To Be Free

In the midst of feeling the country going to hell in a hand basket, I am reminded of some 2006 posts on this blog. I started basically trying to understanding what green meant to me and why I suddenly cared about the environment in a new way. By attempting to build a structure green you are considering all the natural aspects that go into and surround the building. You are forced to acknowledge the natural world and your shared existence there. This concept opens up new ways of thinking about things beyond just what goes into building a house. Their are 2 new books in my radar, the first being Hot, Flat and Crowded by Thomas L Friedman. It talks of an idea that has been rolling around in my mind as I learned more about the green movement. There was the Industrial Revolution, then the Information Revolution and now Friedman introduces the Energy Revolution. The basic idea is as with the 2 previous revolutions, the fundamental way we experience life on earth would changed with rapid economic growth and cultural shifts (for better or worse on the last one). This Energy Revolution promises to save the U.S. if only we would take up arms in the form of invention, innovation, and entrepreneurial endeavors focused on alternative energy and energy conservation. To focus on this grand scale would provide new jobs, cut our dependence on foreign oil, assist in national security and re-establish some sort of U.S. credibility in the world. People question whether we can do this in 10 years. If Americans only new the industrious history of America. Human nature promotes the idea of change but want nothing to do with causing it to actually occur. Bottom line: a country will be the leader in these new technologies and conservation techniques and if it isn't us then we simply aren't going to be around in say 2050. Just a guess.

The second book, How to be Free by Tom Hodgkinson is a jaunt comparing a the new trend lifestyle of getting back to nature with a little twist. The author tries to debunk the myths of and promote the benefits of the Medieval lifestyle. Hodgkinson writes about the book, "On first sight, this idea seems bonkers. Surely the medieval age was a time of bad diets, corrupt priests and abject serfdom? Well, no. This view is actually a calumnious caricature. When I started to write How To Be Free, I decided to read Mutual Aid by the great 19th- century anarchist Prince Petr Kropotkin, described by Oscar Wilde as one of the most cheerful men he had ever met. In Mutual Aid, published at the same time as Darwin’s Origin of Species, Kropotkin argues that cooperation is an essential part of animal and human life and development. He also reminds us that it was in the medieval age when the great free city-states such as Florence were created. The medievals, he says, valued craftsmanship, cooperation and justice. Mutual Aid led me to read other books on medieval customs and culture, and what I found was a society that made a sustained and conscious attempt to live fairly and justly." The idea is the Victorian age coupled with the industrial revolution wiped out our connection or understanding of our true place on earth- as part of the natural world. Medieval lifestyle certainly could be describe as down and dirty.