Class 3: Honoring Salinger and Zinn

Class 3 notes by Carmen L.

Our third PDC class began with the Elm Dance, a moment of silence to honor people’s historian Howard Zinn, expressions of gratitude to the 5 elements (air, fire, water, earth & spirit), song and re-introductions.

We learned David Holmgren’s 12 permaculture principles, a synthesis of Mollison’s 28, by matching them to their definitions.  For the remainder of the day, we put into practice Observe and Interact (beauty is in the eye of the beholder) and Design from Patterns to Details (can’t see the wood for the trees).

Jay said that permaculture is applied nature awareness, which we should cultivate like indigenous or native people who have a deep-rooted knowledge of place through observation. Unfortunately, I might have nature deficit disorder common to urbanites like Woody Allen, who said he was at two with nature.  To help us become one with nature like naturalists, Jay encouraged us to allow space and time for core routines like sit-spot, journaling, storytelling, wandering without an agenda, childlike curiosity, etc.  Nature is sensitive so we need to be more self-aware, especially our impact on the natural environment, and walk softly on the earth.

Because animals have more direct contact with our natural world, they seem to sense danger like impending natural disasters or predators better than humans and can respond in fight-or-flight mode.  We Americans are so sheltered (wearing clothes and shoes, altering climate with heaters/air-conditioning) that we’re less attuned to our senses and we don’t encounter life-threatening dangers daily so we just don’t pay much attention to nature but seem to rely on language and technology.

During the 15-minute excursion to go outdoors to observe nature’s patterns, I also used the time to think about J.D. Salinger, who passed away on the same day as Zinn.  Like the hypersensitive Holden Caulfield of The Catcher in the Rye, I spent my adolescence observing “phony” behavior and feeling alienated.  Now that we were encouraged to practice our “innate” childlike sense of wonder, I kept visualizing Holden as a “catcher in the rye” saving innocent children from falling off a crazy cliff and being exposed to phony adulthood.  Like Holden, I’d pretend to be a deaf-mute so I wouldn’t have to have useless conversations with anybody and then I’d build a cabin near the woods but not in the woods because I’d want it to be sunny all the time.  I digress a bit, but I wanted to honor J.D. Salinger, whose writings influenced me to look at things honestly.

We returned indoors to review patterns found in nature and our own bodies, their function and where they’re found in design:  branching, radial, wave, branching tree, decentralized branching dendrites, packing/cracking, spiral, lobe and scatter/random.

During lunch break, we took a 20-minute stroll over to 100-year-old Brigid House, a 7-bedroom intentional community, for our site analysis.  We wandered the grounds noting landscape features based on David Jacke’s Scale of Permanence:  climate, landform, water, legal issues, access & circulation, vegetation & wildlife, microclimate, buildings & infrastructure, zones of use, soil, aesthetics.  Sage and Jay discussed sectors (map based on larger influences like elements of sun, fire, water, wind) & zones (map based on human energy on land to maximize efficiency), design process (inputs, outputs), and evaluation based on SWOC (Strength, Weakness, Opportunity, Challenge).

Jay discussed bird language (song, companion call, fledgling, male-to-male and alarm), reminding us that the Apache knew when a white man was approaching within two miles by observing birds.

After dinner, few of us shared learning affirmations, which were re-assigned to us as a “curious exploration” (euphemism for homework) so more of us would be prepared to share next week.  Finally, guest trainer Liz Turkel facilitated storytelling exercises (biographical, traditional, spontaneous) to demonstrate how talkers and listeners are co-creators in storytelling.

My left brain created my own curious exploration about the 5 elements: fire, earth and water elements are commonly recognized by Pagans and Chinese, but why do Pagans observe air and spirit (invisible) while Chinese observe wood and metal (visible)?

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