New Mythologies and Musing from the Garden In Oregon

Any comparison to Thoreau's Walden need be colored by this fact. In 1844, on a camping trip, Thoreau accidentally set fire to 300 acres of the Concord woods. What a screw up! I have never done anything like that! 

The photos were grabbed off the Internet. I have asked for and received no permission to use them

Oregon Musing 

“Let us cultivate our garden.” 
― Voltaire 

We arrived at Woodpecker Flats on April Fools Day. Dave was fool enough to invite us to stay and we are fools enough to have taken him up on it. How we got to this place at that time is open to interpretation. The story cannot be told in a straight line. The myths that we choose to live by are the myths that we create for ourselves.

So, this is the story about how Alachua Habitat for Humanity in Florida made us homeless and how we came as refugees to Oregon and became pioneers ending homelessness and hunger through direct action. O.K. It's more complicated than that, but we can elaborate further later on. First, these musings from our Oregon garden.

Too much water or not enough? The same question for fertilizer and sunshine.

The real garden question is: How do the deer prefer their vegetables grown?

We are living at Woodpecker Flats located on nine acres in O'Brien, Josephine County, southern Oregon, near the junction of Loony Mountain Road and No Way, not real far north of the California borderline. It is largely wooded - predominantly pine, manzanita (which I am told is related to the blueberry) and more - with some clearings.

The manzanita fruit is edible and has a pleasant tartness, but it causes gastrointestinal upset if eaten in large quantities. It is not much like a blueberry.

The property owner is an esoteric artist. There are some random sculptures and the remains of some old projects including a tree-house that has fallen out of the tree and the Bus Stop to Nowhere.

I began my share of tera-forming with some trails and garden patches. The ground is hard, iron rich and very rocky. I have "harvested" piles of rocks and have incorporated them into garden walls, terraces and a sculpture entitled Big Ben Meets Salvador Dali in the Garden.

Inspiration for my sculpture.

We received some seed packs from a local food bank and some more from a friend in town. Liz had a tin with a variety of seeds marketed as a "Survivalist supply. So, veggie and flower seeds in hand, we are off and running...

My initial garden idea was to create a living art project. Nice, comfortable strolling paths with artistically placed edible plants and flowers along the way. The local deer seem to appreciate the effort. They like to eat the tops off of plants. Marigolds - yum! So now, we have wire fencing around and over everything with the hope that the deer, the bugs, the birds, the wild monkeys (just seeing if anyone is still paying attention) will leave something for us to harvest...and clearly not enough protection. Chomp, chomp, chomp. Fourteen tomato plants decapitated. Peas nearly annihilated. More wire.

I have been told that this region has one of the largest concentration of deer in North America. This may be true. I had an extended conversation with a fairly large deer one recent morning. I asked him if he didn't have enough other things to eat without messing with the garden. He scoffed.

Summer was hot and dry which I assume is about normal. One day, as we sat outside discussing deep thoughts and abstract philosophy we hear a clunk from inside the camper. On examination we find that a glass bottle of olive oil - extra virgin, organic - exploded from the heat. Glass particles and oil everywhere. Glad we were outside.

Josephine County has almost no local government. There is a volunteer Fire Department. The library is funded by donations - it receives no County money - and, the local branch is only open 13 hours a week. I heard recently of a (non-fatal) shooting with a Sheriff Department response time of two hours! Don't know if that is true but it seems plausible. I was told this by a woman who claimed to be a Volunteer Sheriff and Fire Fighter. (She had a handgun on her hip.) She also told me that a tiger had escaped from the local Wild Cat facility, mated with an indigenous cougar and now there are two cubs (tougars?) wandering around. Hmm...seems unlikely to me. What about you? Which reminds me of the story about the guy who walks into a bar with a giraffe...

This police car is parked at the blinking light. 

I have yet to see a cougar or a bear although I am told that both are present. We have had close encounters with deer, hummingbirds, a jack rabbit, snakes, lizards and other sorts of flying, buzzing, hopping, squirming and crawling creatures. And oh yes, that rattle snake certainly got my attention and respect.

The night sky here is incredible! Stars, stars, and more stars. Star travel? Alien visitors? Why not? And it is quiet. Not much traffic in the daytime and even less at night. There are sounds of wild creatures. Also sometimes you hear a neighbor's rooster and there is a donkey nearby that likes to bray. And there is the occasional gunfire - pop, pop, pop - I guess because they can, There was a large amount of helicopter summer traffic. There is a forest fire out there...

July First something miraculous happened. In gardens all over Oregon tomato plants metamorphosed into cannabis plants. According to a new Oregon law, every household MUST grow four marijuana plants. I think that's the law. I know it is something like that. Anyway, glory be, we found four marijuana plants growing in our veggie plot. Thank God for marijuana.

I have begun dismantling an old trailer, saving parts, particularly windows. I have a pile of old tires and a collection of bottles and jars. We intend to build an Earthship greenhouse. It is possible to grow even tropical plants year-round if you get it right. I saw a video of pineapple growing in an Earthship in Canada! Commercial greenhouse? Starter plants? Exotic vegetables? Indeed, why not? Well...have you ever filled even ONE tire with dirt? It is very labor intensive. For labor we have one old man and for tools we have a wheelbarrow and a shovel. We had a few filled before the rains start.   

And then October came and as it went it began to rain. It hasn't stopped yet and Woodpecker Flats has become a river. Much of the garden and all of the paths have washed by our door and our camper has become Huck Finn's raft. We shall see where it floats to. The deer still find us charming and amusing and it is time to start the spring garden.

Poetry as poetry...

10/12/14 by Zvi Baranoff
for the poets still here, the poets no longer here & the poet in each of us

poetry as a political act

poetry as a contact sport

as an act of love

as an exertion of self

as a denial of reality

as an expression of reality

and other realities & possibilities

poetry as revolution & counter-revolution

answering to no one

conforming to no one

street poets

bar poets too poor to buy their own drinks

unpublished or self-publishing poets

taking on the universe

one word, one beat, one syllable at a time

vibrating forever, timeless, boundless

trackless tracks in the sand 

Just Us

Just Us Book Project

This was the idea - and why we came to Philly. Unfortunately, to date we have not been able to find a partnering organization with space that we can work with...so the Project is on hold for now.

The Just Us Book Project is a broad Social Justice program promoting literacy and culture operating on a regional level to bring about positive change both locally and internationally.

The task of The Just Us Book Project is to promote, encourage and organize ongoing book drives regionally on campuses and in schools as well with religious and social organizations and redistribute the collected materials where most needed.

 We believe that culture and literacy have an inherent value beyond quantification and beyond the limits of class stratification. We believe that culture and literacy are basic human rights worldwide.  The Just Us Book Project mission is to expand access.

We will be collecting books with three target groups in mind. We are partnering with the African Library Project to help build pop-up libraries in Sub-Sahara Africa. We are partnering with organizations that send books to prisoners in the USA. We are working hand in hand with various local youth literacy programs.

For donations of 25 or more items, we may be able to schedule a pick-up. Please call or e-mail.

If you are interested in organizing a book drive or getting involved in the effort, please contact us because until there is justice, it’s just us.

The Bookworm & the Nonprofit Corporate Mindset

• The Bookworm & the Nonprofit Corporate Mindset 

Or

The Questions & Answers that Lead to Ending My Job

The questions below were given to each store employee to answer by the new store administrator. I turned in my answers on April 21, 2014. 

On May 5 I was informed that I was no longer a full time, salaried employee. My new schedule would be 20 hours a week. I posted this change on my personal Facebook page. On May 7 I was summarily dismissed.

Write down what you do (not job description):

I process books and other media, develop ongoing relationships to assure regular donations and an understanding of our customer base as well as the concerns and interests of people that donate materials to us. 

I work on an ongoing basis to improve displays of materials in these departments. 

I network with others in our immediate community and the book community worldwide. 

Where do you see changes needed?:

The store is the most public face of Alachua Habitat for Humanity. As such, it should serve as outreach for folks interested in working on projects concerning issues of housing and social justice.  Shopping at a Habitat Store should be an educational experience.                                                                              

We need to do a better job of reflecting the core values of Habitat for Humanity in all aspects of our work. As a nonprofit organization, we have a responsibility to the community at large, especially those that donate to us and those who shop here, that we are serving a higher purpose and the common good. 

Mission-related displays as well as displays reflecting organizational activity need to be regularly updated and prominent.

The organization misses an opportunity when it neglects this valuable outreach tool and is shortsighted when it sees the store only as a funding source. Our “bottom line” must be understood not merely in terms of dollars and cents but also in terms of social good accomplished and a sense of purpose.

Store employees choose to work here because of their personal commitment to Habitat for Humanity's expressed core values. Therefore, Habitat employees should be seen as primarily social activist and not merely retail workers.

Store employees need to be reassured that the money they raise for the organization is well spent, fulfilling the goals of Habitat International. Better two directional communications of accomplishments and goals should be developed. Indeed, store staff should feel a part of the organization to the effect of influencing our development of programs that directly change conditions of poverty.

All Habitat Employees should earn a living wage. No full time employee should suffer with a lack of affordable housing, from periodic food shortages or find they are dependent on charity to fill basic needs.

Concern for employee housing, nutritional needs, childcare needs, etc. should never be considered as secondary, “only personal” or irrelevant. When employees find that they cannot meet their personal needs through their work, there is a loss of productivity. Additionally, retaining good workers requires understanding the needs of the workforce and finding ways to satisfy them.

Retaining workers will become a more prevalent organizational concern as the economy expands and even putting aside all moral issues, the market value of labor increases.

What would you do to increase sales and production?:

A comfortable shopping experience as well as a knowledgeable and happy staff encourages customers to return and also encourage those they know to be supportive of our endeavors.

Creativity and artistic flair should be encouraged from employees.

Gainesville, Florida - January 7, 2014

 

African Libraries Get Gainesville Books

 

Habitat Bookworms is shipping books to Africa and needs your help! 

Habitat Bookworms, the staff and volunteers of the Book Department at the Alachua Habitat for Humanity ReStore - in conjunction with the African Library Project - is gathering and packing books. $500 for shipping will make Alachua County’s first library in Africa possible!

Habitat Bookworms’ first shipment will be sent to Ghana, in Western Africa. Habitat Bookworms expects to follow up with additional shipments as supplies and funds allow.

 

In Sub-Sahara Africa widespread poverty conditions are the norm. Many people are living barely at a subsistence level, existing on incomes of less than $2 per day. In rural African communities the overwhelming majority of the populace live as subsistence farmers in homes that often lack electricity and running water.

 

Habitat International is a nonprofit organization founded in 1976 that believes that every man, woman and child should have a decent, safe and affordable place to live. Habitat has helped build or repair more than 800,000 houses and served more than 4 million people around the world.

 

The African Library Project was founded in 2005 with the purpose of establishing libraries in rural Africa. The African Library Project mobilizes volunteers in the USA to organize book drives to gather useful materials and raise money for shipping. The ALP partners with organizations in Africa that establish and maintain the rural libraries. Since the organization’s founding over a thousand libraries have been established and more than a million books have been shipped with many more on the way!

 

The Alachua Habitat for Humanity ReStore serves as a fundraising mechanism for Alachua Habitat for Humanity. At 2317 SW 13^th Street in Gainesville, Florida, the ReStore sells gently used furniture and household goods, second hand clothing as well as building supplies at greatly discounted prices. This model provides low cost basic needs to the community, reduces the flow of materials that may otherwise end up in landfills and raises money for local building projects. A percentage of the ReStore’s income goes directly to Habitat International to fund the work done worldwide.

For the last two years, the ReStore has significantly expanded the display and sales of books. The book department now consists of over 600 square feet of the store, raising around $4,500 per month. 

 

Recently, the large supply of books has been supplemented with the help of the Friends of the Library, as well as many donations directly from members of the community. With this opportunity, the ReStore has culled many of its older stock of books to make room for the new supplies. Many of these are now earmarked for the African Library Project.

 

The goal of providing the basis of life beyond poverty includes both a healthy living environment and culture that includes literacy and educational opportunities. The work of Habitat for Humanity and the African Library Project dovetail nicely. Both organizations have an active presence in Malawi, Ghana and Zambia. These are each countries where English is the official language or the primary language of education.

 

The Habitat Bookworms are seeking donations to cover the shipping costs of our part in this project. The books will be boxed at the ReStore, mailed to the ALP warehouse in New Orleans and then sent by cargo ship to a distribution point in Africa. The cost of shipping a load of 1000 books is $500 or a mere 50 cents per book! Checks can be made out to Alachua Habitat for Humanity. Please designate African Library Project on the check’s memo line. Cash donations are, of course, accepted as well.

 

This is one more case of small change making big changes; As the Habitat Bookworms are inclined to say, “Building Community One Book at A Time!” or as the African Library Project slogan says, “Changing Lives Book By Book”. To help, please contact the Alachua Habitat ReStore.

 

Contact:

Harold Baranoff, Book Department Manager

Alachua Habitat, 2317 SW 13^th Street, Gainesville, Florida 32608

Phone: 352-373-5728 Cell: 352-870-0384

 

Find the Habitat Bookworms on Facebook @ Habitat Bookworms

The African Library Project can be found on the web @ http://www.africanlibraryproject.org/

The Habitat Bookworms

The Habitat Bookworms

(This was published in the Alachua Habitat for Humanity Newsletter)

Harold Baranoff and Carol Doherty

For Harold Baranoff and Carol Dougherty, the only limitation to their work is "time and space." Both are members of the Habitat Bookworms, the employees of Alachua Habitat for Humanity which manage the book department in the Thrift Store. 

 

"It is not only our responsibility to sell the books," said Baranoff, a seasoned Bookworm, "but to create an atmosphere where members of the community can come together."

 

Baranoff has been a Bookworm and full-time employee with the bookstore for more than two years and has helped evolve the department from a large table with books scattered on it, to organized shelves accounting for over 600 square feet of the store. Dougherty has been a part-time employee with the shop since July of 2013 after volunteering for over a year.

 

In addition, they have created an online sales program, selling textbooks and more valuable books online, in order to make the most profit from their donations. The Bookworms often receive donations of rare books, including a first edition poetry book whose publication dated back to the 1800s. 

 

The Bookworm slogan "Building homes and community one book at a time," clearly holds true when witnessing first-hand the work that Harold and Carol do. 

 

Each month, in-store and online book sales account for roughly $4,500 in revenue. These profits go directly into the Habitat operation building program which provides local Alachua County families in need with access to affordable housing.

 

"I believe in giving the gift of reading, especially to children," said Dougherty. 

 

Originally a large number of donated books came from the closing of two stores in Gainesville, Books Inc. and Wayward Council. In addition to book donations Wayward Council also donated a large number of records which Baranoff and Dougherty used to start a music department in the Thrift Store. 

 

"Wayward Council had an established books for prisoners program," said Baranoff, "and with their donation of books came hundreds of letters from prisoners asking for books." The Thrift Store continued this program and receives daily letters from prisoners asking for books.The cost of postage for this program is supported through community donations specifically for this program. 

 

To find out more information about the Habitat Bookworms check out their Facebook page:

 

https://www.facebook.com/HabitatBookworms

---

My record department



Still doing grunt labor!

They say: “It’s the Economy, Stupid!” I say: “It’s the Stupid Economy!”

By Zvi Baranoff

What is the one, most compelling way that you, as an individual can contribute to stimulating the economy? Get in your car and crash it, preferably in a way that results in multiple injuries that will require hospitalization and legal complications that will take years to resolve in court. You have helped employ cops, tow truck operators, emergency responders, doctors, nurses and various hospital workers, lawyers, court personnel, auto mechanics, parts manufactures – the list goes on.

Waste, carelessness and destruction are good for the economy. Safely driving your car and avoiding accidents really contributes very little to our economic system.  If you feel the least bit reluctant to do your part in this way you probably have the basis for understanding the fallacies of virtually all discussions of jobs.

No class of people does more to help stimulate the economy than blown out heroin addicts. Under the current system many junkies steal to support their habits. A junkie with a $200 dollar a day habit may very well steal a thousand dollars worth of stuff to pay for his fix. This set up supports a wide array of people in the underground economy and keeps cops employed. Stolen items are replaced at full market value. Security systems are installed. If the junkie gets AIDS he stimulates the medical industry. If he goes to prison, he helps keep the prison-industrial complex going.

Now some may argue for a harm reduction approach to heroin addiction. I myself am one to take that position. From an economic perspective, harm reduction offers nothing but negatives. If you were to provide heroin to confirmed addicts by prescription in safe clinics at a reasonable cost, all the above mentioned economic benefits would disappear. If you can actually cure the addiction, even the doctors and clinicians would be out of work! Of course, you may think that it is a good thing to reduce the harmful social affects including lessening your chance of being mugged, but that is a pretty selfish point of view!

Clearly, “creating jobs” cannot be the primary motive of any individual action or social policy. The motive must be the greater common good. While some jobs may be created as a result, the most positive approaches will lead to less work being needed rather than more. For society no less than an individual, jobs are a means to an end. We want the security of having a safe place to live and enough to eat. We want medical care when we need it and we want to be able to educate our children. We want recreational opportunities and the occasional luxury. When politicians begin to wave the flag of jobs, they have distracted us from the true goal.

Almost all the public discussion and debate concerning the economy in general and jobs in particular is based on misconceptions, wrong thinking, delusions or outright lies. Pundits and other know-it-alls from the left, right, center, environmentalists and anti-environmentalists alike, all talk about creating jobs and stimulating the economy.  We are asking the wrong questions and the answers we are getting are at best useless and sometimes dangerous. We need to look at the bigger picture, draw honest conclusions and offer suggestions that will make our future more livable.

We need to start with the honest, blunt assessment that the nature of the economy is in the process of a fundamental change that will result in a future with less jobs. No amount of tinkering with structures, no ideological game playing, no government interventions and no wishful thinking will change this. There are things we can do to temporarily create jobs but in the long term we need to recognize that many of the jobs we have known in the past will no longer exist and most of them will not be replaced with an equivalent. We need to think beyond our current set-up.

Where did the jobs go? A popular response is to blame outsourcing or illegal aliens. This is a convenient way of sidestepping truer analysis, while stoking the fires of xenophobia. Newspapers, movie theaters and book stores did not move to India. Undocumented Mexican workers did not take all the jobs in the buggy whip factories. The jobs are going, going, gone mostly because our technology has made much of the work more efficient or obsolete.

In the not so distant past, it took a lot more workers to get anything done. Agricultural work on large estates was done by slaves or serfs. Early factories were crowded places. Mining was done by hand. Wealthy households were staffed by swarms of servants. Transportation required the support network of horse breeders, stables, blacksmiths, etc. Then was then. Now is now. It just ain’t like that any more!

Greater efficiency driven by the combined forces of scientific advancements and the drive for increased profit have steadily moved in the direction of getting more work done with less physical effort and fewer hands needed. First tools and then machinery have significantly reduced the number of farmhands required to produce food.   Production has moved from the craftsman to the factory. The factory system developed the assembly line and the assembly line has become more and more automated. Electrification and household appliances have significantly reduced the number of servants even in the wealthiest of households. Now a flick of a switch or the push of a button can accomplish what took manpower to do not so long ago.

 Of course, all this “advancement” has other costs as well, particularly the environmental degradation.  By the middle of the last century a comprehensive critique of much of the mechanisms of our economy developed as environmentalism. In a piecemeal approach, environmentalism has operated mostly as an emergency break on the madness-driven forward motion exploitation of natural resources for profit. Each step along the way dominant business interests claim that the more environmentally sensitive proposal is “jobs killing” and as of late the environmental knee jerk reaction is to start talking about “green jobs”.

A green transition is an imperative that falls outside of the widespread current understanding of the economy. The argument that a given environmental policy is “job killing” is spurious because continuing with ecologically destructive practices will not “create” jobs. When we respond that green initiatives will create jobs, we are using half truths and basing our arguments on wishful thinking and self-delusions. Ideology or philosophy will not create jobs. Only the need or desire to accomplish a given task and the willingness for someone to pay for it creates jobs. Anything else is smoke and mirrors.

We are right to encourage the development of green technology and it is perfectly logical to use incentives like tax breaks or government loans to help bring about these developments. Manufacturing and installing solar panels, retrofitting older houses to make them more energy efficient, installing and maintaining windmills and more is certainly needed but to claim that it is “job creation” is less than truthful. Some jobs will be created, but many of them will be short term. Once the solar panels or the weather stripping is installed, that house is done. A crash program could –and should - convert the entire country over to energy efficient and clean energy in a relatively short time frame. This would be a labor intensive transformation. The end result of a job well done will be a much healthier environment, which is absolutely necessary but will not be lasting full employment.

The key catchphrase of Environmentalism as a movement has been “Reduce, Reuse & Recycle”. A greater truth has probably never been stated in such a pithy manner. Efficiency and voluntary simplicity are central to any long term healthy environment. If you don’t need it, don’t buy it. Of course, if we consume less, we manufacture less, which means fewer jobs.

Green activist are not the first, of course, to claim that adopting their policies will create jobs. Peace activists have long claimed that ending wars and reducing military spending will result in a Peace Dividend that will stimulate the economy. There is a failed logic here on several fronts. First off, it presupposes that if the military spending was curtailed, the same amount of money would be spent on social programs. The government has been funding the military with borrowed money. If we were to seriously cut back on military spending (and we certainly should) we could reduce or eliminate borrowing. Ending a war brings troops home with no jobs. Cutting out wasteful military production leaves factory workers idle. War is a good business. Nonetheless, peace is still a good idea.

Lately hemp activist have argued that the reintroduction of hemp would turn the economy around. Hemp offers a lot of environmental advantages and the reintroduction would certainly change the nature of the economy, but anyone that thinks that the economy will be stimulated has probably been smoking hemp’s psychoactive cousin. Hemp can produce a better cloth than cotton with less impact on the environment. This would replace one agricultural product with another. Hemp production would be less labor intensive than cotton and the resulting cloth will last longer, reducing purchases of clothing. Hemp can make paper better than wood pulp. The production of paper without cutting trees is a wonderful thing. The process however will certainly be less labor intensive and offer lower paying jobs. Hemp for fuel has a lot of potential. We certainly need to shift from fossil fuels to renewable. However, the key word here is “shift”. I’m all in favor of supporting farmers rather than the oil industry, but if we eliminate one industry and create another, how many jobs are “created”?

Every step we take in reducing waste at either the government, industrial or personal level also reduces the amount of work that needs to be done. We must recognize this, change our methodology of measuring economic worth and begin to develop mechanisms that promote a soft landing because the economy as we know it is going to come down.

One social reform that is already in use in other countries that it would be wise for us to adapt is a system of voluntary part time work.  In the United States part time workers are penalized. For instance, only full time workers have any company benefits and part time workers are generally paid at a lower hourly rate. If we were to adopt a system that made it easier for workers to have a part time work schedule, many full time workers would choose this as an option, having more leisure time for themselves and opening employment opportunities of others.

There is a growing movement striving for self sufficiency. This is made up of individuals, families and collectivist communities. As folks build their own homes, grow their own food, make their own clothes and generally care for their own needs, there is less need for the wasteful processes of industrial production or the assistance of government agencies. Government could encourage self sufficiency in various ways. At the very least, government should remove any regulatory impediments there are in the way of this sort of social development.

The goal must be the development of systems that offer individuals the ability to live securely and with self respect. A job is really only one path in that direction and very well might not be the best long term choice. As we develop alternative mechanisms of support outside of the industrial model, the lack of a “job” will become less and less significant. As a movement we should be far more focused on building alternative economic structures and far less concerned about “economic stimulus” and “job creation”.

The jobs of the last century are gone and will not be replaced. The workers however are still here. It is time for us to roll up our sleeves and do for ourselves what neither government nor capitalism can do; make a livable future.