solarpunkfool

[solarpunkfool]

My friend asked me what she could send me that could make up for her not being here to give me a hug and break things with me in a fit of catharsis, and here's what I thought of.

A thousand dollars. Fuck, ten thousand dollars.

A massage. Like a long one that leaves me feeling like overcooked spaghetti afterwards.

A video of her telling me she still thinks I'm cool, even though I'm sick with the cold my two-year-old brought home from daycare and I can't do ANYTHING.

Some ozempic, even though I do and will always stand for the liberation of my own fat body. It's just exhausting trying to fight against so much social hatred just to like myself.

A big box of those gluten-free stroopwafels.

Some of her art - whatever it is she's working on right now.

A guide on how to start a community center, where I can teach free yoga and run a tea/coffee shop with a bakery staffed only by formerly incarcerated folx with a big community garden outside and a food pantry and a playground and weekly free dinners.

A thousand dollars.

Her most recent favorite poem.

The smell of the first snow from her little Oregon mountain town. The sound of the blacktail deer and the coyotes skittering away while we're on an early morning run. The sight of Mt. Shasta, covered in white and streaming clouds bright with the sunrise.

An appointment for a new tattoo.

The surgery my dog needs.

A thousand dollars. A thousand dollars, so I can get her on a plane, and give her that hug, and then we can go break things.

[solarpunkfool]

"What's your dream job?" "I don't dream of jobs."

[solarpunkfool]

I'm still over here dreaming.

Dreaming of making raised garden beds out of reusable pallets (the heat-treated kind) and giving them away.

Dreaming of neighborhood meal-trains for families in need. Just had a baby? Surgery? The loss of a loved one? Your doorstep is now covered in casseroles and cookies. Yes we know you're gluten-intolerant, all the food is safe for you.

Dreaming of having my son's friends over after school and just... letting them be here. Your favorite snacks are in the fridge, your favorite comics are on the shelf, the dogs are so happy to see you. I'm sorry your grandma doesn't understand that you like boys. Your mom's at work still? That's ok, I've got her number, if she has to stay late we're having spaghetti and meatballs for dinner.

Dreaming of every mother attending every trans-child's wedding.

Dreaming of my kiddo growing up and not just LOVING women and girls but RESPECTING them and VALUING them, getting to see other men in his life setting the BEST examples.

Dreaming of parking lots covered in solar panels.

Dreaming of not needing parking lots.

Dreaming of teaching kids about bees.

Dreaming of clean water and air. Dreaming of streets safe for tricycles and dog-walking. Dreaming of fruit trees in neighbors yards, and bringing them pies in the fall.

[solarpunkfool]

[solarpunkfool]

"Hope is a tool. Hope is a weapon. Hope is a plant we must nurture."

SAY IT AGAIN.

Tips for Defying the End of the World.

[solarpunkfool]

I am trying to choose to hope. 

I am choosing to imagine public transportation. 

Grocery stores with attached soup kitchens to decrease food waste. 

Neighborhood meal- and garden-sharing programs.

Green spaces connecting to other green spaces.

The rainforest ADVANCING, churning up dry soil and turning it dark and healthy. 

The sky filled with birds and the sea with fish, their populations increasing. 

The air and water clean. 

Emissions-free vehicles on roadways, with speeds governed, and safe streets for tricycles, bicycles, dogs, deer, and stray soccer balls.

Solar panels on every public building, over every parking lot. 

Beehives and wildflowers on the open berms between roadways. 

The total lack of gunshots around the world, and instead the sound of shovels, digging holes to plant fruit trees by public sidewalks. 

[solarpunkfool]

I love hearing news of the Olympics, because it’s exactly the kind of hopeful, human news that makes the world seem so much warmer and brighter. When we’ve put solar panels over all the parking lots, the wild tigers are no longer endangered, the water is clean, the birds have come back, trees cover the concrete, and the last bomb has been destroyed, I want my newsfeed FILLED with things like the Olympics. 

Sports can be fraught with corruption and greed, as can most things that are important to humanity - just look at the music industry, fashion, food - but that doesn’t mean we shouldn’t embrace all the things that make them great. The great things were there before the corruption, and the doping accusations, and the petty rivalries. Sports are one of the few arenas where we can give our all, develop skill and strength and power and artistry and courage and daring, and experience total triumph or total defeat, but still absolutely OWN the victory of DOING THE THING. 

You practice and you play and you practice and you try and you work so hard and you DO THE THING and at the end of it, regardless of how you compared to others, you DID THE THING. You strove, you pushed, you focused, you achieved. The world is a terrifying place and a lot of the time I have no idea if the things I’m doing to survive are worth doing but at the end of the day I still did things, and how great would it be if DOING THE THING was as valued in our everyday tasks as it is in the sports we love. Everyday they go to practice, and everyday I do the dishes, the laundry, answer the emails. These things I have to do to survive, and they don’t exactly bring me joy, but together they help make a life that I want to live. A life with good food, clean clothes, a little money to buy treats for my child and my dogs. In the same way, I’m sure an athlete doesn’t want to run the same drill over and over and over and over again, but together those drills and practices all come together to make a game, a performance, a routine, a sport that creates joy. 

Let’s see the art, the effort, the strength, the victory and defeat that are all a deep part of DOING THE THING.

I want news in the future to only be about things like the Olympics. Let us stop invading our neighbors and start playing football with them.

[solarpunkfool]

You wake up. The sunlight filters through the tree branches leafing outside your window, and you hear the birds calling (the birds are back, populations returning in the thousands, then millions as air pollution lessens and climate patterns rebalance). You head to your kitchen and make yourself a morning drink, coffee or tea, pouring the spent grounds into your countertop compost bin - municipal pick-up is tomorrow, you remind yourself. You put the paper wrapper from the tea/coffee into the recycling bin. There are no trash bins anymore, no plastic to throw away. 

You get ready for your day, putting on your clothing, soft cotton/linen/wool that won’t last much longer than you when you’re done with it. You message your work friends on your slightly clunkier, but infinitely repairable smart phone - you’ll meet them at the local light rail stop. You summon a link (a free, sometimes remote controlled, publicly available cab service - serviced by the municipality, and fully electric). You make sure to give yourself a little extra time than you did when you had a gas car, since the links travel more slowly and carefully, but that’s ok, because the streets are safe for tricycles, bikes, dog-walkers, nighttime deer, errant soccer balls, and neighborhood cats. You spend the time before it arrives watering your backyard garden, and you chat with your neighbor who has just finished picking blackberries from the vines along your fence. She tells you she’ll make cobbler and bring you some later. You’re grateful, since you never have time to bake when you’d rather be spending time with your family. Your phone alerts you when your link arrives, and you head out. There’s another neighbor in the link already, and you’re both headed to the light rail stop. You chat about the weather, how the trees that were planted en masse all those years ago have kept the summers so much cooler and the winters so much milder. He jokes about not having to mow the grass in his yard nearly as much as he used to, after the ordinances for planting slower-growing native plants. He shows you a picture of how well his garden is doing, and you mention your neighbor and the blackberries. His eyes widen, and he mentions that he’s never been able to get berries to grow. You take his information and promise to invite him over for cobbler sometime next week. 

You arrive at the light rail stop and walk under the fully green bridge (for animals to cross safely, and to keep the station cool) to meet your friends. You exchange notes about how your efforts are doing, what you think should be improved as you board the nearly silent electric train. You look out the window as you travel deeper into the city and watch as the green of trees along roads and sidewalks never lessens, the dullness of concrete doesn’t increase. With the links available and so few private cars on the streets, the size of the roads has decreased, making more room for trees, playgrounds, gardens, and wildflower patches. You see what used to be a concrete and brick center berm taken over by the boxy outlines of beehives, surrounded on both sides (what used to be narrow sidewalks) with fruit tree orchards. 

You arrive at your destination and disembark, walking with your colleagues to your building. It’s still a highrise, mostly concrete and glass, but the rooftop terraces are fully green spaces and the glass panels are permeable solar panels, drinking in the sun’s energy like the plants that stretch across its roof. You spend your day leading your team in delivering top quality services, eat lunch at the free market kitchen down the street, and then head home. Your work day is 5 hours long, with an hour for lunch. 

When you get home, your partner and child are there already, playing in the street on your kiddo’s new bike. The street is quiet and safe. You breathe deeply, smelling absolutely no car exhaust. 

You meet your neighbors at the community house (every neighborhood has one), where there’s always a free dinner if you want one. You don’t like to cook, so you don’t offer to take a shift, but you help clean up. Your partner mentions taking your kiddo to the doctor for a possible ear infection, but it turns out they just had a bug bite in their ear. You laugh about it. The doctor’s appointment cost nothing, just as your dinner does. You can cook at home, but why would you? You could eat alone, and sometimes you do, but today you want to laugh and talk with your neighbors and let your kiddo play with theirs. You and your partner help the clean up team after dinner, washing your own dishes and a few others’ so it all gets done. The dishes aren’t perfect, chipped and older, but who cares when the food is free. 

You and your family walk home and meet your old dog on the porch. He snorts and snuffles your child’s hair and leans in for pets. 

You go in and put your kiddo to bed. You spend the rest of the evening watching tv or reading with your partner. You talk about your day. You see the news that more sustainable grazing practices mean that the rainforest has advanced by nearly 2,000 feet this year, dark soil and thick tree roots spreading outward, crowns capturing more and more carbon from the air. You hear that the tigers and snow leopards, elephants and rhinos, are all increasing in population. 

It starts to rain. You are thankful you don’t have to water the garden tonight. You and your partner head to bed, and you think - this is my life. I am leaving a planet to my child that they will WANT to inhabit. Sure, there wasn’t steak on my plate tonight, but my belly is full and my air is clean and my home is safe. You dream sweetly, thinking of dandelions sprouting up through cracks in concrete, deer and foxes walking through breaks in fences, children swimming in clean water.