Peace, Quiet, and Obligation

What we need and what we must give

I am pretty certain that there are many people in the US right now who are yearning for - or are maybe desperate for - space to take a breath and not think about all of the difficult things going on right now. As a matter of fact, I have been amazed by the expanding vocabulary that can be used to indicate a person is overwhelmed and just wants quiet time.

Truth be told, I feel this at least a dozen times for every rotation of the planet around its axis. And no, it doesn’t just happen during the daylight hours. It turns out 3 AM is a pretty good time to be overcome by it all.

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Kilauea on the island of Hawaii in December 2024

Letting your sense of obligation erupt

It is healthy to seek out peaceful moments. It is good to find silence and calm. It is important to continue to hold things that are pleasing to you or that make you happy in a prominent place of your life.

If you can.

It is also critical that we recognize that not everyone has the privilege of rejuvenating places or activities right now. And as long as that remains true, the rest of us must allow our sense of obligation to erupt. We can’t stay stuck in the places that heal and calm us. Instead we must emerge from them to be a part of what makes this world a better place so MORE people can have the opportunity for peace, safety, and belonging.

Let me make this personal in hopes that you can do the same.

I would dearly love to write about the walk Tammy and I were able to take around Kilauea and the experience we had as we observed a fountain of molten rock. I would like to focus on writing that shares learning opportunities with others. I would enjoy sharing a new Faux Real Story.

In fact, I am fortunate that nothing is preventing me from doing just that. Except, I only have so much time to write and my continued sense of obligation and responsibility pushes me to write about other things.

My life experiences and my involvement in things like small-scale farming, local foods, education, computer science, organizing, and surviving cancer have given me tools that I have a responsibility to use - and use well. While there are moments each and every day that I wish I could live in a remote, wild area that magically has all of the amenities I could ever want, I know that I will not do that.

And neither should you.

Yes. We all need to find balance so we can be healthy and effective in all that we do in our lives. So, if you (and I) have opportunities to do things that help provide that balance, we should do them. But we also need to feel the magma of obligation building under the surface. Then, rather than hold it back or allow it to vent to no purpose we must allow it to erupt with direction and good effect.

We must fulfill our responsibility and duty to speak out, to act, and to do things to give everyone the same opportunities to be healthy and whole.

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Steam rising from the sulfur banks at Kilauea

Things I’m still doing

First, let me tell you about some things I am trying to do to balance my concerns, worries and difficult tasks with places where I find comfort, solace or fulfillment. I continue to write Postal History Sunday each week because I enjoy it and I feel that it shares and encourages a love of learning. Tammy has gotten out on her kayak a few times now and I hope I can get a few hikes in soon.

We planted several trays and tubs of seeds for this year’s crops recently. While farm is its own roller coaster of challenges and rewards, it makes me move and it gives me a chance to connect with the land and non-human living things. Sometimes trading world stresses with farm stresses, though it sounds a bit odd, can be a good thing.

Tammy and I still try to play board games regularly, though I will admit that both of us have actually been too tired or too overwhelmed by current events to play each evening as we had been doing since the Covid pandemic. Now that is saying something! Feel free to do your own reading between the lines.

On the other hand, I am also doing my best to stay informed - especially on topics where I have more knowledge and expertise. But I don’t limit it to things I know because that’s not always where I am needed. I do this even when the news isn’t good or if the content is hard to follow and understand. I have been given the gifts of learning, communication and teaching that I have a responsibility to hone, improve and use with purpose and integrity.

It’s just hard work building the callouses and resilience so I can keep going and be effective. And it is so tempting to sigh deeply and say, “I am so tired. And no one is at my door threatening me right now, so I’ll just hide at the farm.”

Except I know that things are hitting very close to home and they are getting closer each day. And I know it should NOT matter whether it directly impacts me or not. If it is wrong, it is wrong.

And guess what? I am also familiar with building callouses. I know what I need to be doing.

But I often feel terribly inadequate and ineffective. I know I am making mistakes. I am aware that I should be doing so much more. And I start to wonder, if I am not making a difference, perhaps I should retreat and stay in my own little world?

I felt that way this past week, when the Lawsuit Immunity for Pesticide Companies bill passed the Senate in Iowa. It’s also waiting to be signed on Governor Kemp’s office in Georgia. It passed through the Judiciary Committee in Tennessee’s Senate. I heard that the current federal administration is attacking Habitat for Humanity, an organization Tammy and I have supported both with funds and our own building skills. I am aware that they have halted funding for food banks and stopped some deliveries of perishable foods so they could rot rather than be used. And we have growing concern that Iowa will pass laws that will essentially identify professions, like Social Work, as “less valuable” options for young people to pursue in the future.

Thank goodness I got some feedback that balanced the ledger - at least a little. The Lawsuit Immunity bill got only what it needed (26 votes) to pass. It was thanks to the protests brought forward by people like you and me and organizations like PAN, Iowa CCI, Iowa Food and Water Watch and Iowa Association for Justice that we actually got close to stopping it in the Senate - a place where passage was once a given. And the bill was stopped in Oklahoma.

Some people we know are back at their jobs after being wrongfully removed because others stood up for them and the courts made rulings to return them to work. I was told that some of the talking points I helped to craft were used effectively in other forums and that they made a difference.

And I was reminded that I wasn’t alone. My willingess to meet my obligations did not go unnoticed and they were not fruitless.

It’s more than enough to keep going.

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Let’s build callous together - let our senses of obligation come to the surface

Yes, give yourself chances to breathe and find balance. Get enough rest so you can get back at it.

Just make sure you don’t skip the gym too many days in a row. We’ve got a lot to do.

Pesticide Lawsuit Immunity Bill news

The Iowa Senate actually had a more difficult time passing this bill thanks to the noise people like you have been making. The Republicans in charge of the Iowa Senate stopped debate and proceeded to have a long internal discussion to secure the 26 votes they needed to pass the bill. And that’s all they got.

Here are the voting results:

Yeas, 26:

Bousselot Costello Dawson De Witt Dickey Driscoll Garrett Green Gruenhagen Guth Klimesh Koelker Kraayenbrink McClintock Pike Reichman Rowley Rozenboom Schultz Shipley Sinclair Sweeney Warme Webster Whitver Zumbach

Nays, 21:

Alons Bennett Bisignano Blake Campbell Donahue Dotzler Knox Petersen Quirmbach Salmon Sires Staed Taylor Townsend Trone Garriott Wahls Weiner Westrich Winckler Zimmer

Absent, 3: Celsi Evans Lofgren (note: Celsi was out due to illness, Evans and Lofgren indicated opposition)

If you see your Senator has voted yes, now is a good time to let them now you are disappointed and you will REMEMBER this when they are up for election. If you see a no, let them know you saw it and you appreciate their vote.

The next step will be to stop this bill in the Iowa House.

Local Food Purchasing Programs

Local food producers are smarting after the USDA halted funding for the effective and efficient Local Food Purchasing programs. Iowa was particularly good at running this program, and now it is gone. But, I have heard that it was effective in several other states, like Missouri and Kansas. I suspect it had positive impacts elsewhere too.

As a person who has run a small-scale, local foods farm, I can tell you how much effort it takes to change the scale (size) of your operation. We experienced multiple events where we were promised sales and we scaled up to meet that promise. The process of adapting our farm STARTED the moment we agreed to that promised sale and typically took six months to a year to implement necessary changes. For example, if I committed to doubling our egg output, I would need to add pasture and shelter spaces. I would need to expand feed storage and rework my pasture rotations. I would need to adjust how we clean, pack and store eggs. And I would have to buy chicks to expand the flock.

Now imagine what would happen if the promised purchases were pulled after I had everything together and the chicks were on the farm. I’ve spent my resources - time, energy and money - because I was promised there was a place for the increased production. And now, I don’t have an outlet for it.

That’s essentially what happened when these moneys were removed.

Contact the USDA, your US Senators and your US Representatives and let them know that this is NOT okay.

Iowa’s AG jumps on a bad lawsuit

Attorney General Brenna Bird added Iowa to a group of 16 other States to Texas vs. Becerra. The plaintiffs are asking the court to declare a 1973 law known as Section 504 unconstitutional and unenforceable. Section 504 protects qualified disabled people from discrimination in programs that receive federal funding.

I am not an expert in this area. However, if you want to understand better who it will impact and how it will impact them, I recommend this article by Seth Watkins. Seth concludes his article with information to contact Bird. And if you don’t live in Iowa, but you live in the following states, you should contact your Attorney General: Texas, Alaska, Alabama, Arkansas, Florida, Georgia, Indiana, Kansas, Louisiana, Missouri, Montana, Nebraska, South Carolina, South Dakota, Utah, and West Virginia.

The motivation for the suit is that people who cite gender dysphoria as a disability are included. As an individual who knows several very good, kind and valuable people who do not identify strictly by the binary and “traditional” definitions of gender AND as a person who is aware of some of the struggles these people deal with, I support that inclusion.

Like so many of the things being done by those in power right now, they’re using the sledgehammer and chainsaw mentality. Tear it all down. Who cares who gets buried in the rubble?

I do, and so should you.

It’s not just going to be their targets - people with gender dysphoria who don’t deserve to be targeted - it’s also going to hurt people like my Uncle John. Or those that require additional help to go to school. Or… Well, the list is long - and it’s because of Section 504 that many things are made accessible to them.

A bill that identifies which careers deserve Iowa Tuition Grants

Then there is a bill (HF 867) that is still live in the Iowa Legislature that would limit Iowa Tuition Grants to certain “high wage and high demand” majors or fields. Not surprisingly, the “high wage and demand” could easily be based on myth rather than fact. Given the current trends, it is likely that if a profession just MIGHT exist to help other people it would not qualify. If you want to be a Social Worker, for instance (full disclosure, Tammy is a professor of Social Work).

Never mind that Social Work graduates make starting salaries that are competitive with Business majors (by the way, they qualify because - you know - money). And the demand is high. Placement of Social Work graduates into jobs usually happens very soon after graduation.

But that should not matter either. People should be given the chance to learn and excel in the arts or education or ecology because they also have value. Why are we looking at wasting time coming up with another easily flawed and misued ranking - and frankly spending resources on that process? Why are we encouraging professionals to waste their time and effort justifying that what they do is important instead of actually DOING those things and providing value to the community?

And that is enough for today. I encourage you to take an action today and the next day and the day after that. It is hard work. It does require some dedication and building of callouses. But it is making a difference.

Let those obligations erupt with purpose.

Thank you for reading and considering my words and thoughts. I hope you can find something that will renew and rejuvenate you.