Another reason Hollywood blows

http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,352736,00.html

Basic Needs

Speaking of basic needs:

"With more than a billion people lacking access to safe drinking water, and five million people dying of water-related disease every year, here's an opportunity to make a small but extremely meaningful difference."

http://www.treehugger.com/files/2008/04/lifestraw-family-water-filter-sponsor-project-h.php

Quest for Sustainability

I keep a “to do” list on my computer desktop. It is a daily reminder of what I really need to be doing, what I could be doing, what I wish I could be doing, and future things I need to think about doing. It’s not stratified at all according to wants and needs, though it probably should be. In fact, much of it borders on the theme of “how to make more money in less time so I can play more often, all while eliminating as much waste as possible.” I recently began thinking about the level of attention (e.g., stress) that this underlying thought has in my life, and the “mindcycle” (so to speak) that fuels it. I realize this is not an earth-shattering concept; philosophers, scientists, environmentalists (e.g.,“hippies”), and many others have been contemplating thoughts like this (in part, at least) for centuries. And I think it (quest for cash) is really what drives people to get out of bed on a daily basis. Let me clarify: I’m not, and never really have been, driven by monetary gain or goals.

Personally, I came to the conclusion in the last 3 years that I can’t address life like most of my 30-40 something year old counterparts: those people who are considered, and most importantly consider themselves, relatively “successful” – in the generally accepted definition of that word. That is, they are: married, have kids, content in gated-community McMansion-style home ownership, have a combined 6-digit income, spend their evenings on a leather couch watching ‘whatever’ on their 60” flat screen TV, and take annual vacations to “anywhere elsewhere” (excuse me for a moment while I go outside to hang my laundry to dry; a luxury not afforded to those successful homeowners living in gated communities & in accordance with their HOA’s anti-white-trash regs!). Rather, over the last 3 years, I’ve learned that my quality of life is dictated by freedom: freedom to breathe clean air; freedom from bumper-to-bumper traffic; freedom to run, alone, without fear, along mountain and desert trails whenever I want; freedom to never have to lock my doors (day or night; I don’t even own a key to my house); freedom to have chickens clucking in my backyard; freedom to hang my laundry in the backyard to dry. These are all freedoms which have nothing to do, really, with money. But the freedoms I enjoy do have to do with time. I do want more freedom of time. And that’s just assuming that I am going to be granted many more years of life to enjoy that freedom of time (which is, a driver in itself: the retirement nest egg).

I want more freedom of time, and that is something that cannot be bought, yet, the equation translates into having more money with less time invested, to pay those necessary bills and to pay for those things in life that I really need. The solution for me, it seems, is having to sacrifice those freedoms I love for more money (by moving back to a bigger city to make a larger income) and saving for several years, and then leaving when that bank account seems big enough-as if there is any way to really know that for sure. That’s not an attractive option, so instead, I’ve been closely scrutinizing those things that I really “need” and determining that maybe, perhaps, those things that I really need I can get more easily on my own, and with my own creativity, and without paying much, if anything, to anyone else for them. Thus, my journey has begun, scrutinizing my way of living, and the waste that I create through consumption of foods, gasoline, “just stuff” and, particularly, in time.

Puck and 'Mo

Puck, the black lab we nearly lost to a rattlesnake bite last year, and Cozmo, my 13-1/2 year old dalmatian. Need I say more ?

Eastern Sierra Weather

Friggen ES weather ! Forecast calling for snow and to expect winter driving conditions Tuesday night and Wednesday, along with gusty winds. This past weekend I began packing away my winter wear. Saturday night the weather station on our roof measured sustained winds in the 30-35 mph range, and gusts over 55 mph. Most of our fencing remained intact, somehow. I'm learning that there is no 'Spring' in the Eastern Sierra !

The Farm

I'm extremely lucky to live where I do. Not only do we have the space for the dogs, there's plenty of room for our 3 chickens! And they all get along mahvelously .... I'm working on getting a couple of goats, next. I was already told "NO" but, I'm not easily convinced :-D

Coaching Terry

18April08

I’ve known Terry now for about 3 years. He is an Iraq War Veteran (Operation Desert Storm) with peripheral neuropathy. Over the past 3 years I’ve seen his mobility deteriorate; from crutching around the physical therapy clinic where I work, to now spinning around in his ultralight wheelchair. When I first met Terry, he seemed (rightfully so) fairly angry. Nobody was able to do anything for him to fix his problem. Getting his physical therapy paid for was a major ordeal, and he was resentful. I felt bad for him; his problems are real, yet so much about the disabilities that vets come home with, especially one like his, are not taken very seriously.

Terry seems to have transformed over this short time. He found Disabled Sports Eastern Sierra (http://www.disabledsportseasternsierra.org) and has been an integral participant, instructor, and mentor for many other athletes with physical and cognitive challenges. I became involved with DSES shortly after I met Terry, and volunteered as an instructor with them for a year; but I then decided to spend the past winter pursuing my own personal desire to learn telemark and Nordic skiing. I’m still far from skilled at these forms of skiing, but, I feel that next winter I can go back to volunteering time with DSES. There is such a sense of satisfaction and reward for “just being” at the end of a day with these students.

Today I met with Terry for his first “official” coaching session to prepare him for the San Diego Challenged Athletes Foundation triathlon in October. He has spent a fair amount of time over the past summer on his hand cycle, finishing a good chunk of the Fall Century bike ride; not only attempting to ride 100 miles in a hand cycle, but that would be 100 miles at an altitude of 7000-8000 feet. I’m excited to be part of a team (myself, plus 2 physical therapists from our clinic) that will help Terry to success in October. During our session today he told me that he received approval from the Forest Service to “rehabilitate” the trail from Mosquito Flats to around Rock Creek Lake, essentially widening it, to make it wheelchair accessible; backcountry wheelchair required, of course. I was amazed by this; as far as he knows, there is no one else in the country advocating for wheelchair accessibility to the backcountry. According to Terry, presently, national (congressional?) mandate is that trails be no more than 22” wide. He successfully generated a modification in this mandate (at least at the state of California level) that would allow the widening of trails to 24” – just wide enough to accommodate a wheelchair.

Terry skis Mammoth Mountain as well as I do (probably better, actually), maneuvering his mono and bi-ski, and he just championed wheelchair access to the backcountry in the Eastern Sierra. Terry has found the one person who can fix his problem. That person, of course, is him. Now if I can only convince Terry that he CAN, as well, champion the ocean swim in La Jolla Cove this October ….

Ultra running

16April08

A beginner’s perspective:

Several weeks ago I went home to visit my mom. For some time now, these visits have followed a particular pattern. She is in the process of trying to sell her home; the house I grew up in, that my parents bought in 1968. In preparation, mom has been setting aside boxes of my childhood junk, photos, dolls, ballet recital outfits, 3^rd grade poetry, and such, all for me to sort through and take home with me. I’m not big on sentimentality I guess, because given the choice, most of these things end up in the trash next to the garage. Certain that I’ve made a huge mistake and that I’ll really want that tutu someday, mom goes outside, sifts back through the trash and puts most of these things back into my box and sets it aside, until my next visit home.

During this particular visit, I found a photo in my box that brought a strange comfort to me. As I continued to look at it, I began to smile, and then I laughed. I thought, “wow, I really understand you now.” The photo is from about 1972, maybe 1973, and captures 7 little girls sprinting down the track at our local high school. It’s from my fourth grade track meet: the 100 yard dash. I’m the smallest girl in the photo, but only because I’m so far back in the pack that I look about half the size of the others. The photo has caught my pigtails defying gravity; I’m running as fast as I possibly can, one knee and one arm high in the air. As I held that photo in my hand, I distinctly remember running SO FAST! Like the wind! Yet, I finished dead last. Clearly not sprint material, that moment marked the birth of an endurance runner.