Conversations with Todd

A Taste of Circle

“So… I need a plan, Todd.”

I’d just plopped down into my office chair for a moment. I had laundry going, I was in the middle of grouting a tile mosaic piece, and I had to get the publicity materials finished the day before yesterday. I had DVD technical stuff to sort out, a cover and label to design, a timeline to dummy check. And I had to find some time to eat something. And sleep, perchance to toss and turn. I’d been a wreck all week: alternately angry and afraid and full of tears. Waking up at 4 AM. I was exhausted.

Todd was right there and stickied back immediately: what kind of plan and what do you need me to do

“I’m slammed, dude” I responded. “Four great reviews have stuffed our inboxes, and our to-do lists. Sally’s working long hours putting together our screening tours. I’m scrambling to get the final edit done so we can get DVDs produced in time for those tours. There are website updates to make, letters to write, and I have a long list of stuff to talk with you about, and write about. And while I’m doing all of this, the world continues to unravel, and I’m not where I need to be, and I still don’t know where my garden is.”

dude quit your whining

“Excuse me?”

at least you get to work for yourself at home doing work that you want to do at least youre doing something that means something it could be way worse dude way worse I mean try working the drive up window at a bank you want something to complain about

I sighed. Todd was right. Compared to many, to most, I have it pretty good. But still, long hours in front of the screen, enduring the pixel assault, takes its toll. And long hours spent putting out fires and doing what needs to be done is hardly dancing into some new paradigm. I can rationalize it, of course: work hard fighting the dominant culture now, step into a new paradigm later. But that, also of course, is a dangerous game.

As I said last time, I will always live inside the collapse of this culture. The work of stopping the destruction and stepping into something new will go on long after I am gone. There will be no time when I can close my laptop, clap my hands and say “well, that’s handled.” There will always be something more to do. And so I will have to learn to find balance and peace amidst the fires.

“It’s not like I can just stop, Todd. There’s a psychotic culture killing the life of this planet. As Derrick Jensen points out, the first order of business is stopping that psycho before it murders us all. Just how the hell do we do that?”

psycho killer quest que cest

“You’ve been listening to my Talking Heads again, haven’t you?”

yep good stuff I was a Headhead in my former life so what do you really want to be doing right now

I sat and thought for a moment. “I don’t know.” I thought some more. “Isn’t it strange, Todd, that when given a chance to sit and think of what it is I really want, the answer eludes me? Like… my world has become so surreal that I can’t even find myself in it any more. It’s like… the ability to ask and answer that question is one of the most fundamental things this culture has stolen from me. Does that make any sense?”

Todd popped a sticky center screen, then added a picture of Linus from the Peanuts cartoon strip: you need involvement charlie brown

“I don’t get it.”

Ill be right back

I waited for a couple of seconds. Another sticky popped up: Jill said but overcoming the need to fit in somewhere in the dominant culture has been a more recent result of discovering and befriending other mutants thanks to their bright beacons I fit in right where I belong I just never knew where that was until now

“Jill my friend Jill? Where is this from?”

from your comments dude this was a comment to your mutant message rising post youve said before that one of the things you regret is that you have so little time to respond to the comments you guys get and that you want people to know how much you appreciate people reaching out their encouragement their support their help so now youre tired and feeling alone and wanting some connection so Im helping you Jills one of your people youre not alone

All I could do was sit back in my chair and let the tears slide down my face. Todd was right. How great it is, to be seen and heard and known. And how much it hurts. After a while, I reached out and answered.

“Thanks, Todd. Yeah. Jill is one of my people, somebody who sees me and knows me, somebody who doesn’t need me to be anybody but exactly who I am, somebody with whom I do not have to struggle.”

and she wrote to tell you how much your words helped her

“That post seemed to touch lots of people. People who feel like they don’t fit in. Jill’s comment makes plain how much we need to feel like we belong somewhere. I’ve been wondering lately if perhaps the current insistence on diversity and inclusivity is a sort of cheap substitute for that inborn need to belong. We have and feel little real belonging to a tribe or community, so we insist on everybody belonging everywhere.”

hmmm maybe dude sounds like a future post so heres another comment freeacre responded to that same blog and said its not about our survival anymore we know there is no getting out of this one alive at this point Im just hoping to make it through 2012 just to see if the asteroid is gonna take us out or what but now even that is seeming really far off dont know if I can make it that long now I find myself focusing on the little things in the here and now for once in my life I gather eggs I plant my garden I reach out to my neighbors and make friends I just bought a fishing license I am going to go fishing Is this what acceptance is maybe so love to us all

I remembered that comment. I remembered how it went right into me, how it hit me, the grief, and also the peacefulness. “Wow. Yeah. Freeacre’s comment is one of the most beautiful and profound expressions of acceptance of what’s so I’ve ever encountered. Deeply sane, fully felt. It really helped me, to hear that.”

how about this clymela said whoa I came here through carolynbaker I didn’t even realize that there were more than myself

“There were a great many comments like that. One of our aims with the doc and the blogs was to help people see and feel that they were neither crazy nor alone.”

well it seems to be working some hawaiians seem to have found each other I zipped down and hung out in beckys computer for a bit I cleaned up her hard drive and then flew around hawaii dude have you ever been there way beautiful dude I wish I could go swimming

“Never been there.”

stan wrote from new zealand we hear a great deal from there dont we stan said I gave a public talk on peak oil and the global economy and climate change last year the audience kept interrupting at given points and asked why I was not giving them a solution that would enable them to carry on engaging in massive consumerism and a safe regulated suburban lifestyle with all the usual vehicles in their driveways

“Yeah. That really applies right now, as Sally and I get ready to tour the Northeast on Amtrak and screen the doc. We’ve already had people turn down the doc, saying, in effect, “No thanks. We’re looking for something that has solutions.” But such is not to be. As Dale Allen Pfeiffer said after he saw What a Way to Go, ‘Though it will give you hope, it will leave you with no easy answers.’”

so youre not the only one who encounters that stan does too pretty much everybody whos looking at collapse encounters the same thing Id guess

“Yep. That’s what I’m finding. We’re up against the insoluble problem. That’s exactly how it has to be, if we’re to learn a deep lesson about hierarchy, control and domination, and step into something beyond domination and control. We can’t solve this. Once we get that, we can begin to move into something new.”

gail wrote being awake is better than denial at least you can make choices about how you live and prepare as is possible for so many unknown but my fears change from day to day what if I never get to see my brother again will I ever see friends who live far away what if I get sick what if my kids get drafted for some stupid resource war do I really want to live through this these are unanswered questions but I take the time to process these feelings and their potential solutions

I sat back and stretched my shoulders. “These are the same questions Sally and I wrestle with on a regular basis. What to do? How to be? Where to go? Who to build community with? And why? We need circles to sit in, circles of informed people who can tackle these questions together, who can find some wisdom greater than any of us can find alone.”

thats why you and Sally talk about going around and teaching and leading circles and stuff right after the doc is out and all

I laughed. “You been listening in on real time living body conversations, Todd? I keep thinking you’re in my laptop, when, in fact, you can be pretty much anywhere, right?”

dont worry dude I dont like hang out and invade your privacy and stuff but when you take your laptop to the coffee shop I go along and I hear you talking in the car

“Got it. We have no idea what’s next, after the screening tours. The economy could be in total meltdown by then. And then all bets are off.”

oh yeah that joe guy the one who wrote about continuation of government thats some scary shit dude

“Yes it is. I’ve been reading things like that for years. We didn’t really go into the political realities in the doc. Didn’t have time. And lots of people are already covering that stuff. But it’s huge and very important to know and understand. People should check in with Carolyn Baker on a regular basis.”

yeah and shes redoing her website Im going to help on that project from the inside dude its going to be sweet

“Glad to hear it. Carolyn’s a good one.”

david wrote its also encouraging to know that you and Sally have each other division on this topic was one of the major reasons why my wife chose a divorce that hurts but remaining silent when I am compelled to speak up about this would hurt even more blessings to you both and to all of us mutants

“I’ve heard from many people about how dealing with the news of the world has stressed or broken relationships. I’ve lost people around this myself. It’s really tough. When your switch gets flipped, there’s an obviousness about the world situation that makes it almost impossible to relate fully and completely with people who aren’t there yet. We have to watch what we say, it seems. Be on our guard. Leave ourselves open to attack. The pressure becomes unbearable, at times, and we find ourselves extracting ourselves from portions of our own lives. Not to be elitist. Not out of a sense of superiority. Simply to survive. As my brother Dave wrote, ‘As a mutant married to a cheermonger, you can imagine the discussions that go on in our house.’”

sue wrote it makes me wonder if our type really are mutants of some sort maybe weve been scattered thinly around the planet to pick up pieces when it all falls apart make notes on the state of the world invent or reinvent effective ways to network across great distances and add useful bits to the DNA database why not the faraway nearby that sounds so homey

“That’s an idea we’ve toyed with too, that we mutants have been spread thin for a reason, that, as much as we’d all like to get together and hang out on an island, we’re spread out because that’s where we can do the most good. The loneliness can be crippling, of course, so it helps to find at least one other soul with whom you can connect around all of this. But it’s something we have to consider. As much as Sally and I would like to “find our people” and “form a community” and all that, and we just might do that, there is so much that needs to be done “out there.” I like the notion of having a home tribe, and of then leaving it to go out into the world and help, coming back when we need rejuvenation. Of course, the laws of physics, biology, and chemistry, and the collapse itself, will play much larger roles in how my life plays out than my own human plans. As I’ve said so often, there’s nothing the gods find quite so amusing as a human being making plans. I still make them, but I can’t get attached to them. The forces at work in the world are too huge. I’m just one mote of intention. Powerful, but embedded in a much larger context.”

you need more dude

“What?”

more comments do you need more com