We didn’t cross the border, the border crossed us.” That’s the message from communities who live with the troubled legacy of colonialism today—the descendants of Native peoples who have survived in defiance of the national divides that strafe their lands and run counter to their cultural inheritance.
Such a move, (THE WALL) according to the resolution, would threaten territorial rights, “further divide historic tribal lands and communities,” “militarize the lands on the southern boundary,” and “disturb or destroy tribal archeological, sacred sites, and human remains.”
READ: Defying US Borders, Native Americans Are Asserting Their Territorial Rights | The Nation
**
BAD MOVIES? A final, crucial step to being a responsible media consumer is to look for works made by Indigenous artists or in collaboration with Indigenous artists.
GOOD READ: Native American Stereotypes in Popular Media – SAPIENS
**
For her 16th birthday, Maddy Fernands asked her parents for an unusual gift: to switch the family to wind power. She didn’t want an iPhone, new clothes or — banish the thought — a car. Cars and trucks account for about a fifth of greenhouse gas emissions, and a significant amount of Fernands’s climate anxiety. “Sometimes we’ll be stuck in traffic and I’ll look outside and watch the exhaust coming out of the car in front of me and I’ll freak out,” she told me. “I feel so powerless to stop it.” Fernands has been struggling with that sense of helplessness since she first became keyed into the accelerating timetable of climate change in seventh grade. “It seemed like the end of the world,” she said. “But the apocalyptic message wasn’t being broadcast. Nobody was taking correct action to put us on a path away from climate catastrophe.” Because her parents and teachers didn’t seem to share her urgency, Fernands decided that she herself would have to sound the alarm over climate.
Climate change is causing mental anguish in people of all ages, according to Lise Van Susteren, a psychiatrist and member of the Climate Psychiatry Alliance. “When you’re hearing day in and day out that we’ve got 12 years, we’ve got 11 years, the oceans are collapsing, fires are burning, air quality is terrible, wear a mask, the anxiety is inescapable,” said Van Susteren.
READ: Young People Feel Betrayed by Adults Over the Climate Crisis. Today, They’re Going on Strike.
**
book review: Truly prolific writer poet community organizer
By LT
J Glenn’s visionary fiction novel Wayfarers – Where No One Is an Outcast is about an interesting mix of homeless people who want to help other homeless people. Do we need it? Timely? Absolutely.
Right to the end of his fiction novel, suspense abounds.
In real life: There are always two groups of people: the Have’s and the Have Not’s. Can there be a Happy Ending? The brilliant idea from Wayfarers story leads the author to buy land in Oklahoma for this very purpose: a farm where the homeless can resettle in 2019. I interviewed the author in Jan. 2015.
J Glenn is an elder, a man of vision and great wisdom. He is a good friend and a true inspiration. He has shared his ideas on this blog HERE HERE
FORK IN THE ROAD
WEWOKA, OKLAHOMA — He arrived at this latest fork in the road pretty late.
Glenn Evans is 88 now but excited about what he calls his last hurrah, an idea he would like to try out on this plot of land.
A visitor asks, “Why in the world would you want to leave Washington State, one of the gardens spots of the U.S. to here?”
Evans makes a circle with his finger beside his head and chuckles, “I’m a little nuts.”
He grew up on a farm near Wewoka where most of his family’s food needs were met with a big garden.
Glenn’s family moved to town though.
On a walk through tall weeds on his new land, his guest asks, “Are we bushwhacking your trail?”
Evans says, “No we’re just starting one. We’re pioneers!”
He went off to school and chased success as a stock broker.
He left that and turned to a career in writing.
Several books in he wrote a novel called ‘Wayfarers‘ about a group of homeless people who want to help other homeless people.
His thoughts while writing, “I want to do something for people. Create a place where they can live together as a family.”
Evans started walking around and thinking what worked in fiction might work in real life.
“I wanted to make my first place right here in Oklahoma,” he says.
So here’s his new idea.
Invite people, maybe homeless, he’s not sure, to open up this acreage to folks who want to grow their own food, who want to live off their gardens like his family did.
“Food and shelter, and you’re part of a family,” he suggests.
They use no till farming methods, plant some fruit trees, and live in underground houses to stay cool in the summer, warm in winter, and safe in the spring.
Of living underground, Evans says, “It’s good for tornadoes.”
It took him a couple of hours to walk through the brush and get a good gauge on the property.
The only road on it leads to a pump jack, but J. Glenn sees a successful future here.
“Is the land good,” asks his visitor?
“Oh. I think it’s good and rich,” he responds. Look at the soil. It’s had years of composting.”
Call him a visionary, or call him a crazy old man.
Glenn Evans just needs a few more crazy people like him to unplug and dig in, to make this fork in the road a little bit wider.
Glenn currently makes his home in Olympia, Washington.
VIDEO: https://kfor.com/2018/07/20/he-grew-up-on-a-farm-at-88-j-glenn-evans-hopes-he-can-lure-people-back/
To learn more about his work go to http://www.poetswest.com
Book Description: Wayfarers
From Seattle and the Pacific Northwest, this picaresque novel takes on the issues of homelessness, big city corruption, and corporate greed. An engaging, rollicking tale of those who are mostly down on their luck and chafe under the rules and regulations imposed by those in authority. They were small in numbers, inexperienced, and some of them uneducated but they made up for it in a passionate belief in themselves. Wayfarers is an adventure story about a homeless half Cherokee who sets out to do something for the homeless with the help of such characters as a prostitute, a disbarred lawyer, a cuckolded preacher turned prospector, ex-CIA man, a veteran turned warrior for the good and a small Indian tribe. The two main protagonists, RB (Chief) and Warrior, each has his own way to bring justice into the world: one that allows the Native American culture to nourish and restore health to the planet. The other protagonist, Warrior, has a strong sense of justice laced with a mission to punish the evil-doers. Against this backdrop are the greedy power-brokers hell-bent on imposing their views on society. What will be the final outcome and whose philosophy will be the winner? A regenerative culture vs the competitive materialistic one? The wayfarers seek to provide alternatives to living on the street or to incarceration. There is a wisdom of indigenous peoples that we can use to help put our post-industrial society on a more ecological basis. Laced with the honesty of Steinbeck – both religious and profane, dangerous and divine – this pot boiler keeps rolling to the finish line.
I can’t wait to visit the Glenn Kay Evans Farms
LT
p.s. I had a very good check up in February and see my doctors again in May – my one year cancer anniversary. Thank you all for the good thoughts and prayers and kind words. I’m doing GREAT!
