Spirit in Action
Spirit Afoot at the MREA's Energy & Sustainable Living Fair 2007 - Part 1
The Midwest Renewable Energy Association Energy Fair is an amazing event, rich in speakers, workshops, vendors, music and more than 16,000 attenders. I went with an ear for the voice of the Spirit - and heard PLENTY. A collage of many folks who took part, as I roamed around the fair grounds on June 15-17, 2007.
- Broadcast on:
- 29 Jul 2007
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I have no hands but yours to tend my sheep. No handkerchief but yours to dry the eyes of those who weep. I have no arms but yours with which to hold. The ones grown weary from the struggle and weak from growing old. I have no voice but yours with which to see. To let my children know that I am out and out is everything. I have no way to feed the hungry souls. No clothes to give and make you the ragged and the morn. So be my heart, my hand, my tongue, through you I will be done. Fingers have I none to help and turn. Welcome to Spirit in Action. My name is Mark Helpsmeet. Each week I will be bringing you stories of people living lives of fruitful service, of peace, community, compassion, creative action and progressive efforts. I will be tracing the spiritual roots that support and nourish them in their service. Above all, I will seek out light, love and helping hands, being shared between our many neighbors on this planet, hoping to inspire and encourage you to sink deep roots and produce sacred fruit in your own life. I have no way to open people's eyes, except that you will show them how to trust the inner mind. We've got a real treat for you today for Spirit in Action. I had the pleasure of spending a couple days in Custer, Wisconsin for a really impressive event put on by the Midwest Renewable Energy Association, the MREA for short. The MREA sponsors the Renewable Energy and Sustainable Living Fair each year for a long weekend in mid-June. The Fair is lots and lots of things, and the whole is much more than the sum of the parts. It is speakers, vendors, workshops, food crafts, children's activities, music and friends. It is new technology, old technology, alternative ideas and values put to practical service. It is a powerful culture, a tribe of people living an alternative vision of our world. The MREA Energy Fair is not to be missed. This year attendance at the fair was around 16,000 people. I went to the fair to track the trail of spirit in action in the event. I talked to the common folk attending the fair, as well as those who took the stage, trying to find out what motivated the participants and find what part the spirit played in the mix. I found plenty of spirit under many names and many forms, abundant and compelling. There is an exhibit area open throughout the weekend, and there were nearly 200 exhibitors. There's also 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 could still only attend a fraction of the 170 presentations offered this year. The fair opened around 9 a.m., but I figured I could take in the exhibits and workshops throughout the weekend, so I made the decision to trek from Eau Claire to Custer, which is near Steven's point, on Friday morning, arriving in time for Friday's 1 p.m. keynote speaker, Dr. Helen Caldecott. Dr. Caldecott, many of you know, has been an outspoken critic of nuclear energy and nuclear weapons for decades. As a physician, she speaks with authority of the medical horrors of nuclear material. As an Australian, her observations come from outside the mindset and media limitations of the USA. As a moral crusader and passionate member of the human race, she speaks compellingly of what's wrong and what we need to do to turn things around. America has no right to be spending your money on these weapons. You know where it all goes, into the coffers of Boeing, TRW, Lockheed Martin and Raytheon, and they get filthy, filthy, filthy rich, and the CEOs pay themselves millions of dollars a year, millions of your harder and tax dollars. I go to the doctor, very good medical care system in Australia, I pay, I go next door and into my hand is put the dollars by my government that I paid my doctor. That's what you deserve. You deserve a totally free world class, uniform egalitarian medical care system. You deserve a totally free educational system, no education should be paid for. And the money's there, there should be no homeless people in America, none, they should all be cared for. The people who are mentally sick should be treated with love and compassion. We shouldn't be stepping over them in the streets in New York. That was Dr. Helen Caldecott, Friday's keynote speaker at the 2007 MREA Renewable Energy and Sustainable Living Fair. To be perfectly honest, however, that recording was not from her speech at the Energy Fair, as the MREA staff recorded that address with an eye to selling recordings to those interested. After Dr. Caldecott's presentation, I mingled with some of the folks in the audience, finding what brought them to the fair and what they thought of Helen Caldecott's ideas. For instance, I asked Dorothy Toye, what led her to the event. A friend referred me here because I'm interested in natural living. I want everything energy saving. How do you live physically that is energy saving? I work in the yard, I enjoy doing everything, like my garbage is very little, maybe once a month, and my neighbors have garbage, tons of it every week, and the garbage might like me. I like my neighbors, they like me because of my natural ways of doing things and beautiful. Over the years, I made things nice, trees and plants, and I want to see and hear more and follow up on this, what I'm learning here. How long have you lived this natural goal in your life? I've been raised that way through the war in Germany, and then I came to America as a teenager, and I always wanted to learn more about making a living the natural way. It was a baby thought in the war, and my parents had a tough time. My father was a POW for three years, and it wasn't easy for my parents or us as children, but that's how we learned really to save and enjoy what we have. When did you leave Germany, what age? At 17 and a half, at 1959, I went to Milwaukee. I wanted to get away from Germany, to experience freedom and wide open places America has. Weren't you experiencing freedom in 1959 before you left Germany, wasn't it free? I was raised under very strict parenting. We had very little. I never really complained. I enjoyed my life as primitive as it was, because my parents made a good living for the little we had. We raised chickens, we ate the eggs. My father cut the eggs off and made the roasts out of it, and I didn't want no part of it until I was hungry, and he made it look good, and the crisp skin and everything after that, I enjoyed it. How has originating from that place, Germany, that kind of horrific time in the world's history, how has that fashioned what you believe and think and work for in your life? It has made a big impression on me where things come from and what I get, and I enjoy every little thing I get in life, just cooking myself an egg. Having an egg is a happiness to me, or getting a piece of bread, I like to make my own bread when I have time. It's just everything. I just see the birds and everything. It's amazing what God has made for us. It's just wonderful, it's so beautiful, everything, and I hope we can someday all have that harmony in life, and not all this biggering and money greedy chasing. She just heard Helen Caldecott speaking, and one of the comments that she made, and I'm paraphrasing very loosely here, she said that the real threats, the real dangers to the world are the US and Russia because these two countries hold 97% of the nuclear bombs in the world. How did you react to that statement? I think she hit it right on the head, and it's very few people who talk up like that and let us know this, and it's very few people who open their ears and eyes to this. I am just absolutely astonished that she was able to come to us like this. I am so happy to hear this, because normally people just squash you like a mosquito or you're crazy, and this woman is telling us, "We are not crazy, do better start opening up and learn to listen where things are coming from," because Paris Hilton and all that stuff is such a waste of time. I am so proud of this woman that she's here. That was Dorothy Toy, a member of the audience at Dr. Helen Caldecott's Friday keynote for the MREA Energy Fair. Checking the time, while speaking with Dorothy, I realized that it was time to head over to the designated starting point for the advertised peace walk, sponsored, I understand, by the Wisconsin Network for Peace and Justice. It's W-N-P-J to the uninitiated. As we started walking, I put the microphone in front of Aaron Miller, a 20-something man, and asked him where he came from. I've hailed from La Crosse, Wisconsin, between the river and the bluff. It is a very nice place to live. So what brings you here to the energy fair, and you're part of the peace walk that we're on right now? Yeah, actually, I'm here with a company that's exhibiting here, but I've got some time off too to enjoy the fair, and so we came down a couple of friends and I to participate in the peace walk, because peace is the answer. Yeah. How do you come by this very odd thought that war is not the answer, and that peace is the answer. I thought that all Americans were supposed to believe in peace through might and war. With me, it's peer logic. It just makes sense that peace is the way. So I guess the other answer is just so confounding to me, I don't get it. So that's where I come from on it. How long have you been thinking this thought? Well, I'm 31, and I've just had-- it's kind of a natural feeling that I've had just inside my heart for as long as I can remember, and it's not necessarily ingrained by my parents or anything, but it's just, like I said, it goes along with the fact that for me, it seems logical and sensible to be peaceful with other people and to be peaceful with other countries, and it just goes on to the bigger circle of the family that's here on this earth that we all shared together. So it's just ingrained in me, I guess. How do you live it out? Evidently, you're here at the Energy Fair, and you're part of some company. How do you live out whatever your concern is for the big picture? Big picture obviously includes peace for you. Must have something related to the theme of the Energy Fair. Well, just loving my neighbor, and I think that's all connected to what the Energy Fair is all about, because it's about loving your neighbor here and now, and in the long term, which is our future generations, there are neighbors too, really, and it's just a different time. And to be conscious of what we're doing with the earth and what we're doing with each other, it's all hand in hand to me. So I do what I can to learn more about renewable energy and sustainable living and also just promote peace, like we're doing out here right now. Woo! Yeah! I think you better cheer along with them. Yeah! Peace! Peace! Now, what do we want? Peace! Now! Woo! Woo! Woo! Woo! As the peace walk crowd threaded its way past offense and alongside a road, I fell into step alongside a woman and asked who she was. My name is Bonnie Block. I'm with the Wisconsin Network for Peace and Justice. So Bonnie, why are you here at the Energy Fair, and why are you on this peace walk? Well, I've been really working pretty much full time for peace since about 1990 and been concerned about it much longer than that. I'm very concerned about the fact that we're engaged in an occupation, a genocidal occupation in Iraq. I was really upset to hear Senator Lieberman talk about bombing Iran. I visited there in December of 2005 and they are not our enemy. They're very interested in the U.S., they would like to have diplomatic relations with us. Well, they're not the problem, as Helen Caldecott said today, 97 percent of the nuclear bombs in the world are in the hands of the United States and Russia. It was so interesting meeting with all kinds of groups. We met with the women's environmental group. We met with minority religions. We met with Jewish and Christian and Zoroastrian people. And they're just like us. They want peace too. They want to be able to live their lives. I've heard at least attributed to him some statements, which are really pretty offensive and very scary. I've also heard some things that sound very just. What did you hear from the Iranian people while you were there that so clearly convinced you that they're not the threat? In many ways the impression we got was that Ahmadinejad is not really too different than our own president. He is talking to his base, the more fundamentalist part of the population. But there are many reformers in Iran. Since we've gotten back, I read the book, "Iran Awakening" by the Nobel Peace Prize winner. She's a human rights lawyer in Tehran. And she talks about how important it is to let the people who want to bring about change in Iran actually work to do that without having their government threatened. It's kind of like here after 9/11, the Iranians feel when the U.S. threatens them with nuclear weapons or with bombing. They sort of circle the wagons as we did. And if we really want change, it's much better to treat them with respect to negotiate. Bonnie, you said that I think since 1990, you've basically been a full-time peace worker. Where should I be sending my resume so that I can get that kind of job? I'm also a war tax resister, and so I've really been doing low pay or no pay work with the Wisconsin Network for Peace and Justice, with Fellowship of Reconciliation, and with the Lutheran Peace Fellowship. You mentioned amongst those three groups that you're working with, the Lutheran Peace Fellowship. Does this mean that you are or at least have been a Lutheran? Yeah, I am a Lutheran, and an ELCA, right? There are 16 denominations that have peace fellowships, and that includes the Muslim Peace Fellowship, Jewish Peace Fellowship, Catholic Peace Fellowship, Lutheran Peace Fellowship, Episcopal Presbyterian, disciples of Christ. There must be some Quakers in there, too. Oh, yeah. They're one of the historic peace churches, actually, so that their whole church is, and brother in and, and then a night. So you're part of the Lutheran Peace Fellowship. What do you have to do with that organization? Well, actually, I was the national coordinator for four years. I'm now on just a volunteer, and I do some non-violence training with that group. As Bonnie Block and I move toward the midpoint of the Peace Walk, I asked her about why a peace walk should be part of the renewable energy and sustainable living fair. Our government, I think, is trying to scare us into thinking that only if we support war, are we patriotic? When, in fact, I think it was Thomas Jefferson that said "decentous patriotic." It's the highest form of patriotism. So right now, the network on its website, W-N-P-J dot org, has 35 visuals that are going on every week in the state. And I think that it's changed public opinion. There have been over 30 towns, villages, cities that have also voted to end the war in referendum on the last two elections. When you mentioned that you're Lutheran, I imagine a lot of people, they recognize Quakers and Mennonites as peace churches. They don't necessarily think of Lutherans as having a strong or clear or unified stand in that direction. Tell me how that fits in with Lutheranism as you experience it from the ground. Well, I think probably we are at the edge of the church, but the Lutheran Peace Fellowship is one of the ones that formed out of the Second World War to support Lutheran conscientious objectors. There's always been a strain of pacifism or of a feeling that violence does not really result in anything but more violence. Martin Luther King said it real well when he said violence only deepens the darkness in an already starless night. And you don't put out fire with fire. You put it out with water. So I think we really need to do that, and certainly for me at least, if I look at the local word, it's pretty clear that we are to be peacemakers. The Beatitudes of the phrase blessed are the peacemakers. One of the really amazing actions of Jesus is in the Garden of Gethsemane when he told Peter to put back his sword. If ever you would have thought there was a time for drawing a sword to protect a friend from being arrested and tortured and killed, you would have expected that would be it. And yet what Jesus said no, those that take the sword, die by the sword, and it seems to me we're seeing that in Iraq. Over 650,000 Iraqis have been killed, 3500, over 3500 now US soldiers have been killed, and I think the number now is either 75 or 76 from Wisconsin. So it's pretty clear that what war does is kill. It does not ring about life or peace or democracy. Bonnie, why are we involved in this peacemarch here in the middle of the energy fair? What's this got to do, one with the other? Oh, I think they're very closely connected. Part of the reason, probably the major reason in fact that we are in Iraq and that we're threatening Iran is that they are numbered two and three in terms of oil reserves. And the reason we have all those bases in Saudi Arabia is also because Saudi Arabia has the oil and we want to control it. We've built the largest embassy in the world in Baghdad. We are clearly trying to control the oil. And if we were more energy conscious, if we use renewable, if we use less oil, we wouldn't be in the situation of having to kill people to get it. As called the cut said, one of the first bills we want the Iraqi parliament to pass is to privatize the oil so that our Western oil companies can make the profits. What people really need to do is look at alternatives. The mainstream media right now is corporate controlled and they're not likely to give us both sides of the story. So what you're saying is they should really be listening to programs like those produced by Northern Spirit Radio instead of what's being produced by Fox News. Yeah, I would think so. That was Bonnie Block with the staff of the Wisconsin Network for Peace and Justice. We were both at the 2007 Renewable Energy and Sustainable Living Fair, taking part in the peace walk organized by WNPJ, one of many activities happening daily at the Energy Fair. I'm Mark Helpsmeet and I decided that Northern Spirit Radio needed to visit the Energy Fair and look for signs of the spirit of foot at this awesome and impressive event. I finished speaking with Bonnie just about halfway through the peace walk right near Highway 10. As we headed back toward the energy fairgrounds, I struck up a conversation with Lillian Dipold, a 14-year-old from Edgerton, Wisconsin. We took a course evidently with Chris Ben-Pierce who teaches Environmental Public Health. Why did you do that one? It was through the Science Institute, it's a two-week short program that just gives you an introduction to different subjects in science and the classes are good but I mainly go for the social part of it and I love being with the kids there that I'll share my intellectual values. So are you here at the Energy Fair because it's got science stuff or are there values that are part of this I guess maybe visions of how the world could be that are part of it? What motivates you or is it just because you could get a ride? I think it's a little bit of both. I've been coming for the past four years with my dad, he's a solar installer and I've been coming with him and it's a fun experience and you get to learn stuff and you get to hang out with my family. So with all the science stuff that you're interested in, what kind of livelihood would appeal to you at this point in your life and I realized there's many more years before you have to make a decision? A field in Environmental Public Health is very intriguing to me I thought. I wanted to go into medicine and I still have that desire a little bit but after taking Dr. Pierce's course and just being surrounded and knowing what's going on in our environment I feel the people that are working in that field I really needed. My mom always talks about being in a job where you feel like you're doing something for society that is really going to push it forward and I've always wanted to do that. She's in social work and that's not what I wanted to do but that feels like a field that I can really, I feel passionate about that I could have fun in. You still got a lot of years again before you have to make this decision but one of the questions that I have for anybody as they work out their future is how do you stay grounded so that the technical aspects of what you do serve the values that are underneath because they tend to get lost. What are you doing to stay centered so that as you look towards being Environmental Public Health or whatever, how are you finding yourself a base of inspiration and support so that you're going to be true to your values? I think a lot of that is just who you surround yourself with. I choose to surround myself with people that have similar values to me. I am a pretty grounded person just by nature that I tend to not get caught up in those types of things and to really stick true to my values and that becomes a lot easier when you're surrounded by your family and your friends that also share those same values. And what would you say some of those values are for you and for your family I guess? To be kind to people and peace around the peace walk and the environment is very important to me. I mean it's so beautiful and there's so much of it that I haven't seen yet. I mean I'm only 14 and there's so much that I want to explore and I want it to be around for a long time. I was enchanted by my visit with Lillian Dipold, impressed by her activism and awareness, comparing it to my relative ignorance at 14. But meeting Lillian I was sure that I wanted to meet her father. As the peace walk drew to an end back at the grounds of the MREA's Energy Fair, Lillian and I sat down with her father, Douglas Dipold, so I could get to know him. First thing I asked was why he added renewable energy to his business which was originally a plumbing business? Well solar kind of gave a new dimension to my work life. I mean I got tired of putting in extravagant heating systems and extravagant plumbing systems for I did some pro bono work for the Habitat for Humanity. I donated a solar water heating system to them and that kind of changed my life and my perspective on what I in my particular trade could do. I look at it as a contribution. Because the systems we put in it will certainly last me and it will last most of the people that I do installs for. Lillian tells me that she's been coming here to the Energy Fair with you for some years now. Do you just come here as a business opportunity? No, I came here originally just to see what was happening in our state and my son was here for quite a few years and had been coming and my brother is also involved in geothermal systems and had been coming for a while. I was the latecomer. They kind of dragged me up here and it was after I was here for a couple of years just as a visitor I decided that I wanted to enter more into the solar business and then I did have a booth here for a number of years. This is the first year I haven't been quite a few. And Lillian started coming with me four years ago. He would be my reliever during the times that I would go to hear people like Helen called to speak or Amy Goodman or whoever else was here, Julia Butterfly who had lived in the Redwood Tree. She was here that year also. So Lillian was my reliever so I could go and hear those people speak. But this year I wanted to come back less offering my services as a solar technician and more as a visitor again just to see what has changed. You know some people might not expect that the energy fair would be highlighting things like a piece march or Julia Hill Butterfly. What's your sense of why these things do make sense as part of the energy fair? Why did you just participate for instance in this piece walk? I think the Midwest Renewable Energy Show makes you question many aspects of your life. How do you live on this planet as a consumer? How do you live on it as an educator? How do you live on it as someone who takes in the knowledge that's offered here and how do you give that back again? That's part of my way of giving back is I'm a firm believer in peace and I think we have to work for peace. It's not something that comes naturally. Our government today is one that seems to be bent on taking, taking, taking. Not necessarily from our people here at home although that certainly is the case from our lower class people but more from the underprivileged classes overseas. That's our place right now of robbing. So, it's all tied together. If I look at my energy use and where our energy comes from, I also have to become part of the global community. Douglas, when I was talking to you a little bit earlier, you mentioned something that happened to you back at the time of the Vietnam War. You mentioned your commitment to peace. I have a feeling it certainly is rooted in a few decades at least in the past. How did you react to the, shall we say, promise of military service back during Vietnam War? Well, I don't believe that we come into this world with a debt to a government that says that they're by the people, for the people and of the people and yet it doesn't work that way in reality. So back when I was 18 and as of military age, I didn't believe that I owed my country that kind of service and I refused to go to war and I wound up going over to Sweden and I stayed in Sweden until Jimmy Carter was elected and extended amnesty to those of us who had left the country because we were not going to become part of the military machine. I would have served in downtown Chicago and the inner city in some kind of capacity but that wasn't an option that was open to me. It was go to war or go to jail. I just don't think my constitution was such that I could have stood that kind of time in jail. I mean I love this fear because of its open air atmosphere. I like getting outside. These are things that are really important to me. The air I breathe, the water I drink and I wasn't willing to sacrifice those things. I was willing to leave my country because I didn't think it was more important than this ideal I have is that people are, people regardless of where they're born. In high school my best friend was a man whose father was English and his mother was Japanese. The children all look quite Japanese and I understood from watching him that there were prejudices that came against him that there were really not because of him, simply because of the way he looked. A good friend of the both of ours was drafted into the military in 1966 and sent letters home saying how it tore him up inside to be shooting at children that looked like the kids he had grown up with and he wound up committing suicide. That happened in 1967 and I think out of that I just, I don't know how I could justify taking someone's life who I never met, don't know what they're doing. I have no idea what brought them to be where they are. All I can do is answer myself and say I wasn't going to put myself in that position. Douglas, you made what I think is a very well informed and courageous decision to go over to Sweden rather than participate in the horror that I think war is. The injury that I think war is, did you have to do it alone? Did you have support from your parents or other community or were you an automatic outcast in the family because of this? I think we all have two families. We have the family of the heart that we generate as we grow older and we have the biological family into which we're born. I had support from both although there are portions of my biological family that felt like I abandoned the family by making a decision that I did. In other words, they had a love bond with me and they felt like because of the decision I made that I was not reciprocating that love bond. But my family of the heart are people like you, like a lot of the people that I could probably find here that believe we all have a unique sense of individual responsibility in this life and we have to honor that in our lives and follow it. You mentioned to me, I think some advice, I came from your father. Maybe he wished that you had been part of Quakers or something so you would have had no where you wouldn't have to leave the country. Was that not an option? My father had a deep and abiding respect for the society of friends. He always considered it an absolute guiding light, I guess I would put it that way, as far as a moral compass in life. But my mother was more of a traditional church-going Christian and had trouble with them and their seeming lack of organization. It's not seeming and it is really a lack of organization. Well, she was right then, but it was harder for her to support my decision that I was my father's. He realized that at that time that if you had been a member of the Quaker Church, you were exempt from military service and he wished that that had been an option that was open to me, that it was not. Well, you know, I'm really pleased to meet both of you, Lillian and Douglas. Thanks for each within your own age group, within your own spheres of influence. Just doing the good work. I think we need people who let their light shine, and you clearly are both doing that, so it's just wonderful to meet you. Clearly, there is a rich community involved in the MREA's renewable energy and sustainable living fair. It seems that everyone I talk to had some deep connection with the issues I see so clearly linked to living a spirit in action, peace, justice and care for creation. Douglas dipold and his daughter Lillian are two shining examples of living out the spirit in my view. After leaving the food area where I'd been talking to Douglas and Lillian, I headed through some of the exhibitor's booths that I hadn't yet passed. I'd only passed a handful of the booths and displays when I came to an old-style wind mill, mounted at the booth to demonstrate its water pumping ability. I instantly knew this could be no other than Bryce Black, who I've known well in Quaker Circles for the past couple decades. I decided to pay Bryce a quick visit, ask him about his company and his work. My business is low-tech windmill service, and I repair and refurbish vintage air motor water pumping windmills, and I sell reconditioned air motor water pumping windmills, and sometimes brand new air motor windmills. So why are you doing this stuff? Didn't this stuff go out with the pioneers? Is there any relevance to this stuff? These are air motor windmills that were originally made in the 1920s and 30s, but new ones are still being made by the air motor company in San Angelo, Texas. There are companies making clones of the air motor windmills in Argentina, Mexico, China, North Dakota, South Dakota, and other third world countries. These water pumping windmills are actually still a technology that's being used all over the world, and they're a time proven viable technology that I am proud to help people rediscover and recover and have access to. So why should we rediscover it? Why shouldn't it just go the way of the dinosaurs? Aren't these kind of windmills just old-fangled and don't we need the three-bladed kind, aren't those the only kind that are of any value at all? The three-bladed kind, which are wind generators, have intrinsic value of themselves. These are a different kind of a machine that's performed a different specialized job and performs it very well. I guess one of the main reasons that I continue to work on these machines is that they are robust and reliable. I'm working on water pumping windmills that people took care of and are 80 years old and they still work. When I hear people use the phrase "durable goods" as being something that lasts three years, I just laugh, because to me, something that's a durable good should last for decades, the technology that I'm working on here has proven itself for at least eight decades to be something that can be viable and reliable. So why are you doing this business? I mean, couldn't you get a real job? I'm just really wondering, why did you choose to do low-tech? What is it that's fundamental to your worldview that made you want to keep on this technology instead of digging your teeth into the cutting edge? I think this is the cutting edge. I ask myself that question, Mark, quite frequently, why am I doing this? And sometimes I think I should have a real job. But I guess why I do this is that when I started doing this 26 years ago, I'd drive around the country and I'd see all these old windmills that were 50 years old that were just sitting there falling apart and that people thought were kind of an eyesore and piles of junk. To me, they were a resource that deserved to be preserved, a technology that still works, that did not deserve to be abandoned. And I could see that with a little tender, loving care, these machines that are not only a technology, but somehow an embodiment of something that's an archetype in the American spirit, it just seemed to me a total shame if that archetype would not physically be present in the world. There's something about windmills that seems organic and alive and like it is a part of our souls as the American people and that I'm keeping that alive and out there in front of people. I guess I sometimes jokingly call me the curator of all windmills in Wisconsin. Yeah, you put into words the way I feel when I see those windmills myself. It does feel like it calls to something that is just, here's what it is, to be part of the American landscape. Bryce, would you care to share a song or a prayer to send me on my way? I'm going to walk on something that captures a little bit maybe about your work or your connection to the energy fair or just the spirit that motivates you? This is an apocryphal song and I wrote when my son Christopher was at babe and arms. Mama and baby Christopher were out in the yard. They were hanging the wash and waiting the squash and working mighty hard. Mama had to run to the out house she said, baby, I'll be right back. But the boy set off up the hill at a crawl, just as soon as she turned her back, as soon as she turned her back. Mama was back in the blink of an eye, but the boy was nowhere in sight. She searched all over, low and high when she found him it gave her a terrible fright. At first she couldn't speak then she started to shriek, Christopher Black get down. They were sitting up there on the windmill platform, watching the wheels spin around and round. Just watching that wheel spin round, cause he's a born windmill baby, a natural windmill boy. He can climb up any tower, he just pep his pride and joy. He got a tail like a monkey and a vice grip in each hand. It'll be a wind spinning water pumping, bonified windmill man, oh man, a bonified windmill man. Popper rolled up in his pickup truck, he was tired and mighty beat. Mama said if you're hungry, you're out of luck, you got a job to do before you can't eat. We got a baby who's been climbing on the windmill tower, you got to build us a fence this very hour, ah, don't be a fool, my, he's learning wind power. He can take my place when I'm obsolete, it'll be a windmill baby complete and he's a born windmill baby, a natural windmill boy. He can climb up any tower, he just pep his pride and joy. He got a tail like a monkey and a vice grip in each hand. It'll be a wind spinning water pumping, bonified windmill man, oh man, a bonified windmill man. Thank you. Now you may think that it would be unusual for one person on rehearse to just walk up and ask another person if he had a song to share, but as I mentioned, I've known Bryce for more than twenty years, so I knew that Bryce always has a song ready, creating them as he does while doing his work on windmills or at his homestead. The song he came up with, by the way, is not one that I'd ever heard before, so it was as much a pleasant surprise for me as I hope it was for you. Continuing down the row of exhibits, I saw all kinds of do-hickeys, thing-of-a-bops and widgets, rounding the corner, I just about got run over by another Quaker friend, heading full tilt between duties. David Abbaz's stop gave me the two-minute update on his life before passing me off to two early teens nearby in his tail who were able to update me on what the youth crowd was doing at the MREA Energy Fair. I first asked David how he was spending his time. We got a kid booth going with the bicycle that runs different electrical parts, so it's been drawn like it's. Our bike just runs different fans and bulbs and TV just to show the kids how much energy it takes to generate a watt, so that's kind of cool, but we also have a plug-in with solar so that you can plug it into the same unit and not ride your bike and just let the sun do it, so that also teaches the kid how cool solar is. Is this something connected to a round river farm or is this just a David thing that he likes to do at the Energy Fair? Well, I've just incorporated round river renewables, trying to install solar and hot water and PV, but this booth's all about education, just because it's cool, and the kids get turned on, so that's what it's about. David, I happen to know that you're going out of country shortly. How does that fit with your lifestyle and with the same things that bring you here to the Energy Fair? Why are you going where you're going? Well, we're going to teach environmental ed down in Argentina. There's not a lot of awareness about environmental ed there. It's a very hot, dry area, and there's virtually no solar going on, so I'm hoping to bring in some wind and solar technology that I can build there, not with the fancy equipment, and hopefully the kids will get kind of excited about that while we're down there teaching. And how long are you going for? Just about ten months. So we'll be back in a year. We're leaving in about six weeks. Keep up the good work. Have a great time down in Argentina, David. Thank you. It's good to see you. Do you know, Anna? You bet. I did that dancing at Northern Yearly Meeting, so why didn't you stop and talk to my microphone? I don't know. You just walked right past. What's your name? I'm Yaro. And Anna. You're both Finland. No, I'm from Dubuque. No, I'm from Dubuque. You're Dubuqueian. Anna, how does it happen that you're up here? You're from Dubuque, Iowa, but for some reason you end up here when David is actually from Finland, Minnesota. I mean, it's like, you can't possibly even know each other. David is at the Northern Yearly Meeting, too, and our family was. And my dad heard about this energy fair from our meeting, and he wanted to go. Some other people from our meeting were going to come, but they decided not to, because I have like three-month-old twins, and then we heard David was coming, so just me and my dad are up here. So this is your first time to the energy fair? Mm-hmm. Yeah. Were you the leader? Was your dad the lead in coming here? My dad, definitely. And you let him have his way? Well, I wanted to come along to see everything, too. Because you knew there would be neat people like David here, right? Yeah, pretty much. You've had a half a day at the energy fair. What do you think of it? You know, what about this is interesting to you? I like the music, and I like seeing all the different kinds of people. And I kind of wanted to learn more about solar energy, but I think we'll probably do that tomorrow. I was just kind of checking it out today. Let's see what was going on. And Yarrow, you're here. Why are you hanging around with her? Well, I'm sharing a tent. Where have you guys been hanging out while you're here? By the booth, and now we're just sort of walking around. We went to a patchouli concert, and that was really fun. I was going to make it over there, but I'm just too slow. Is that the same stuff that appealed to you? Yeah, I like to patchouli. I had to leave early because I wanted to see Kobe Vaz doing his making buttons and balloons and balloon animals over there, so I wanted to get out early to see him do that. And I was supposed to take pictures, get a fish with paparazzi. Well thanks to both of you. Go have some fun and do your paparazzi thing. Bye. That's fine. I turned around from talking to David, Yarrow, and Anna, and the exhibit at my side piqued my interest right away. The signs and displays announced Arthur Sustainable Living Center, Solar Thermal Consulting Services, Bed and Breakfast, Retreats, Yoga, and Workshops. I just had to check these folks out. I walked up, introduced myself to Marguerite Ramlo, who filled me in on what Arthur is all about and why they're part of the MREA Energy Fair. It's here because we're very involved in education already and renewable energy. We have had our farm for the last over 30 years, and we've been in the renewable energy business all those years and sustainable lifestyle. We recently built a straw bale home on our farm, and the home that we had lived in for over 30 years, we have turned into a bed and breakfast. And we're also on that property doing workshops on gardening, yoga, solar consulting, and solar energy workshops. So what is the connection here? How does Arthur Yoga Studios connect with solar power? Well, it takes energy to really do anything, right? It's all about energy. If the molecules aren't moving, nothing happens. So energy is at the base of everything. Certainly renewable energy is geared towards using our energy in our day-to-day life wisely so that we have enough of it. And we're all about how to sustain our energy so that we can have a sustainable lifestyle. That's our mission, I guess. And then you take it to yoga, and you see a lot of stressed out people walking around, a lot of people bent over and in pain. And yoga is about sustaining the body and the mind and the spirit. So there's really a big connection. Lately I've realized that not too many societies have lasted very long. So we're not always real productive in our choices, or we don't, as a human, societies, have not always made really wise decisions in the long haul. And I think that you could say that we're in a period where that's becoming more and more apparent in this society. Our choices have created some problems. And I don't think that we've made these choices to do bad things, although greed certainly is involved in some of the choices as far as energy used. But they've led, our choices have led to situations occurring that create not only an unhealthy society and environment, but also that same thing is happening to our physical bodies because of some of our choices. So therefore people do need to think about what they're doing on all levels so that they can feel better. It's all about we want to be happy. You know, really, who wakes up in the morning and doesn't want to be happy. But sometimes our choices aren't really productive. So I think that the more that we can be made aware or educate ourselves about what truly is satisfying and makes us feel good is a good thing. And I can do that if my body works well. If I'm not stressed out, if I know how to breathe, enough to make myself feel good and a lot of us don't. And if I'm not breathing polluted air, if I'm not involved with fighting wars over oil because I don't have enough, if I'm not driving an SUV where I need a lot of gas, if I drive a hybrid maybe instead, if I don't have to work 10 hour days to heat my house because it's not well insulated, you can get down to every single level, it's all about energy. And conservation is a good thing. One of the things that led me to stop and talk to you Marguerite is I saw bed and breakfast and I saw yoga studios. And I was just wondering when people come to your bed and breakfast, do you get up in the morning and do yoga together? Is there sunrise yoga at the Artha bed and breakfast? Well, there are yoga retreats. So people could come with the intent of doing yoga there, yeah. Actually, we've only just opened it. So I don't know. I checked out more of the specifics about Artha's sustainable living center with Marguerite and then I turned my attention across the way from their booth. I started that direction and shortly noticed a man with a cast on his foot in a wheelchair attempting to navigate the dirt and gravel courtyard with some difficulty. He looked pretty discouraged, actually, so I stepped over and offered myself as an alternative energy source to get him where he was headed. Turns out his name is Tom Newton and he was going to pay a visit to Anthony Quarter of Solar Pathfinder, one of the booths I hadn't yet visited. Anthony was displaying a device and a method that helps a prospective solar site be evaluated for adequate solar exposure. Turns out that Tom, Wisconsin resident and Anthony, who's from Tennessee, had become good friends through the MRA Renewable Energy Fair, finding common interest among other things in their devout Christianity. I asked Tom to introduce himself to the listeners of Northern Spirit Radio and this is what he said. Well, I'm the gentleman at this wonderful servant who saw me in a wheelchair getting struggled in some dirt and decided he would help me find my way over to the Solar Pathfinder booth. I'm Tom Newton from Wisconsin and we traveled over today to visit a lot of the different booths and things we come over with our whole family every year and just enjoy it. What was there about the energy fair that led you to come here when you know it was going to be a lot more work with that cast on your leg? Are you going to use this against me to my doctor? I'm so interested in renewable energies and my doctor's rather against this. I was supposed to be in bed until this coming Wednesday and then have the stitches and things out, but I've been dealing with this for almost a year with each of my feet and my hands and my arms and things and one thing at a time and I just said to my wife, "No, this is our family time and we're coming and no matter what." And of course I've got pain pills too, so you know, that helps. You say this is your family time. When you say family, does this mean you and your wife, you and my children, aunt's uncle's grandparents? Well, actually we have a lot of different Christian friends from, whether it's rawhide ranch and different other places, but I myself have my wife and three little gifts here, age nine, seven and three, and you'll find them over in that rainbow tent with the kids' activities. They don't leave there very much throughout the day. Do I understand that you've been coming to this good number of years? Oh, yes, in fact, we actually joined a handful of years back, got a chance to meet our dear friend here already years ago and then we were able to introduce them to like some family, Bible camps on the way back at Spencer Lake, let them do some swimming and different things, so it's not just a business thing to just save money on electricity or heat or things like that. We make it a family fun time and we look for the opportunities to meet marks. Is renewable energy a Christian thing to do? I believe that anytime you look at what were to be, it says, you know, to be Christ-like and what would Jesus do as a kind of a unique saying that's gone a long way. So what would Jesus do about smoking in a restaurant when you don't smoke? Well, praise God, they've finally done something about it and it took people like this to really spearhead and go after lobbyists and go after legislators and things and then it went to how do we combat the high rates of electricity and how do we combat having so much coal dust in the air and all of the carcinogens that come out of the coal plants or nuclear or whatever, you know, you want to pick on. I think we're all supposed to do everything according to what the word says and it says do everything as unto the Lord, whether you eat or drink, do it as unto the Lord or in your work or deed or duties, do it as unto the Lord and anything, not a faith is sin. So when you put all those elements together, even though some of these people really dress a little odd here, you know, they have piercings in their bodies where, you know, I've got to give myself a shot every day in the stomach and I think, oh man, I don't think I'd want to wear earring there either. So you get to see the uniqueness of the spectrum of people. That was Tom Newton, otherwise known as the guy in the wheelchair. As you can tell, he has a good and gentle sense of humor as well as a real Christian center. Tom and Anthony and then Tom's family all came to the Solar Pathfinder booth where we had a great visit before it was time for everyone to move toward the evening meal. There was great, fresh, ethnic and quality food available and folks spent time socializing and sharing the ideas of the day for a while, leading up to the time that the evening music started up in the main tent. We had some great dance music with a band calling themselves Baba Ghanuz. In case you don't know, that's the name of an eggplant-based Middle Eastern dish. I held my microphone in the middle of the dance floor to capture a little bit of the music. This wasn't the way to get quality CD music, but you may enjoy some of the energy from the Friday stage at the MREA Energy Fair. This is Baba Ghanuz with the Beatles Tune Revolution. We are the first to see the man who shot me in the right hand. We are the first to see the man who shot me in the right hand. We are the first to see the man who shot me in the right hand. We are the first to see the man who shot me in the right hand. We are the first to see the man who shot me in the right hand. We are the first to see the man who shot me in the right hand. We are the first to see the man who shot me in the right hand. We are the first to see the man who shot me in the right hand. We are the first to see the man who shot me in the right hand. We are the first to see the man who shot me in the right hand. We are the first to see the man who shot me in the right hand. We are the first to see the man who shot me in the right hand. We are the first to see the man who shot me in the right hand. We are the first to see the man who shot me in the right hand. We are the first to see the man who shot me in the right hand. We are the first to see the man who shot me in the right hand. We are the first to see the man who shot me in the right hand. We are the first to see the man who shot me in the right hand. We are the first to see the man who shot me in the right hand. We are the first to see the man who shot me in the right hand. We are the first to see the man who shot me in the right hand. We are the first to see the man who shot me in the right hand. We are the first to see the man who shot me in the right hand. It was time for this pumpkin to head to bed to save up some energy for the remaining day and a half of my quest for science of spirit at the 2007 MREA renewable energy and sustainable living fair in Custer, Wisconsin. The theme music for spirit in action is "I Have No Hands But Yours" by Carol Johnson. Thank you for listening. I welcome your comments and stories of those leading lives of spiritual fruit. Email me at helpsmeet@usa.net. May you find deep roots to support you and grow steadily toward the light. This is spirit in action. I have no hide or call for you and peace to love and serve your neighbor. Enjoying selflessness. To love and serve your neighbor. Enjoying selflessness. [Music] [MUSIC PLAYING]