Spirit in Action

Spirit Afoot at the MREA's Energy & Sustainable Living Fair - Part 2

Snapshot visits at this year's Energy fair, including Stan Gruszynski keynote, Steve Mellenthin, Mike Miles of Anathoth, music by Pine Wilson & Kevin Soucie, Community Homestead visitors, Ned Boyles workshop on Reality 101, exhibitors TS Designs, Tall Grass Bioneers, SonLight Power and Lake Michigan Wind & Sun, and part of Judith Levine's keynote on her "Not Buying It" book.

Broadcast on:: 05 Aug 2007
Audio Format:: other

[music] Let us sing this song for the healing of the world That we may hear as one With every voice, with every song We will move this world along And our lives will feel the echo of our healing [music] Welcome to Spirit in Action. My name is Mark helps me. Each week I'll be bringing you stories of people living lives Of fruitful service, of peace, community, compassion, Creative action, and progressive efforts. I'll be tracing the spiritual roots that support and nourish them in their service Hoping to inspire and encourage you to sink deep roots and produce sacred fruit in your own life. Let us sing this song for the dreaming of the world That we may dream as one With every voice, with every song We will move this world along I take you today again to the 2007 M.R.E.A. renewable energy and sustainable living fair. This is part two. In part one, I walked around the fair on opening day, Friday, Capturing a little of the life and spirit of the event, and it is quite an extravaganza. After listening to the Friday keynote by Dr. Helen Caldecott, I interviewed a few of the people who took part in a peace walk Toward passed a couple of the exhibitors, then sat down with some of the folk who come to the fair each year. This edition of Spirit in Action picks up as I returned to the energy fair grounds on Saturday morning. After touring some of the displays and having lunch, I went to the rousing 1 p.m. keynote address by Stan Grisinski. Stan was a representative for Wisconsin's 71st District and is now the director of UW Stephen's Point's Rural Leadership and Community Development Program in their College of Natural Resources. Stan is a down-home, humorous, and a thought-provoking speaker, and he certainly did it well at the energy fair. In fact, this is the first for me. My two grandsons are here today. This is the first opportunity that they'll have together to listen to their granddaddy. I give a public talk and I hope it doesn't drive them out of public life because I really have encouraged my kids and my grandkids to take an interest in public life. But as I was sitting, waiting for them to arrive on that little pink bench, I was looking out over the crowd and I noticed something, many things, but one thing in particular I noticed was that there was no litter on the ground to speak up. I mean, I think if you really went and looked... I think if you really went and looked, you could probably find some. Now that wasn't because people were monitoring and saying pick that up, although maybe a few parents had done it. It's because there's a collective sense when you're at this event, you have a heightened sense of awareness as to what is appropriate and what isn't appropriate. And throwing down your garbage and your waste and those sorts of things simply isn't appropriate here. Now that's good and I don't care what motivates that. But it does illustrate a point as far as I'm concerned about how that sort of crowd impact, that sense of what is right, what we ought to be doing, can impact our lives in other areas outside of the grounds of the Midwest Energy Association. And one area in particular that I'd like you to think about is expanding your own base and connections. The people that you associate with, the things that you take an interest in, your public side to get beyond those who agree with you. Now I'll be the first to tell you that there's nothing easier and more fun than hanging around with people that think the way that you do. And it is after all the right way to think. And it's much more comfortable having a discussion with a knowledgeable person than an argument with a blockhead. So we tend to move in the direction that allows us to have those comfortable conversations with the people who have a grasp of the issues. But I have learned, and I have to practice this if I'm going to be, as I'm asking you to be, more engaged. I've had to practice this in my own community. I grew up in Northeast Wisconsin. I'm happy to be back there now living on the farm that I grew up on. We're not farming it, but we did save it from being subdivided. And it's a lovely piece of property. [applause] It frankly cost me what little savings I had. But there again when you talk about values, as my dad used to say to me, when he was offering money for the property for development, he used to say money doesn't mean that much to me. I didn't understand that as a teenager, I understand it now. That was Stan Grisinski, and I should mention that you'll be able to hear the whole speech by Stan delivered at the 2007 Energy Fair in a future edition of Spirit in Action. For the moment, I just want to give you an impression of the various aspects of Spirit I heard in my visit to the fair. Stan went on to speak of some of the nitty gritty of public involvement with these comments. It's always the same argument. There isn't enough money for us to be able to take care of our common wealth. That which is important to this society because it's important as what we hold in common. It's good to have individual wealth. It's important to have a private life. It's good to have a business and have it work. It's good that you take care of your family. But I don't believe that a society can be strong if it doesn't have the third leg to the stool and the third leg to the stool is public interest in public life to engage the political process and make it work for you. So I'm sitting there getting frustrated and a little agitated because agitation is my middle name. Just check with my family if you don't believe that. Stan's advocacy for our common wealth and for our communal involvement in the work of caring for the common good clearly hit a note with the Energy Fair crowd seemed to me, at least as an observer, that this was a group clearly in tune with a well-being that is more than just individual. Of course, high-flown ideals sometimes crash and burn when confronted with real people and real situations, which made Stan Grissancy's comments about his own dealing with hometown folks all the more relevant. If we want to do good and make a difference, we have to deal with all of our neighbors, especially those who disagree with us. Frankly, to tell you the truth, I grew up over there. Most of the people living there are either descendants of families that we've known and they are good people. I'm not sure they voted for me when I ran for Congress over there, but that doesn't mean they're not good people. They're a little touchy about things like the DNR, and they're probably a little over-armed in terms of what's actually necessary. To hunt and fish and engage in sports sort of activities, which I do too. But that's beside the point, a small detail, just keep a low profile if you're approaching the house. But the thing that I've learned is that for me to believe that I know and they don't, and that somehow they should learn these things all on their own so they can be like me. It's a very arrogant way to approach life. That was Stan Grissancy, former representative for Wisconsin's 71st District, currently Director of the Rural Leadership and Community Development Program at UW-Stevens Point's College of Natural Resources. I'm Mark Helpsmeet, and I'm strolling the grounds of the MREA's Renewable Energy and Sustainable Living Fair in search of Spirit in Action for Northern Spirit Radio. Stan clearly had spoken to people's condition. That's a common quaker saying. I think you get my drift. In fact, as I left the tent where Stan had spoken, I overheard a small group of people talking about the need for political engagement of a specific sort, as opposed to Stan's general call to community engagement. As I eavesdropped on their discussion, it was clear that they were discussing how they could arrange for the Democratic Party to sponsor a booth at the Energy Fair in future years. I pulled aside the man who had facilitated the discussion and got to know Steve Melonthon a little better. I see you've got a button on that leads me to think that you might be a Democrat. Well, that's a pretty good guess. I'm the chairman of the county chairs association for the Democratic Party of Wisconsin, and I represent the chairpersons from each county party across the state. So, what are you doing here? This isn't particularly a political event, I guess, but maybe there's a reason that you're particularly felt led to be here. Well, I think it's natural for Democrats to gather at a place like this, whether it's political or not. I think the root of everything is in politics, you know, in order for us to have an effect on the earth, whether we're talking about energy or whether we're talking about conservation or good stewardship, the organization makes change more possible. I heard you talking, Steve, about the need for the Democratic Party to have a booth here next year. You were talking about how it just seemed such a natural thing. Is that because Republicans wouldn't be welcome here? Well, I don't think that it's that they wouldn't be welcome here. I think it's more that the Democratic Party looks at these issues and takes them seriously, knowing that at some point oil is not going to be there for everybody. I think that oil is the energy of the past, and I think that the other party is probably going to milk it till they get every penny out of it they can and worry about the consequences later. My program focuses on the roots and fruits of spirit working in the world, and I consider environmental peace justice things to be very prominent fruits of a good spirit life. Can you talk about that, the Democratic Party, its relationship to spiritual or religious or rooted interests in that point of view? I think that as world citizens we all need to take a serious look at what we're doing to the planet, what we're doing to the earth, what we're doing to its resources, and how we interact with our communities. I think it's important to pay attention to the whole picture so we can make the world a little bit better place. I mean we all need to contribute something that will make the world a better place to live and a safer place to live. I guess there's an obvious link that must be in your mind because you didn't say it explicitly. When you're looking at the big picture it is a question of spirit I guess is what you're assuming. Absolutely. What workshops have you gone to hear? What kind of thing calls you and is your particular interest? Well personally I'm interested in solar energy. I have several solar projects at home, but I'm interested in biodiesel. I mean there's a lot of things here that serve useful purposes in real time. You know we're years behind in some of this technology and we really need to move forward with it. I'm proud that many of our Democratic legislators have pushed this along and created incentives. Well thanks for being here. Thanks for getting the energy up and trying to harness it through your work with the Democratic Party to make some really positive change for the world. Well thank you I appreciate your time. That was a brief visit I had with Steve Melanthin, Deputy Political Director for the Democratic Party of Wisconsin. As I spoke to Steve, another passerby caught my eye as well. A man with a somewhat different political connection. Mike Miles ran for Congress last year as a representative of the Green Party and he's a member of an intentional community in rural luck Wisconsin called Anathoth. The residents of Anathoth are committed to a combination of simple living and activism. And Mike has been part of it since it was founded 20 years ago. I asked Mike if he and the other folks from Anathoth had been part of the energy fair for a long time. It took us years to get over here because we're on the other side of the state and we tend to stay as close to home as we can especially in the summer because of gardening and hanging. I actually came over here the other night after hanging until about seven o'clock and then I got cleaned up and drove four hours over here or whatever it was. You live off the grid, right? Pretty much? Not really. We've got five buildings up at the farm and the grid comes into a couple of them. And then we have buildings that are also off-grid and so we've got a nice combination. We're hoping with the buildings that are on the grid to do some kind of grid tie as soon as we can come up with enough money to get a win mill and to get some panels. But we do run enough electricity around that we probably do need to have some kind of grid tie instead of being off the grid altogether, but two of our houses are off the grid. What brought you down to the energy fair? Why is this important? You said it took a long time for you to get here. Is it just addictive when you got down here? Yeah, we just kept coming back year after year just because it's the community that sees where the future is. And there's great vendors here and great speakers here and we keep running into people that we know from different circles. It's just wonderful to be here with all of these folks. I mean, the reason that I'm here this time around is because I'm promoting our 20-year anniversary, our live earth show that we're doing at the farm in three weeks. And so I've got a lot of friends who have booths and I've got our flyers out of booths all over the fair. And so I'm spelling people at their tables so they can go to different talks. And I'm just having a great time wanting around seeing talks and promoting good stuff. Well, tell the listeners with the live earth event that you're going to have on 777. I believe that's a day, July 7th up at Anathoth Community Farm up there in Luck. What's going to be going on? Why should they want to show up in Luck, Wisconsin, while places? Well, it started out as our 20-year anniversary of the farm. So for 20 years, we've been 10 miles out of luck promoting non-violence, community, and sustainable living. We heard about this thing that Al Gore was doing and all the inconvenient truth people having a day of global concerts to raise awareness of global warming. And we thought, well, heck, why not just jump on that? Because global warming is a big part of it. So we picked 777 as the date for our 20-year anniversary party. And I happened to come up with purely through chance Buckwheat Zydego as a headliner and then a lot of good local world beat music. What we're telling people is this is going to be the best live earth concert of the day. Because you can either go to a giant stadium in New York and see Bon Jovi and Peter Gabriel. Or you can come up to the farm in Luck, see Buckwheat Zydego and Devin Evans, who used to play with Bob Marley. And while you're there, you're going to get a tour of the eco-village that we built from the ground up. And you're going to see the future of energy right in front of your eyes, hands on. So it's going to be great music, great education, great community building. It's going to be a wonderful time. Mike, I know a fair amount about Mammothoth, although I've never actually been there. One thing I know about you is that you ran for Congress on the Green Party a couple times recently. And last night, when you were introducing a song or two that you sang, you mentioned your campaign song. Could you share some of the lyrics with our audience here? It's a Jack Hardy song. I heard it on Wojb. And the name of the song is "I oughta know more than I know." And it just goes on and on. I oughta know more than 1492, I oughta know what the Buffalo Bills do. I oughta know about Oliver Cromwell, I oughta know about the Gnostics in St. Paul, I oughta know. And it just goes on in this vein. It's kind of an ironic song to pick as a campaign song because the chorus is "I oughta know all this stuff, but I don't." So it was fun. I would sing that song every time I had a chance and I actually did some busking. You know, I'd...for raising money for my campaign. I'd just put the guitar on the sidewalk and start singing people throw change in the guitar case. It's a great way to raise campaign money. Unfortunately, I didn't get a recording of you last night, but I wish I had. I'd like to run that any day. It was great to see up there jamming with the local backup group that you just picked up. They're amazing, too, aren't they? Well, that was the most fun open mic thing I've ever seen in my life because you've got... It's like...they called it "live karaoke." So you've got your song and you got a band and you give them the chord changes and off you go and they just follow you. They're really, really good. Bob and Ganush is just terrific and it was great fun. Well, keep up the good work in Anathoth, I hope. On July 7th, you have a very rich, full crowd there. Anathoth has been doing great things for the world since you founded it back in 1987 and it's just wonderful work. Keep up the energy. That was Mike Miles of the Anathoth Community Farm. That's an intentional community centered around activism and sustainability located outside of Luck, Wisconsin. You can check them out via the website anathothcommunityfarm.org and Anathoth is spelled A-N-A-T-H-O-T-H. In case you didn't know, it's the name of a city that's mentioned several times in the Bible. It was a Levite City of Refuge, among other things. And the Anathoth Community Farm, Mike and his wife, Barb and the other folks up there are some of what is really spirit led and spirit filled in Wisconsin, quite a refuge from our common culture. About the time that I finished talking with Mike, I noticed that they were tuning up some music in the Big Tent, which is also known as the Purple Tent. Stuff was color coded for those of us who respond to colors better than numbers, I guess. Checking my program, I saw that it was to be a duet of sorts and I knew one of the people. Pine Wilson is a folk musician who performs and records often as part of a group called Maritza. The band specializes in Eastern European folk music, though today for the MREA's Energy Fair main tent, Pine Wilson was teaming up with Kevin Soussey of Milwaukee, whose repertoire is of French origin. Listen in on one of the songs that they did. I think it's about the area of Spain, known as Andalusia. [MUSIC PLAYING] [MUSIC PLAYING] [MUSIC PLAYING] [MUSIC PLAYING] [MUSIC PLAYING] [MUSIC PLAYING] [MUSIC PLAYING] [MUSIC PLAYING] [MUSIC PLAYING] [MUSIC PLAYING] [MUSIC PLAYING] [MUSIC PLAYING] [MUSIC PLAYING] [MUSIC PLAYING] [MUSIC PLAYING] [MUSIC PLAYING] [MUSIC PLAYING] That was some of the music from the Purple Tent at the 2007 Renewable Energy and Sustainable Living Fair, held this past June in Custer, Wisconsin. You heard Kevin Soussey on guitar with French vocals accompanied by Pine Wilson on accordion. I'm only sorry that the recording doesn't nearly do justice to the quality of their music. They are both excellent musicians and their music selection was refreshing and exotic. Their music was only one of the many things going on around the fair. There was a kids' tent, for instance, lots of displays and vendors, wonderful food concessions, much, much more. Eventually, I'll work my way over to some of the workshop tents. But first, I'm hoping to catch one of the Eastern European folk dance tunes that I know Pine Wilson does. After all, I first met Pine while folk dancing at a regional, quicker gathering in the early 80s, and I've run into her sense when she's been performing with her folk dance band Maritza. I didn't have to wait too long before she and Kevin played a folk dance tune that I recognized. [MUSIC] [MUSIC] [MUSIC] [MUSIC] [MUSIC] [MUSIC] [MUSIC] [MUSIC] [MUSIC] [MUSIC] Nice folk dance tune from the Purple Tent, where Pine Wilson of the folk dance band Maritza was teamed up with Kevin Soussey to share some music with the people attending the 2007 M.R.E.A. Energy Fair. I couldn't stray too far from their fine music, but I did wander around the general vicinity of the tent, and I bumped into some folks whose open and eager faces caught my attention. So I stopped and talked with them for a little bit while you can hear the music by Pine and Kevin continuing in the background. Are you liking this music? This is gorgeous, we love this. Where are you folks from? Asiola, Wisconsin, we're on proper donation in North West Wisconsin, community homestead. Community homestead, Asiola isn't that far from me, and I've been over there, of course, but I haven't run into a how long your organization been around. It's been about 12 years now. We're on a farm of seven to nine acres, organic garden, and then we also have a dairy farm, and our milk is going to organic valley for the butter. Can I get a couple of your names here? I'm Heidi Krattiger. Heidi Krattiger, please do meet you in your name. And I'm Oscar Boyding. Oscar, please do meet you, and do you want to say something? Andrew Inners. All four of you that are standing here are part of the community, or are you just good friends? I work at another organic farm right down the road called Burning River. Burning River's yours, and what's your name? Mary, I live here, I hope so. So you all work on the farm, do you do other things that community homestead? Well, throughout the winter, since we are 40 people, we need to entertain ourselves somehow. So we do crafts, and we do woodwork, and we sell any local stores. We appeal to the Waldorf schools, and so a lot of our stuff has gnomes on it, and we do fabric painting, and we make cards. So for the cards, we make paper, and we paint the fabric, and do stenciling. And then our woodwork is for schools. And chairs, and puzzles, and sailboats, and jewelry boxes, yep, boxes. And so there's all sorts of things that we do in the winter, and then in the summer, it's more just the garden. You said 40 of you. Is this a big apartment complex? This is a lot of little buildings. How do you have it organized there? It's an intentional community, so it's six houses at this point. We all have similar values and ideas of how we want to shape this community, and it's a branch off of the Camp Hill organization. We're not actually a Camp Hill community, but we have the founders are Camp Hill kids. What brings you to the energy fair? I can think of several good things, but I'm just really wondering what made you stand up and say, "This is where I'm spending my weekend." Well, I went to school in Stevens Point. I graduated there last year, and so I know several people doing exhibits here, and so it's good to know, and we're trying to get more sustainable at the community, too, and get a little bit better with our solar ideas and with our wind ideas, too. I don't know how official or written it is into the bylaws organization of Camp Hill organizations, which you say you're not officially one, but I'm wondering if there's a religious spiritual underpinning that's specifically part of your organization, of your community. It's spiritual in the way that we know that there's spirits and there's a living being within everything. It's not really the religious aspect of it, such as Christianity or Hinduism in that way, but just knowing that there are spirits, there's living creatures existing within the garden within the community among us that we may or may not think of in everyday life. So in the garden, we'll talk about gnomes being among us, and so it's just a way of thinking of the ground, and we'll do biodynamics also, and so we'll do biodynamic preparations for a lot of our gardening. Camp Hill's will do a lot of that, too. It's the anthroposophical ideas. It's part of the idea of your community, also to like the Camp Hill ones, that instead of shunting off or separating out people who are considered to have disabilities, it's to mainstream and it's to enrich ourselves mutually with everyone in the community. Is that part of the method of your community? I think so. It's basically, it's just whatever people are capable of doing and know what they are capable of putting things or living without being judged in another way. It's wonderful to see you here. Your glowing face has certainly captured me as I went by and your feet tapping to this wonderful music from Pine Wilson of Maritza and French music that we're listening to behind us. Thanks for being here. Thank you. Thank you. Enjoy the rest of the fair. Thank you. With music by Pine Wilson and Kevin Susie in the background, that was several folks from Community Homestead of ASEOLA, Wisconsin, who are visiting the Renewable Energy and Sustainable Living Fair the third weekend in June. You're listening to a northern spirit radio production called Spirit In Action, and I'm your host, Mark Helpsmeet. We'll continue our Saturday visit to the grounds of the Energy Fair to an area that I have yet to visit, the workshops. There are a number of tents where workshops and presentations are given up to 14 running simultaneously for many hours throughout the weekend. Even though many of them repeat, you still could only attend a fraction of the 170 presentations offered this year. I decided to drop in on workshop number 62, which is called Reality 101 - Energy, Environment and Economics. According to the workshop guide, it was to be an introduction to the interrelationship of energy, the environment, and economics in the U.S. and across the world, shared by Ned Doyle of Back Home magazine. I'd mention that typically the workshops are unamplified, and it's not unusual to have one or two hundred people listening in. To record Ned Doyle as he spoke, I lay down on the ground as near as I could get to him, cranked up the volume on my micro recorder, pointed the microphone in Ned's general direction, and listened in as Ned talked about energy, environment, and economics. There's three sides to a coin! That whole edge going around, and that's the economics of it. Because the reality of our world today is that everybody in this room may care deeply about the environment. They may care deeply about future generations. You may care about wildlife species and extinction, and we can adopt, you may be devoted to, soul power, wind power, high posting toilets, whatever it is. But the fact of the matter is the majority of people in this country, and not all around it, but in this country, pardon me, don't give a rat's ass about what's going to happen in the next generation, and all they care about is the money. So we have to look at this in terms of economics as well, and keep in mind that the economics are a major driving force, whether it's like it or not, and whether or not we consider that moral or whatever, you know, it's a value system that kind of sort of is irrelevant in reality. Because we keep in mind that when we finish destroying this planet in terms of human life, the cockroaches are going to be happiest clams, they're going to be six feet tall and chew it on the rats that weigh 400 pounds. So, you know, the life goes on. It's just not necessarily our life the way we're used to it, and this is what we're breaking down and destroying. Now, the good news in all this is that if you look at energy environment economics in this bigger picture, and you say, "What is a good investment? How do I invest my money in a long haul? How do I look to the future for our children, our grandchildren, these serious concerns? How do I -- how many people have long-term investments? You know, buck stocks, bonds, that kind of thing. We're on about two-thirds, three-quarters in there. And I wish I did, but I'm broke, so I don't, but yeah. All right, see, we think this way. But when it comes to energy systems, collectively, almost all of a sudden, what's it going to cost me right now? No, why not invest in energy for a longer haul? And I'll get into some details. But the bottom line here is investing in sustainable energy, whether it's biomass, solar, wind, hydro. Any of the sustainable lines that are a better investment than any of the non-renewable, non-sustainable energy technologies strictly for an economic sense, even if you don't care about killing the bugs and the bees and the birds and the ground. It's a better investment. Goldman Sachs is putting up tens of millions in dollars in investments. Last year, GE, who is probably, you know, singularly, maybe one of the most important people destroying life on the planet, made over $20 billion in profit in green technologies and energy efficiency sales. They see it, too. It's across the board. There's people left and right. People are invested because it makes sense. The investment for the long haul, and you get a payback on it. In terms of power systems, and I'll just drop to that for a second. People say, "Oh, well, you know, holes are a really good investment." You know, I'm saying it costs this $180 million to build. Well, actually, it's going to be a couple hundred million dollars to build this coal plant. You know, but if we save output for a wind plant, oh, no, that costs, you know, twice as much for that capital outlet. Well, they completely ignore, and they call it external costs, actually paying for the coal over 30 or 40 years. The air pollution, the sulfur dioxide, the carbon emissions, the climate change, even though I don't hope those are external costs, they don't count, all right? But with wind, if you pay for it. But even so, wind systems, the wind farms, large scale, are economically competitive with coal systems right now today, even without all these magic accounting gains and all the external costs and so forth. That was just a few minutes of Ned Boyle's presentation at the 2007 Energy Fair. Again, that workshop was one of 170 workshops and presentations, an incredible wealth of knowledge of experience and alternatives. Some are very practically oriented, things like site analysis for wind or how to connect a small renewable energy system to the utility. Others are more philosophically based, like eco-kids, raising children who care about the earth and sustainable relationships. And some are just all over the place, like stone circles or mortgage free. After sitting in on the reality 101 workshop with Ned Boyle of Back Home magazine, I decided to visit some more of the 200 exhibitors, always on the lookout for spirit in action. I tried to keep my selection of which booths I stopped at, somewhat arbitrary, in order to avoid limiting my choices due to my prejudices, since I realized that spirit can manifest in totally unexpected ways. I wanted to allow spirit to spring up and surprise me from the unforeseen sources. For example, I went by a place that was a screen printing distributor, T-shirts, other items, and I struck up a conversation with Tom Siney, CEO of TS Designs, and I asked him about his company. As a company, we want to be a different kind of company. We're interested in environmental and social issues, and we're seeing a lot of people that agree with us. How is it that you've been able to get customers coming in and paying attention to this kind of thing, because it doesn't ever really just want to shop at Walmart and get the cheapest quality? I don't think so. We see that people, if they're only interested in price, then we're not the company they need to work with. If they're interested in other issues, if they're interested in where things come from, then how it affects the environment, how it affects social things. In our business, we drive our business by three things. It's called a triple bottom line, which is people, planet, profit. So we're looking at how does this impact the planet, which is really environmental stewardship, how it affects people, and these people are employees, our vendors, our customers. You could call it social justice. Obviously, the profit piece has to come in there, which is economic prosperity. We're trying to promote models that measure these three bottom lines rather than just one. When you talk about people buying just on price, they're driving from just one piece of that. So who are the customers that you end up developing, and are they all just walkerfellers? Who is it that you end up being able to sell your high quality t-shirts to? Well, it's anybody that has a social or environmental agenda, a caring about those types of things. We see a lot of activism and renewable fuels, alternative energy, faith-based organizations, anybody that's lobbying for social justice, environmental stewardship. It could be local co-ops, farmers, organic farmers, anybody who's trying to be more responsible. Tom Syneeth, CEO of TS Designs, went on to explain a bit more of his motivations. Perhaps you noticed when he mentioned that many of his clients are from faith-based organizations. I'm afraid that some of us have an unwarranted prejudice against faith-based groups, especially when we think about the current administration's attempt to funnel government funds to right-wing churches and organizations. There are certainly abuses of the system, and there are likely some self-serving religious groups as well. But there are also many groups and individuals like Tom Syneeth, an active Methodist, living out their faith with caring for people and for the planet, and deservedly prospering for their work. I continued wandering around the exhibits at the 2007 Energy Fair and felt drawn to check out something labeled tall grass bioneers. I didn't know what a bioneer was or what it might have to do with spirit in action, but I walked up, introduced myself to Rich Dana, and he enlightened me. Rich works on quality of life issues in Grinnell, Iowa for a group called Imagine Grinnell, and he is organizing the Tall Grass Bioneers Conference there. Well, we're here at MRA to promote a conference that we're holding in Iowa in October. It's been held in Grinnell, Iowa, but the unique thing about it is it's not only taking place in Iowa, but in 22 communities across the United States. We're all linked by satellite to the Headwaters Conference in San Rafael, California. The National Conference is called the Bioneers, and then each sort of bio-region has their own conference. We're called the Tall Grass Bioneers because of our prairie heritage. Folks in the Great Lakes region are the Great Lakes Bioneers. People down in Southern Illinois hold the Heartlands Bioneers. It stretches all the way from Alaska to Taos, New Mexico, and down into Texas. There are 22 cities, and each one will be having their own individual version of this conference, but the beautiful thing is they're all linked by satellite, and we get to see a bunch of big-name speakers at the California Conference while staying right in our own area. Bioneers was established originally by a group in Northern California, the idea of being biological pioneers, meaning that they're going to take a new and groundbreaking move toward the way that we think about Earth and the environment. The idea of bioneers is that it's not serving your purpose well by being an environmentalist only in the context of the environment, or only talking about social justice issues to other people who are involved in social justice issues, that we need to take a holistic approach, and when we get scientists, engineers, advocates, artists, writers, people from all walks of life together, that's when creative solutions come about. This holistic approach is this theological, spiritual underpinning to the conceptualization, or what is the holisticness of it? Well, there is a spiritual component, and bioneers makes no excuses about the idea that all these issues come from a spiritual root, and there's no religious affiliation or no particular doctrine involved, but the idea is that along with science and policy and all these other things, we have to feel comfortable about taking a spiritual stand on issues of moral significance. So the spiritual aspect is a very important thing in the bioneers' experience. What does spiritual mean in the context of bioneers? That's left up to the individual, really. You know, some people might see it as being sort of a negayan model, or might think of it as sort of a new-agey thing, but there are people, I mean, there's a bioneer's conference in Utah that's held by folks in a community that's primarily Mormon, so there's no conflict there at all. As long as people are willing to look at these issues and reflect on them in their own spiritual context, then we think it's a good thing. When does that conference happen? It's October 19th, 20th, and 21st in Grinnell, Iowa, which is, of course, halfway between the amount of colonies and Des Moines. Hey, that's pretty good. I'm impressed. Yeah, it's just about exactly halfway between the amount of colonies and Des Moines just off of Interstate 80, so it's very centrally located for folks all around the Midwest. You can find out about the tall grass bioneers that Rich Dana was speaking of via the go-to-plan-b.net/bioneers' conference website. Leaving the bioneers' booth and turning the corner, another sign caught my eye. This time, because I am unusually fond of puns of any sort. The sign said, "Sunlight power with sun-spelled S-O-N, not S-U-N." It seemed to me that this plan words was meant to attract me on multiple levels. So I said hello to Alan Rainey, who, it turns out, is the founder, executive director, and, as he said, the chief and only bottle washer of sunlight power. I asked him if that meant there were no non-executive non-directors. That means there are a lot of volunteers that we try to get to help us take light into darkness. Well, tell me about what you do specifically, and I especially like the sunlight power. I'm assuming that that is a Christian reference. Yes, it's very biblical to take light into darkness, and that's what the Lord has told me to do, and he's given me some set of skills to do that. I'm not the world's greatest solar technician, but I've studied it quite a bit, and I travel well, so this is what I'm doing. I'm leading mission trips six to eight times a year. We go and take solar power systems into schools and churches and orphanages and developing countries where they don't have electricity. When you provide electricity, especially in a very poor village, to allow light their building to provide audio-visual aids and to be able to run a computer, these are things they've never even dreamed about because they don't have the capability of doing it themselves and don't think anybody's going to come and help them. Where have you done these mission trips, too, specifically? Well, we have current projects. All of our projects are working, by the way. We have 42 installed projects, and they all work. We have them in Honduras, Guatemala, Mexico, Haiti. Haiti is a big field because they don't have a valuable grid there at all, and very many missionaries are using generators and solar power is cheaper than generators. We also have an orphanage in Kenya that we put power into. Small system in Ethiopia that help in defeating the starving people. Is this inter-denominational, or is it specifically affiliated? No, we're not affiliated with any denomination. I'm current myself, Presbyterian, but don't hold that against me. Do you draw from Presbyterian and other religious people as well, and non-religious, I'm assuming? Sure. We take anybody with us. You just have to want to go and pay your own way and want to work. We are looking for people that want to be a part of this. We're looking for churches that might want to sponsor a school in developing countries, or like Kiwanis Clubs or other service organizations that want to better other people. That's great stuff. I love the pictures of the people scattered across the world that you have on your display. Thanks for doing that work. Thank you very much, and come and join us. That was Alan Rainey and his organization Sunlight Power, which was one of the exhibitors at this year's renewable energy and sustainable living fair in Custer, Wisconsin. He invited you to get involved in their mission of taking alternative power to the developing world, and you can find out more about that on his website, sunlightpower.org. Remember, that's s-o-n-sunlightpower.org, and of course you can always check it out on the northernspiritradio.org website as well. It was getting close to closing time, so I sat down to some food in the food area, caught a little music in the purple flag tent from the sidelines, and called it an early night, so I would be ready for Sunday, the final day of the energy fair. When I arrived on Sunday, I did a little more touring of the exhibits, and as I did, I recognized John and Anne Hippenstil, folks I met a couple decades ago when we were all living down in Milwaukee. At that time, they had a toddler named William, and there he was now at the energy fair, 22 years old, staffing the Lake Michigan Wind and Sun display. I decided to try to get to re-know this older version of the child I met all those years ago, and explore his connection to the family business. I asked William if he worked regularly with Lake Michigan Wind and Sun. Definitely periodically, and every year here at the fair. I call him because the more people in the booth, the merrier, and I have a pretty decent history working with the company, so I can help answer a lot of the basic questions at least that people have to ask. What's the most complicated function that you serve with respect to the business, that is to say the building, installing, calculating, loading? I've done numerous installations. I've traveled with the company to South Korea to do the final wiring installations of turbines, so I've been involved in a lot of it, accepting the billing end of things. So you do all the good work and other people do the dirty money-grubbing part. That's how I see it. Are you really one of those people who likes to avoid money as best as possible? Is money, does it taint to your soul, or are you able to live for free down in Milwaukee? Money is definitely a part of my life, but I try not to get stressed about it, but then again I'm not suffering for lack of it. Are you doing school down there, or are you finished with that, or are you doing some other kind of job? No, I do computer consulting in Milwaukee. How does that compare for you in terms of fulfillment to doing work with putting in solar and wind energy systems? I think the solar and wind energy systems in the long run would be a more fulfilling experience. But I take it that you probably studied and became equipped to do computer work. I have experience in computer work, no degree, but I also find that challenging and enjoyable. If maybe less spiritually fulfilling. What's particularly spiritually fulfilling about doing the solar and wind energy? Part I'm asking about what for you you call spiritual and what makes it fulfilling and actual doing the work. Well, the work, the benefit, and I guess as I would say, I don't know what differentiates it from a spiritual end, but it certainly is great for looking into the future environmentally. In that aspect, I think it touches on a spiritual end because the concern for future generations seems to be of a spiritual nature. I guess I've heard it said recently that concern that just reaches across the physical world is one kind of connection and community, and concern that reaches across time is another kind of extended community. So, are you trying to provide for your offspring into the future? Well, certainly that comes into it. I don't think that's the motivating factor, but it certainly is a part of renewable energy, finding sustainable and cost-effective solution. What's your favorite non-human species? Cats. You have cats down there in Milwaukee? Yeah, two brothers. One's named Bear and the other is Micah, and they're two and a half years old now. They were barn cats originally, but have taken pretty well to city life. And they're really the boss of the household, even if they don't appear it. So, I'm going to ask you a deep, ridiculous, philosophical question. Do cats have souls the same way that people are said to have souls? Feel free to use your own language. Sure, I certainly think that a cat has an equivalent spirit to a human, just because they aren't on the same physical progression as we are. It doesn't mean that the spirit isn't there. I mean, they clearly have feeling and emotion, and that seems to be a spiritual end. And tell me where you got that idea. Is this because of your far-out flaky mom who believes things like this? Or is it because of all your peers in high school had these kind of thoughts? By the way, I agree with you. So anyway, where did you get your thoughts? Living with cats and paying attention to them, it seems that it's just evident in their behavior. And when you look them in the eyes, I don't see how you can't see that same spirit that you'd see in a person. And how does that change your life and how you live and what you do? Well, I'm certainly less demanding on them, and I can't view my pets' possessions. And that's probably why they have pretty free reign over the household. We talked about some more things equally off the beaten track in nature, and by the end of the visit, I had the sense that I was really starting to get reacquainted with William, confident that this 22-year-old self resembled in some deep parts at least, the toddler I knew decades before. The big and final attraction for me at the fair was the Sunday keynote by Judith Levine, author of a number of books, including Not Buying It, My Year Without Shopping. I wanted to hear how her experiment with stepping back from the consumer culture went, especially in light of my own commitment to the Quaker testimony and simplicity. I'll play her full speech in a future edition of Spirit in Action, but I wanted to end these snapshots of the 2007 Energy Fair with a slice of what Judith Levine had to say to us. The endless, ever-escalating production, shipping, storing, fueling, and disposing of our stuff is depleting our earth of its water, its soils, heating our atmosphere, killing off species, drowning continents, and maybe finally putting an end to life on our planet. We cannot keep growing like this, or we will outgrow a finite home. Consumer culture is not going to go away soon. I, for one, don't really want it to go away. In many ways, consumer culture nourishes us, but it is also killing us. We have to reach a balance. Now, some people call this balance as the balance between the material and the spiritual. Some talk about selfishness on one side and sacrifice or charity on the other. This is the way I think about it. On one side, there's pleasure. On the other side, there's restraint. On one side, there's personal freedom. On the other side is restriction, compulsory restriction, which is enforced by the government. This is not a new tension, it's been going on for centuries. The rights of man, now included women, go back to the 17th century to the age of revolutions, including our own, which enshrined an inalienable right to the pursuit of happiness. Now, everybody always says, we don't actually get happiness. You just get to pursue it, but I actually think we get some of it. And this idea of the pursuit of happiness really underlines some of the great movements of our time, like feminism, and gay and lesbian liberation, and the abolition of slavery, they're all written into the Bill of Rights. On the other side, there's restraint. Now, this includes everything from criminal law to zoning regulations. The idea that you can't dump your oil in the creek because somebody's going to drink the water in the creek downstream. It may be much more convenient for you to dump your water in the creek. Paul tells me that when he was a kid in Vermont, everyone had an edge, and whatever the junk was, they pushed it over that edge. So, never mind where the edge ended up. So, we need to think about how to restrain ourselves, and let's face it each other. And when we do that, we assess how much we have, what our needs are, what resources we have, and then we try to divide it up more or less equally. Economically, pleasure, and individual freedom are the values that for better or worse underlying capitalism, and restraint is closer to socialism, or at least to regulated capitalism. So, the pleasure people, the freedom people say, paradise now, the restrainers say, put some away for later. Sustainability is a principle of delayed gratification. So, when you boil it down, we're talking about a tension between individuals and the greater good. And in a democracy, we have to care about both of those. So, how do the two sides influence each other? As I said before, I don't cut into the kind of environmentalism that throws the baby out with the grey water. That is throwing all the imaginative juicy stuff about consumer culture away with its devastating consequences. For certain people, now I'm not accusing anybody here in this room. It's not enough to love your bicycle, you have to hate your television, too. It's not enough to buy green, you have to condemn the whole enterprise of shopping as a crime and a sin. And look down on choppers, including yourself as advertising adult instant gratification-addicted zombies. The social critic Ellen Willis called anti-consumerism the Puritanism of the Left. Now, you may disagree with me, but I don't look back on the Puritans as one of our proudest American creations. That was author Judith Levine talking about her experiment and experience that led to her book, Not Buying It My Year Without Chopping. You can hear the full talk along with some additional interview I did with Judith on the future edition of Spirit and Action. But we now come to the end of this retrospective snapshot visit to the 2007 Energy Fair. There's a lot more that went on, of course, but you may have a sufficient flavor of this real gem of an event. We've got the Midwest Renewable Energy Association to thank for this extravaganza along with the 16,000 or so people who attended the fair this year. I hope you agree with me that there was lots of spirit in evidence in the organizers, exhibitors, speakers, and the attendees of the fair. Maybe you'll want to be there next year, just after mid-June in Custer, Wisconsin, and see what spirit you can find at the 2008 Energy Fair. The theme music for this program is Turning of the World, performed by Sarah Thompson. This Spirit in Action program is an effort of Northern Spirit Radio. You can listen to our programs and find links and information about us and our guests on our website, northernspiritradio.org. Thank you for listening. I am your host, Mark Helpsmeet, and I welcome your comments and stories of those leading lives of spiritual fruit. May you find deep roots to support you and grow steadily toward the light. This is Spirit in Action. With every voice, with every song, we will know this world alone. With every voice, with every song, we will know this world alone. And our lives will feel the echo of our healing.