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Witnessing

April 2, 2012 By Uncategorized


This is me. This is the bay I live by. These mountains are the east wall of the fjord that holds the island that I live on.

Years ago a well known islander gave me the advice about living here that, if I’m in it for the long haul, I would need to develop a practice of witnessing. In the ten+ years I have lived here a lot has changed and I’m finally beginning to realize what that role of witness means.

There is a sharp division here between private and public, growing sharper every year. I believe that the rejection of a national park here was a testament to the strength of the view that public stewardship of public lands is dangerous. I happen to think that view is incorrect but I think that drove the opposition. and I think unchecked, that view will wreak havoc.

We now have here on our island a sharp line. It seems the role of our Council is tilting towards protection of private rights instead of stewardship of the public good. In the paper last week it was revealed that a private developer had cut dozens of trees in a newly established public park on the edge of his development. Not only that but he built a storm water ditch right through the tiny park to deposit rain water and associated detritus right on the public beach.

We have very little public land left that is easily accessible. It’s the height of arrogance to presume that one has the right to encroach on it for private gain.

So to witness and call out acts that violate the community’s assets, our public treasures, our few remaining places to experience wildness on an island that should be rich with wilderness.

I’ll be submitting a document opposing the construction of docks across the public Cape Roger Curtis foreshore. I’ll be opposing a loop road through what is left of Crippen Park. I’ll be asking that the developer responsible for selling the trees compensate us with money at the least, more parkland would be better.

Time to focus on home and powerfully witness what is going on around here.

You with me?

Location:Cardena St,Bowen Island,Canada

Drying out

April 2, 2012 By Uncategorized 2 Comments

After twelve days on the road followed by a further day of work at home and battling a flu I finally have a day off.

This morning the wind is gusting off the sea and it’s dry. The forest is drying out, kinglets and sparrows flitting around and eagles are being chased by the crows who are trying to nest in peace.

I feel the same way. Letting all that soaked through me just drain out. Watching an afternoon scooter match between Manchester United and Blackburn, drinking tea and smoothies and walking in the woods with my beloved. I’ll have a little ferry ride this afternoon to see a friend and recover a lost laptop bag, and I’m looking forward to the ease and flow of having otherwise nowhere to go and nothing to do for a couple of days.

Drying out.

Long day coming home

March 30, 2012 By Uncategorized


A long day of traveling home from Minnesota made longer by a bout of flu and a cough. Hopefully I didn’t poison anyone in the way home. It will be good to have a rest, and see how spring has come in while I’ve been away most of the last three weeks.

Location:Howe Sound

How to get smart – the long answer

March 29, 2012 By Conversation, Leadership, Learning

My friend Ginny Belden-Charles told me a great story today.  She was working in Detroit on some community development issues with a number of activists and others.  Their focus was on empowering community development and social action and creating the kinds of citizen based responses that Detroit needs, and she was invited to come and host a circle.

When Ginny arrived in her circle of folks, she was amazed at the presence of  the famous revolutionary activist Grace Lee Boggs.  Grace Lee Boggs is an institution in social activist circles and at 96 years old, with 70 years of practice under her bel,  she is an elder in the world of social activism, and is dedicated to the long waves of social change.

Ginny reported on how in awe she was of being able to sit in a circle with this important persona and how she was looking forward to learning some of her wisdom.  So when she asked Grace to begin the circle, she was eager to hear what this Elder might say.

To Ginny’s surprise, Grace turned to Ginny and said: “So why don’t you tell us tell us your story…what have you learned?”

I think you must get awfully smart by engaging in that strategy for 96 years.

The silence of the big things

March 28, 2012 By Being, Practice 2 Comments

Sitting by the Mississippi

Yesterday I spent an hour sitting on the banks of the Mississippi River near Albertville, Minnesota.  We were deep in a design day, and I’m feeling a little run down and tired.  I needed to go and sit, and rest and fill my lungs with air and my mouth with silence.

One of the tried and true things I know about sitting in nature is that it takes about 20 minutes in stillness and quiet before the system you have entered has absorbed you.  Humans are clumsy at being in the natural world and we stumble and make noise.  All the little birds around us stop singing, the mammels stand stock still and everything waits for us to move away or become still.

After 20 minutes of sitting in the same spot, bird song starts to return, little animals start moving around, and my own inner chatter has quieted enough that I can experience being a part of something bigger.  It’s always at those moment that the possibility to learn something, however small, becomes real.

It was really windy yesterday as I sat on a little staircase that leads down to the river.  The cottonwoods were clacking their big branches in the wind and last years bullrushes and milkweed, dried stalks, whistled as the wind passed over them.  Little birds were flitting about – juncos, chickadees and song sparrows.  the little things were chattery and noisy.

And in front of me, the river was flowing fast and deep. And as huge as it is, with all that water going through it, it was silent.  It slid by, a massive quiet anchor in the scene.  Several times bald eagles took off from the trees across the water and soared in the wind, stillness in motion, also completely silent.

And it just struck me then about how the biggest things are so quiet, and how our attention is drawn to the small and the flittery and the chirpy.  Something about coming home to a large omnipresence.  Something about the way the land hosts, the way the river hosts the scene, hosts the valley, and in this case, hosts half a continent.

Silent, large, present and in quiet collusion with the flow of water and wind.