Don wrote:
> That is because "life as we know it" is almost entirely
> supported by cheap energy in the form of cheap oil. . .
> When the oil runs out, life as we know it will be gone.
>
> So life as we know is not sustainable. It may go on for my lifetime and
> maybe my grandkids lifetimes, but there will be an end to the
> party.
>
> In a little over a century we have become completely hooked on cheap energy
> and in a little over a century from now, we may not have any more cheap
energy.
These are thoughts that often influence my ideas about sustainability and
the transitions to it. "Life as we know it" is true for most North
Americans, but it only takes some travel to the third world to see other
ways of living, ways that are likely to be much closer to what we will all
be doing in another hundred years or less. A two hundred (+ or -) years
blip in the geologic span that Gene mentioned. Brief even when looking at
written history.
It is fascinating how "normal" most people see this society built on cheap
oil and how hard it is for them to imagine themselves living in others
ways, ways as I said that are happening all of the place here and now.
Many tell themselves that we'll have some clever ways to continue: solar
trains, nuclear electricity, etc. I'd rather not see this continue much
longer. We seem be to digger a deeper and deeper hole that we're going to
have to climb out of some days, or it will be our grave.
I often get my grandmother to talk about her childhood; she was born in
July of 1911. Life was very different, and she has seen a lot of change.
I believe that I will in my life time, too. Certainly the next generation
will. And it may take some time for things to settle down. For something
so recent and transitory, it is amazing that in most people's minds it is
"the only way things can / should be done" or "just the way things are" or
"the best way."
I recently had the thought that it would be much easier to live sustainably
in the third world. The support systems are there. Here it often feels
like swimming upstream: codes and laws and taxes, no local craftsmen for
most things, little practical knowledge for doing things for yourself, most
other people doing something totally different, etc.
My thoughts on sustainability have been quite negative lately; it must be
time to do some gardening or pruning or swale digging or something like that.
Live, Love, Learn, Laugh!
Eric Storm
