Future Feminism

"We have created our society in man's image. But now the ecology is collapsing. We have abused the bodies of women and the body of the earth in the same ways. We are reaching the end of His story. Our old methods of survival as a species are becoming the cause of our downfall.

Men must find the humility to retreat. Women must step forward and start to forge a new way forward for our species and for all of nature. If there is to be a future on earth that includes us, it will be feminine."

Don't resist it just because it's subversive. Do think for a moment about how much we need characteristics like cooperation and emotional expressiveness that are most often associated with femininity and most valued in women. And remember that true insight can come from fashion blogs...

IF you are at work

Then you are allowed to not watch this video right now. Otherwise, no excuse.

Interesting how all these people are AT SXSW, witnessing exuberant live music, and are nearly motionless electronic-recording-device zombies....they are grooving out so much less than I would have been, had I been there, indeed much less than I actually am while listening to this song. Although I guess it's thanks to the zombies that I can groove out to it at all.

Climate change research at the Earth Institute...and me!

Jeff Sachs, Director of the Earth Institute, giving an introduction to the Research Showcase:

If you want to skip to my section, it starts at 8:38.

Dream=Reality

BEAUTY

There are no losers. There are only children.


Losers from Everynone on Vimeo.

From that first kid spearing broccoli, I saw nothing other than an adorable, sweet-seeming person. Show me a child that is a loser and...I'll show you a person who needs a character lesson from Dolly.

Because-



I should never complain. You should never complain. Not everyone is my mom, so maybe this will help inspire you, like it did me. The day we're born we start to die, don't waste one minute of this life! Quit whining. You will always have something negative going on, so you're wasting your life if you focus on it.

Dolly is like a pre-Lady Gaga Lady Gaga. Don't tell me her exuberantly re-engineered body isn't just as unsettling and provocative as this (if not more so- her artistic realization of what she's called "just a backwoods girl's idea of glam" is permanent. That kind of commitment is impressive.) :




Did you watch it? You should. As rock-pop songs go it's rich. Gaga and Dolly have a lot in common- song writing talent not the least.

We don't have to be rich and famous to be an example to ourselves and others.

Am I procrastinating by posting videos that inspire me, while also trying to write about fuel efficiency? NO- I'm just trying to do a little more.

Fuel efficiency is really interesting. Did you know that 14-25% of the gas you put in your car actually ends up moving your car down the road? The spark plug ignition internal combustion engine is one of the least efficient engines ever. Why is it dominant? Because energy used to be cheap. Well, it's not anymore. But the interests in power want to trick us into thinking that gas should continue to be cheap.

I used to think we were running out of oil. We're not- we've got plenty of oil and gas and especially coal. But it will be hard to extract, and expensive, and we can't afford to increase our greenhouse gas emissions by as much as using them would. Making things more efficient is the way to go.

Anyway, in other news, my parents are coming to visit in December! Family and friends in New York for the holidays? I have nothing to complain about.

I don't eat/ I don't sleep/ I do nothing but think of you

"You keep me under your spell"

Maybe the ideal scenario is that these words would describe a love interest. But my love interest is too far away to be keeping me from eating or sleeping. Instead, classes and thoughts of exams are doing this. That's the worst kind of mindset to have when not sleeping or eating- worrying. But dreams are to come. If you care to know where these particular lyrics came from, I am currently obsessed with everything about the movie Drive (linking to clips from the soundtrack- the preview gives too much away, and I want you to see it.) I would love to think that the music is the perfect accompaniment to this post too.

Today, I got an internship with the Lenfest Center for Sustainable Energy at the Earth Institute. If there were a dream within the dream of coming to study in this program, (a dream which apparently, when realized, precludes other kinds of dreams. When our biggest dreams come true, do we always lose sleep over it?) it would be to combine those esteemed and respected words with "communications" on my resume. It's exciting. It's ten hours a week. I can handle that right? If a second dream can come true, I can start being able to sleep again,  right?

Making new connections is good for me. That picture above is of my city from the Hudson River last night- I went with some of the other people in my program on a cruise put on by the School of International and Public Affairs. It was fun.

I've taught myself what a derivative is, and what the relationship between a first and second derivative tells you about individual preferences toward risk, and all kinds of other microeconomics factoids in the last few weeks. There is still a lot I don't know. I am still freaked out by the fact that I'm being tested on Lagrange multipliers- I was so wrong that I didn't need to learn math in high school. LESSON: learn as much as you can, while you can. Sometimes your wildest dream requires calculus.

One of the programs I will work to support at the Lenfest Center is called PositiveFeedback, and one of their upcoming events is a "dating game" event between artists and scientists. The concept is to "set up" artists and scientists, to see what kinds of influences and projects result. It's going to be at The New School for Design in Manhattan. I know a few artists, some with decades of dedication to various crafts behind them, and some with just a few years, who would make great dates. Aunt Margaret, it's on Thursday, December 1st. Alison, I know you just came out here....

I'm exhausted. Let's see how this literal dreaming thing goes.