Paper Towels and the Future

So I just went to clean off our glass coffee table, for which I grabbed a bottle of spray cleaner and tore a paper towel off the roll. It was amazing, as soon as I tore off the paper towel it was if I could feel the connection to the tree from which that table came - me tearing a piece of life out of that tree in order to wipe down my coffee table. I realized a little more how disconnected we are from nature - from the awareness of where our "things" come from and how our actions affect the whole. My whole life I've used paper towels for little silly things - cleaning spills of water or juice off of the counter or floor, wiping coffee tables, eating a bagel or peeling an orange when I've not wanted to use a plate. This was the first time I really began to understand that when I tear a paper towel off of that roll I am impacting nature - choosing to use the gifts (or plundered spoils) of a living thing for my purposes. It's not that I feel we have no right to use anything from the natural world for desired ends, but I do think we should exercise some degree of prudence! I mean, a coffee table! Seriously. I don't think I need to contribue to logging, to deforestation, to some landfill somewhere, just to clean off a coffee table. So I went and got reusable rag and used that instead. Is that a perfect alternative? No. Of course not. There's still the probability that that rag originated in an outsourced sweatshop somewhere, and the awareness of the water and power I will use to wash it (among other items of laundry) in the near future, but as far as I'm concerned it's infinitely better than the one time use of a paper towel that is then thrown away. It's not a matter of whether it will make a difference in the world or not, it is a matter of living a certain way because I am aware that it is a better way to live - a more loving, compassionate, aware way to be in the world. A way that challenges the egocentric american sense of entitlement that I have inherited.

As far as other things I have mean to discuss - there is the matter of my future. So many possibilities on the horizon that, while it scares me to have this vacuous year of uncertainty followed by another one after it, I am grateful to have the next year to not simply continue on the inertia path I have been on. Time to think about PhD work, find a spiritual community, become involved in cooperative farming efforts, continue to examine the ways we live, work to get my book published, start paying back some student loans, read, etc. I guess the difference for me now is the ability to live in the ambiguities - to exist in the sense of process and not chase some illusory point of arrival where it is "figured out." Maybe I will pursue PhD work and academic possibilities; maybe I will puruse a degree at Naropa - Ecopsychology, or an MDiv; maybe a Christian MDiv. The thing is, I have many other existential things that are in process for me right now besides the ecological issue. It is true that things seem to come from and point back to ecology for me, but there are many more questions, many more explorations. This time away from claremont will give me space for that. It will also give me space for my wife, our marriage, my writing, and (hopefully) friendships. All of these I have, to some degree or another, neglected over the past couple years I have been at CST. One thing is certain - I am eager to move on from southern california - I am eager to be visit nature - to live where there are stars - hundreds of them that are visible to the naked eye. Thousands of them. I am eager to live somewhere that there are forests or streams or rivers or lakes. Somewhere there are open fields and hiking trails. For now that is all.