As i sit here in front of the computer, i feel sad, i don't know why exactly. Here in portland, or living with my girlfriend whom i love very much, doing an internship with a particularly cool organization, but somthing's missing. We spend so much time together, sleeping, eating, laughing, watching movies, hanging posters, arguing... we both maintain although she is better at it that we must keep our individuality. it is such a simple concept yet it seems so difficult to do. what do i want to do? it seems as though the answer to that question is only decernable with an encrypted glass bottle bottom. how can i spend so much time not doing what i want to do? that seems contradictory right? it's impossible for one to do what they don't want to do, or rather, it is impossible for one to do that which they don't derrive some utiltiy from. yeah i guess so, but if i only do what i want to do, than why do i feel so depressed? don't get me wrong, i'm not crying in the doldrums, but i don't feel empowered, unique, an individual. instead i feel like i am the mass, the faceless individual that you walk/bike/drive/train by everyday. one of those countless people you observe milling around like an ant from your airplane window, the worst part is you may not even see me doing it, but you can know that i'm down there.without a doubt. the more and more i think about it, the more it makes sence. you will never see me in my right mind be an advocate of knowing someone one dimensionally, but if i every have a "life's work" let it be known that as of yet i see mine as trying to step out and be known as "myself" rather than an environmentalist, or musician, or liberal, or blank... i also realize that sometimes i try so hard that it seems as though i've come full circle. i try so hard not to judge other people, it's hard. sometimes i worry it's more about me than anything else. i derrive so much anxiety from the idea that as if my life were a different chess game played with everyone in my life, that once we got to a certain point they just had me figured out and obviusly that would be bad because then they would know me and be able to expose me and i would be voulnerable? anyway i know not what the hell i'm ranting about, except that somehow i feel like the pressure valve is tipping off. and now i'm voulnerable to you, exposed. i love the idea of being naked, i support it, i feel very strongly that we should not feel like we need to hide anything. maybe i'm just not giving myself that freedom. i want to be confidant in what i do just like anyone else, why can i not afford myself that freedom? I don't know. Maybe later. http://europa.eu.int/comm/environment/ipp/
http://www.greenmap.com/
http://www.moveon.org/pac/cands/

sunday, the day after saturday after friday, when i decided to go, on saturday, to the coast. now i am back and i'm not that worse for the wear, it is weird doing stuff when you don't plan to, going somewhere when you don't have a destination in mind. my brain i fear is not cut out for it, or at least not used to it, for it got a little overwhelming at times. maybe it is just the fact that it is a relatively new experience, and that i need to get used to it, but i definatly felt a little fazzeled the entire trip, especially this morning. okay to start. left saturday afternoon, and had it in my mind that i would head to the general area that talia and i had been on our first trip out this way. so i left about 1p (really do we need the 'm'?) and put on some chemical brothers, the sort of music that is especially good for the beginning of trips because it moves and i move too. I got in town, out of town and toward the coast about an hour or so before I started seeing the 'fresh local ...' signs. At this point i had a issue raised in my head. the thoughts of fresh, local and stawberries or cherries intrigued me, but i really felt compelled to keep a move on, for some reason i almost heard my parents answering my incessent nagging for shakes or fries, which is funny because i think it was not shy little me but my siblings who did the nagging and i just internally supported their efforts. no, it isn't necessary and i have fruit and water in the car and can stop and make a sandwich if i'm really hungry, when i thought... wait a minute, i don't have anywhere i need to go or be i can stop whenever i want. don't you like my insinuation about what my parents real reason was? however by this point in the debate, i had already passed the stand or turnout or whatever, and my thoughts shifted. just keep moving fast enough and you won't have time to indulge. thus it went strawberries, cherries, aspaigus all disapprearing at 63 miles an hour.
now it hits me, wait, i don't have a place to be nor a time to not be there, why am i speeding is beautiful country? no excuses other than habit or flow of traffic to battle the three arguments for slowing a wee. a. already given eg no agenda b. i'm speeding iliigally and thus i could get a ticket, and c. 55 mph, the speed limit, is said to be the most energy efficient speed, what i was told to be the reasoning for the ex facto national speed limit of 55 mph. thus as i slowed to what now felt like a crawl, and tried to be okay with it and all the dirty looks i could imagin i was now getting, i noticed a sign. flea market ahead 3-9 saturday. see now these people are smart, putting the sign far enough ahead that the wife can suggest it, the husband to groan until it just sounds weird and still have time to safely stop, or in my case just enought time to decide. there were some men hanging another sign, probably for people like me, just as i turned. down the road i passed it by on the left and circled back around. parked once for a quick look said what am i doing and pulled out, only to be adimant about the fact that even though i wasn't likely, from the first look, to find cool old gadgets for cheap, i had stopped in part as a demonstration to myself, and whomever else may have been watching, that i can take it easy and it will be okay. so then i pulled over again and this time turned off the car. i got out and walked over to realize that the gateless fence that surrounded the grounds, was blocked with a wraught iron tiered shelf thingy. are you open i asked. no, not until three. right i thought hence the sign 3-9. watch five after two. i went back to the car organized my stuff into the back, went to the port-o-let, ate a really ripe mango, and disposed of the peels. watch two thirty seven. of course in retrospect i realize that except for my age and maybe my spiked braclet and maybe my nose pierce... okay, maybe it is just the facts that i arrived an hour early and i'm a guy, but i looked like an antiques dealer trying to snag the best buys. now an assemblage of people had gathered in the area of the entrance and it looked somewhat like a line so i got up and walked over to join in. as the minutes ticked by, i resorted to watching the 'late commers', now ten till, pay the $2 manditory, suggested donation to park on the front lawn of a congregational member, as a fund raiser for the church. have you been here before asked a woman with her thirty somthing daughter. no, have you. no, is there something you're looking for. not really i said. i just would never imagine my husband or son comming to one of these, let alone waiting patiently. a compliment really, i know it was at least intended that way, but suddenly my 'sunny day in portland' sort of apperance was brought to my attention. luckily the line started moving and i was quickly in and out with a piano bench that seemed the most reasonably priced and desireable piece in the entire sale.

equilibrium - that is what i yearn for, all the time it is the back of my mind. she gets under because she can't handle the stress of not finding a place for her self, not finding a nichè. it is so overwhelming it causes extreme mood siwngs. i want so much to be supportive, to be helping but sometimes i wonder how much i can do, or if rather, i'm just in the way... i don't know. i get frustrated when i start thinking that the only way she can turn her mood is if i get upset, or that i can't do very much in a way that doesn't irritate her. am i prancing around her feelings too much? am i not being sensitive enough? it is really hard not to let it affect my mood, because i feel so strongly for her, i hate to see her upset, while thinking at the same time that if i could just walk away, maybe she'll realize i am not doting and do more to pull herself up?
food for thought from the O₂ Network:
Natureworks by Cargill/Dow is a polymer made from corn. Not a GMO, just plain old corn. My excitement about this polymer comes from their selection of films and moldable polymers for packaging. It is also spinnable, like polyester, to make fabrics. I'm not sure what's available for wearable fabrics, but they had quite a nice display for interior fabrics at the Seattle EnvironDesign.
Fabric mills using Natureworks:
http://www.cargilldow.com/ingeo/partners_abc.asp
General info:
http://www.cargilldow.com/corporate/natureworks.asp
More recently, I was talking to one of their group at the Living Green Expo here in Minnesota. One really cool thing I found out Cargill/Dow is doing, is rather than buy organic corn per se, they're buying all the output a CONVERTING-to-orgainc farmer can produce. Taking away the economic barrier to going organic.
Their rational, eventually all corn could then be grown organically - given the incentive. At that point they could then produce truly organic plastic. Until then, they can provide the transitional step needed to move in that direction. And of course, NOT reward unsustainable players with their business. Not a bad plan.

yesterday i talked with my mom. while at work and waiting on other people to do their thing, i decided to call. after asking about how she was a got an inspiringly greatful rundown on my younger siblings latest endevors. Esther is back from the permaculture workshop she attended in Indiana near her school, i think. although i talked with her briefly about her experience immediatly after her return, i not no where near the impression of impact it had on her that i got from my mom. she told me that Esther had decided to change her major from geology, which she has interest in but i think she found it was too far removed from her passions for life, creativity, etc to a self designed major that will include study of permaculture. that is so cool to me.
next she told me about samuel's lacross endevors. recently he has taken to the game and has really jumped on board. he'll be a junior in high school this fall and so it is considerably late for him to join the team according to most people. he has internalized that and it doesn't seem to bother him. he is really determined, as far as i can see, to succeed. he decided in order to catch himself up to his peers technically, he would join a camp. After researching it, he found that there were two. the first in Notre Dame was intended for non beginners. they were told about a "beginner's" day workshop in the village that was for 5th-9th graders. according to my mom she said to him you can swollow your pride and go to this workshop en route to Notre Dame or... he decided to go for it. the ND camp had a 21 person waiting list on boarded members, so my mom supported him by tapping her friends' 'menonite across america' - housing network. now our family is not menonite, nor have any of us been to church, with the exception of Joy, for years. but he went on. by this point, i think would have given up a week ago. they got down there and he got setup in this man's house across town, got to camp and then was told that there was an opening in the boarding. they partook. last update he was enjoying himself and learning a lot. that is determination.
after the end of the story from my mom i started to share my amazment. so often, i feel like i lack that determination which i admire so much. i love to get excited about stuff, but it is rare that something grabs me by the collar and inspires me to keep my shirt on so to speak. here my mom turned it around on me. your siblings admire you so much. not seeing what she was talking about i naturally refuted. your passion for your environmental stuff, sure it can be annoying when you are so gung-ho about it, but they look up to you a lot. after this i was sitting in my office, in the big pink, in sw portland, in tears. on another note, i got the link below in an email today, maybe it is something to do before/en route to the costa rica progam, if i actually end up doing that. WTO... boo http://www.organicconsumers.org/wto_cancun.htm more from O₂'s bio-plastic discussion:
PLA has never been a GMO because PLA is an end product (made from corn or other plants), not engineered into a single seed or plant. PLA did though contain GMO traces at one point because of corn sourcing issues - buying corn starch made from general corn supplies. About 30% of US - regular corn - is GMO. As part of the regular grain supply. Recently Cargill/Dow started to work directly with farmers to get corn free of GMOs, and help farmers wishing to convert to organic farming.
As Europe has taken a very strong stand against GMO content, and much of the PLA used for packaging is sold to Europe, it made sense to work to eliminate GMO contamination by - NORMAL - US grain sources. Thus the direct to farmer partnership.
It's a pretty common mistake to assume ALL bio-plastics are GMOs. Many ARE. THIS one's not. And moreover, PLA is not really reliant on corn either. Cargill/Dow is looking to use other bio raw material sources, as well, such as residues from wheat and sugar beet production. Both of the below URL's give a very interesting overview of PLA.
http://www.bioproducts-bioenergy.gov/news/NewsletterArchive/May2002.asp
http://www.senate.gov/~agriculture/Hearings/Hearings_2001/March_29__2001/0329gru.htm
I've talked about this before, but as a reminder, for those of you interested in understanding the current state of bio-plastics, and before you act on any past assumptions, take some time with -
http://www.biopolymer.net.
They really break-out what's what, and help point out the difference between end-products made from existing plants (like PLA, starch foam, or natural rubber), products made IN the plant (a GMO), and enzymes added to petroleum products to help them break down.
Not to sound like an ad for Cargill/Dow, but you have to admit, making plastics from agricultural waste is a pretty big deal. Had there been better leveraging of farm products - including waste as a valuable product - we might have eliminated the need for the HUGE farm bail-out we're now paying for. Thinking of all the forests being cut down for paper, when agripulp (another use of farm waste) is just LAYING around - at the same time we're subsidizing both farmers AND the wood products industry - is really irksome.
Granted, plastics make up only a tiny part of our total petroleum consumption, but coupled with bio-diesels and other bio energy technologies in use right now (plus adding other alternative energy techs) we could nearly eliminate our need for crude oil.
http://www.eco-foam.com/
http://www.starchtech.com/