Terry and Beth, with Pamela
and me at Northern Lights Saloon, Polebridge, MT
after a day in the back-country.

I wouldn't quite call myself a Trekkie but I do really like Star Trek. I especially like the fourth movie. At the beginning of the movie Spock's Mother asks him why he needed to return to Earth. He explained that it was because he had to testify. She said "oh, because they're your friends." To which he replied, "because I was there."  After time traveling back to the late 20th. century to find Hump Backed Whales to save the world, having their alien space craft break down, having a crew member end up in a primitive 20th century hospital, and whalers almost killing one of their whales, they return to Earth where they are to face a court martial for something they did in movie episode III.  During their adventure Spock finds himself agreeing with Bones that they needed to stay and take extraordinary risks to save Pavlov. Of course the court realizes that this motley crew had saved the Earth, so charges were dropped and everyone was happy except the Klingon ambassador. As Spock's Vulcan Father is saying goodbye he says, in good Vulcan manner, "As I recall I opposed your enlistment in Star Fleet. I may have been mistaken. Your comrades are good people." Spock didn't blink "They are my friends," he said.

My blog entitled "our journey home" made quite a hit and, at least for me, raised lots of philosophical questions which I feel somehow compelled to address.  Maybe being a seeker makes one a wee bit of a philosopher. Perhaps I should apologize for that.  I'm sure that, if there is some type of life beyond human death where the deceased can look back on those of us still here, my college philosophy professor is enjoying a good laugh at the idea of me being a philosopher. I could always make him laugh.  He was a man of my parents age who had become a Jesuit priest, taught philosophy, fell in love, and left orders to become a faculty colleague of my parents. He was great as a friend as well as a teacher. He told one class that we would be guaranteed an "A" if we could demonstrate an opposite to love. I got the "A" but it wasn't because I demonstrated an opposite to love. To the contrary, I became convinced that love does not have an opposite. He laughed hysterically when he found me reading Paul Tillich.  No matter how mundane our conversations they always seemed, in retrospect, to dip frequently into very complex and meaningful areas of life.

I took a few moments to sit down and make a list of the issues and ideas, the questions and the potential hypotheses, that my journey blog raised.  At this point there are at least eight and the list is growing.  Now being the rather analytic type, I figure that the proper approach would be to finish the list, organize it, research and prep and then start writing.  Unfortunately, or perhaps thankfully, I'm not an obsessive analytic, so I'm not going to do that. I figured that since I'm within seven months of having survived on this planet for seven full decades I need to write in my own order or preference if I want to share what I think is most important before my time is up. No reason to spend time talking about the definition of nature, participant, reality, etc., if I never get to talk about why they are important.

I ended up in bed with a cold the night I posted the Journey blog. I was so sick that it was two days before I saw how many people had read it.  I completed the blog while I was waiting for Pamela to get out of a meeting at the college system main office in Versailles, KY.  and posted it that night when we got home. On the steps going up to our room was a package which turned out to be homemade jam from friends in Washington.  Our friend, who sent the jam, had done everything from picking the fruit to filling the jars. It was not only delicious but we were honored that she would share something which represented significant time and effort with us. We met Bill and Susan when they visited Glacier to meet Bill's brother and sister-in-law, Warren and Michelle. Warren and Michelle are good friends from Hopkinsville, KY, about 90 miles south of home-base, who were coming to Glacier to visit us. Bill and Susan love the outdoors, are avid bicyclist and had just become hooked on trailering, which is what brought us together with Warren and Michelle.

The next morning, as I lay sick in bed, Pamela spoke to the good friends who were supposed to have stopped by to visit on their way home from a local Asian food market. Aseem and Plabita are another couple with whom Pamela was friends before I came along. Aseem is a physics professor. Pamela and Plabita were talking excitedly because Plabita finally received her green card so she can get her PT license.

It was just a short while later that Pamela was on the phone with Cherry.  Cherry is the head of the college library and her husband, Carl, is a professional artist. Many of you have seen the picture I posted of his painting that I bought Pamela for her birthday. It brings our Berges collection up to two. Cherry was excited about a book of poetry she was reading and ended up reading poetry to us over the phone. We had Facebook conversations with a friend who is a traveler and was somewhere in Turkey.  We always have to check his Facebook posts to see where he's living.  We dipped (is that term still around?) into the lives of other friends who were sharing great moments with their family. Then Pamela turned to me and said "we certainly have many wonderful friends."  What an understatement!

Pamela's statement seemed so obvious but it hit me that this was the next segment of the journey that deserves consideration.  So you can either credit or blame Pamela for this blog.

From time to time I have visualized the journey as a pinball machine. As the ball starts its journey from the top of the incline to the small opening between the flippers at the bottom, it bumps into objects, called bumpers, which send it in a different direction and, in some case, may actually catapult the ball. As I think about my own journey I can identify those experiences and individuals which acted as my pinball bumpers. Friends can be such bumpers propelling you in totally unplanned and unexpected direction.

But first we must define "friend".  I'm sure you're not surprised that I got 277 million results when I Goggled "friend definition".  I went through two pages and found so little variation that I stopped. The  Google definition, which was of course first, was "a person whom one knows and with whom one has a bond of mutual affection, typically exclusive of sexual or family relations."  (Google) One look at this one and I knew that I was going to have some problems. The majority of them noted that a friend is not usually a member of one's family. I would definitely have to take exception to that. My late wife, Diana, and for the past two years, Pamela, are both people whom I would have to call "best friends." Right now it is Pamela who patiently sits and listens as I proof read my blogs out loud.  But until we determine what constitutes a friend I guess I can't get into that argument.

Dictionary.reference.com defined friend as "a person attached to another by feelings of affection or personal regard."  I was struck by the word 'attached'.  Merriam-Webster's first definition was "a person who you like and enjoy being with". Poor grammar for a grammatical tool but I like the idea. At first I thought the Urbandictionary.com definition was really bad. It used a psychological diagnostic term as a derogatory term. I really get upset with that. It used poor grammar and no punctuation.  But it grew on me. "... people who are aware of how retarded you are and still manage to be seen in public with you. people who make you laugh till you pee your pants. people who cry for you when one of your special items disappear. when you dont (sic) have enough money to get a (sic) ice cream, they chip in. knows all of your internet passwords. who would never make you cry just to be mean." 

I don't know about you, but the true dictionary-type definitions all left me a bit cold.  The Urban Dictionary definition seems to be a bit more of an example than a definition but in some ways was more helpful. Maybe that's because I can relate to it.

You have to admit that it takes something - not sure yet what that might be - to be seen, nevertheless associated, with a 69 year old man who has a pony tail, a yellow-diamond earring, a dragon tattoo on his arm and a a Goofy on his leg. Besides that he's an unabashed tree-huger, vegetarian, conservationist who would rather be climbing a mountain, kayaking, white-water rafting, cycling, scuba diving or living in the wilderness rather than be confined to "civilization".  Left, right, or dead center, most people are going to have something to say about such a man which may or may not be complimentary.

The Urban Dictionary definition seems to be saying that a defining quality of a friend is one who likes you regardless of your strangeness.  Regardless of our strangeness?  I can't help but think of a psychology professor that my Mother had (she was a grad-student when I was a teenager) who insisted upon, at some point, asking his classes who among them thought they were normal. My Mother always raised her hand just to torment him. I'm very glad that we don't have to try to define 'normal'. Since I'm not proposing a doctoral dissertation, can we save time and agree that we all have our quirks?

Can we conclude without massive evidence or extensive time going through the steps of logic, that at least one of the attributes of a friend is, in a word, acceptance?   I have people whom I consider good friends and whom I like very much but they consider roughing it to be staying in a three-star hotel instead of a five star hotel.  I have people whom I consider good friends and whom I like who are spiritually polar opposites to me.  I accept their differences. In fact, I can not think of any of our friends who do not have some difference.  So, we must then ask, are we friends because we are accepting or are we accepting because we are friends?  Dang it! I'm making this tougher than I meant.

Should we focus on the "feelings of affection or personal regard"?  I really hate to consider this one because it then forces me to ask what causes the feelings of affection. Why are we drawn to affection for another person?  Over the years I have had many situations where I had an un-explainable affection toward another person - usually a patient - which was not necessarily returned nor would I call them a friend. An example is the non-verbal man who was sent to my special secured unit from the State Hospital. He would steal any food or drink left unattended and hit without apparent provocation. It took almost a year of hard work to train him but mostly train the staff. I knew his personal history and I had an affection for him despite the fact that he'd hit me with all his might if I got in his way . . . which I unfortunately had to do frequently. It would seem then that affection might be a part of friendship, but it is not unique to friendship and isn't that which makes a friend.

We can also see from simple observation that there are levels of friendship. I have people whom I like but I do not know well, we share a common interest but not to the point that we keep in contact to talk about it, and I have no driving desire to tell them about life experiences and events. Perhaps we should call such people acquaintances . . . the most basic level of friendship. On the other extreme there are those, like a mate, with whom you share everything and have a driving desire to talk and spend time with them especially when there is a special life experience.

To save time and my poor brain, let's take a short-cut. The one thing we can say about all of the definitions is what they are lacking, viz. none of them says why there is personal attachment, etc. There seems to be a missing ingredient.  Perhaps I'm really asking for a cause of friendship rather than a definition of friendship. Be that as it may, let's push on.

I'm really going to go out on philosophical thin ice here and propose that the missing ingredient is the realization that friendship begins at a point where our journeys collide. I'm going to propose that some factor(s) in that collision creates friendship.  Quantum mechanics shows how a particle collision results in (1) one or both of the particles going off in different directions, (2) the creation of one or more different particles while one or more of the particles that collided disintegrate, and (3) they may both become a part of something new. Can we take a page out of quantum theory and apply it to friendship?

Obviously in Possibility 1 I am assuming that no human encounter leaves us proceeding directly on the same course as before. Since there is nothing in the physical world that can come physically close without being effected by the gravitational pull of one another I can see no reason to assume that we can come physically and emotionally close to another human being without some course change even if that course change is to avoid the encounter. If nothing else, we are constantly learning. When we stop learning we are dead.  We are going to take some data from the most casual and meaningless encounter with another human being which means that our being has been effected and our course is changed.  What then happens when the encounter is something more than mundane and uneventful? That takes us to Possibility 2.  But it doesn't explain what happened in that event, the encounter, the collision of life's journeys that created friendship.

What I fear is the more we dig the more questions arise and fewer answers we will have. I'm already seeing this happening. It is easy to identify those things which attract us; viz. common interest, values and history.  It may be impossible to identify that which turns those attractants into the glue which creates a life-long bond of friendship. Is it chemical or psychological?

While all of our friendships are very special and very dear to us, we can look at a few that practically define the question.  We have friends whom we met on-line. By the time that we finally met face-to-face we hugged and talked as though we had been dear friends our entire lives. That level of friendship has endured.  At the same time we have friends whom we met one day and by the time we parted company one would have thought we were life-long friends. That level of friendship has likewise endured.  Both of those friends (couples) share multiple common interests and values, but we have many acquaintances with whom we share common interests and values but do not have the deep abiding friendship.  And to make things really confused, there is a man whom we would call a good friend whose kind words or advice are a treasure to us and I've never met him.  We follow each other literally around the world on Facebook.

Perhaps what I'm trying to do is like trying to find an opposite to love. It isn't going to happen. It might be that we must be content with being able to identify attributes of a friend and be satisfied with knowing that somehow our life journeys collided in such a way as to create this relationship we call friendship.