Field Season Report Completed

Today I received the preliminary report that Sarah wrote based on my songbird research conducted this summer.  To say the least, it is a great feeling to see my hard work translated into a cohesive report that will hopefully help her obtain her master's degree and, fingers crossed everyone, get the National Parks in the Mid-West more money for conservation efforts.  Attached is the report if anyone is interested (I am not promising anything too exciting for non-birders but I'm just really proud of myself and my research team!)....Actually I can't figure out how to attach it and I have class soon!  I will return.......

New Years Eve, Suenos, Mel Gibson, and John Kerry...on a fine Yom Kippur Day

Let's have a New Years Eve Party for everyone that will be in Oregon! I think I will be in town from like Dec. 20-Jan. 4.

I did peyote with Marleta and Dana in my dream last night, only they called it "coyote." It was awesome. I saw a diner drive down Main St. in Northampton. That dream was so wild. The New York Times had an editorial about Willamette and how WU students' ironic sense of humor has become dangerous, and there was a picture of Kaneko with broken windows and flames. Also, I tried to get a deer to lick my hand at Sam's grandparents' estate, but Sam's grandpa yelled at me and told me that I could only pet the deer. The FBI was looking for Sam throughout the whole dream, which I believe had something to do with the coyote. It may have just been that he thought the FBI was looking for him though.

Oh, I had another dream the other night that might be more meaningful than last night's dream. I was in the mountains of France, and I realized that the Tour de France was about to start at the exact place where I was standing, and I just happened to have my bike. I thought that I might as well join in the race as I was already there, but I was apprehensive since I knew the ride might be beyond me. But, when the race started, I just joined right in. The beginning of the ride was all downhill and all I needed to do was coast. The whole time I was going down this steep hill though, I was getting more and more aware of the fact that I might not be able to continue the ride once it got harder. At the same time, I felt like I had no time to think about my decision, because pretty soon I would be so far down this steep hill that I could not ride back up. The whole dream was a perfect analogy for what I'm feeling in my classes right now. I feel like I just kind of came here because the opportunity presented itself, and it sounded cool. Now, I am sort of coasting through these beginning weeks, but we are just now getting into starting these work-intensive semester long research projects in my two women and gender study classes, and I'm going to need to start peddling faster and harder than I ever have. I just hope I have it in me.

On another note, Mel Gibson came to Northampton to film part of his new movie yesterday. I believe the entirety of the scene was him driving down Main Street and throwing up out of his car. (This part is no longer my dream. It's just ridiculous.)

Also, I am eating dinner with John Kerry and the Smith Dems tonight!

What it is.

Hey yall. Sorry my voice on this blog has been muted for quite some time. Life's been crazy busy for this ole bo'. Let me start by quickly rewinding to August. It was a busy, difficult time for me.

Earlier in the summer, I scheduled a trip home to MN to visit family and friends (also help facilitate my 5 year class reunion... oooold man winter here...) Due to this vacation, my bosses needed me to work more than the usualy 45-50 hours I put in... So that was stressful. On top of that, I had to say good bye to our good friend Sarah, which has been quite a challenge for me to deal with / overcome to say the least. During the middle of this already crazy month, Tom Salina invited me to move into a house he was looking to lease... this added another thing to my platter. Our future / potential landlord was overwhelmingly controlling, intense and possibly an outright liar, so this made for a very stressful decision for me to move into the house (HOWEVER, the house is effing badass... covered front porch w/ rocking chairs, hot tub, three car garage converted into a music grotto)

Anyway, that was the end of August for me... MINNESOTA was amazing. It was my first time back to my roots for the whole year, and it was good to be back (fair chance I may end up there). The highlight of my trip was seeing Cloud Cult perform twice (once at the MN State fair opening for gnarls barkley, the other time at 3am at Minnesota Orchestra Hall for a free performance, it was as epic as it sounds).

Class reunion was pretty good. Had a turnout of about 30-40 people of about 300 in my class... it is what it is.

Lately, the presidential election has dominated the majority of my thoughts... I am very concerned at how far McCain's sharade of having such shallow judgment in choosing his running mate.

I have smelled the roses and no longer have a blank-check infatuation with Obama... But I am still volunteering on his behalf because I honestly think he is what our country needs.

Recently I attended a meeting in Salem dedicated to opening a dialogue about the future of the city, and bringing together people who are interested and invested in making the city a better place. At this meeting, I connected with Ross Swartzendrubber, the man who organized last year's Mix-N-Mash festival where some of us were able to catch Plants (and Fun-House Strippers etc.) It was a damn good time.

It is looking like a really good time, happening this weekend. I know this is abrupt but I totally just ran out of steam. The text is changing colors before my eyes like a rainbow. These eyes want to take a break and close for a while. I will finish this latero. -bo

Home Sweet Home

friends!
It has been far too long since I've been in contact with you all, even the few of you whom I have actually spoken to since leaving the country. If you're out of the loop, I am studying abroad in Edinburgh, my home country, the capitol of the great nation-to-be of Scotland.
My first week (or two... it all sort of blurred together) was a very stereotypical study abroad experience. The one we've all seen in facebook albums, characterized by photo ops with pints, countless consecutive 3am nights, and (perhaps most sadly) safe relationships with fellow Americans. About two weeks into my program, I found myself playing flipcup with my fellow Americans, and a brief spell of depression set in and brought me back to earth. Since then I've been spending a lot more time reading, meeting locals, getting around the city and getting OUT of the city. I am still enjoying the alcoculture that envelopes this country, but in a more controlled manner.
I've been on a few fantastic day trips, but to describe them all would take too much precious time, so I'm including a link to (yet another) photobucket album. Read the captions to get a vague idea of what I've been up to. There is, however, one trip I want to write about, so bear with me. Yesterday I went to St Andrews with three of my classmates on little more than a whim. We bought our train tickets a day ahead of time, but other than that had no plans. We got of the train bright and early at about 8am, wandered around the beach (check them pics), then headed over to the Old Course. We had heard there was a tournament going on, and we figured it was some amateur shit, a prediction only reinforced by the fact that the course was totally open and didn't even have any sort of security check. We walked up to the first hole anyway and watched a group tee off... and the announcer said, "teeing off, Samuel L Jackson." I was in such shock that I really thought it must have been some pro with the same name, but it was motherucking legit Samuel L Jackson. Talk about good timing... Hugh Grant was also there, as well as Jonh O'Hurley, Huey Lewis, Luke Wilson, Wladimir Klischko and a ton of pros including Ernie Els and Justin Rose. craaazy. The rest of the day was fantastic, high points including scaling a castle wall to avoid paying admission and getting tons of free indian food courtesy of my aunt and uncle, but I won't bore y'all.
Aside from that the most exciting moment of this journey was academic. Two nights ago I found out the name of the Member of Scottish Parliament (MSP) with whom I will be interning. His name is Rob Gibson, of the Scottish National Party (SNP - a fairly liberal party with strong desire for independence). I was hoping for a Green, and they aren't taking any interns this semester, but Rob is a fantastic alternative. He's the co-chair of the committee on Economy, ENERGY and Tourism, and a member of the committee on Transport, Inrastructure and CLIMATE CHANGE. A major part of my internship is a massive research project and I think Robs interests and mine will mesh well. Furthermore, he is a former moustache competition runner up, and a representative from the highlands/islands region, so he will probably appreciate my beard and perhaps hook me up with a free trip up north. I meet him Thursday, the day after my last day of class.
This coming week is the last of formal education I will go through for about a year, as I am most likely traveling through the spring. I've been taking classes at the Institute of Governance at the University of Edinburgh, learning all about the UK Government and the newly devolved Scottish http://www.blogger.com/img/gl.link.gifParliament. I'll spare the gory details, but suffice it to say I'm quite fascinated with this political environment, despite the fact that it has inevitably distanced me from America at such a pivotal time in our history. I suppose all of you that are abroad may understand how I feel, wishing to be immersed in (or at least present for) what may likely be the most important election, in the midst of what may prove to be the most disastrous economic situation, of our generation. And to you kids still in the states - please, please vote!


anyway, here are some pictures

One moment at a Time

Before traveling to Mexico I never had a huge urge to travel abroad. After spending 5 weeks in Oaxaca, my mind has been completely changed. I am captivated and in love with this city and this culture. The way of life here has a tranquility that reminds me of my time spent on the farm this summer. Nothing is rushed. People hang out in the streets or plazas for hours, talking or just watching people walk by.

Knowing that my time here is limited, I have tried to live everyday to the greatest extent as possible. There is no barrier, no fear of talking to strangers, singing loudly in a bar, staying out until 6 in the morning. Life is too valuable, too beautiful. Probably taking in/learning about a culture through the eyes of those I meet has been the most exciting part of being here. The people here have a love of their country that is truly inspiring. Mexico's history is one of mixing cultures that has created the vibrant Mexican culture that manifests itself in the museums, art, architecture of this city. That's not to say Mexico does not have a tremendous amount of social inqualities and problems, but there is a sense of patria here that I have never encountered in the United States.

I am encouraged by the experiences everyone is having across the globe. How marvelous the world is. Everyday I am blown away when I think about how many people live in this world, and how many people I have yet to meet.

much love and abrazos from Mexico,
Katy

Oh, and the food here is freakin amazing!

hope, surprise, and friendship

these three words were the summary of my first class on 'policy and the environment.' My teacher, a old compenero, (who does not believe in global warming) has lived with the Zapatistas, defended their rights, critisised our ever advancing global economic systems, and challenges me to understand what is reality and what is an abstraction in my life. hope, surprise, and friendship. here, my friends, is to the 21st century.

i am saturated in an environment of both simple and complex thought. i am steadily learning to think with my own brain, to give birth the thought that lives deep within an unknown area of myself. not my brain, but my soul. to expel my empathy, to learn and to express what is true to me.

my school writings are reflective of my attempts to disregard all hesitation. To write from a pure and honest state of existence, bare and open to criticism. I am humbled daily by the words of my fellows, my teachers, the strangers on the street. I am loving, the beauty of the earth, the pain of my mistakes, the reality of collective thought, the love that exists from all of you, created and fragile and that which travels with me. i am so accompanied by your thoughts that you have shared with me. i feel that you, my friends, are with me, in me, conversing with me daily. i miss you so very much.

i feel like i have learned a lot of things in the past two weeks, in this, probable most academic environment i have lived. in it, we are trying to be intellectuals. we are, for the most part, serious, thinkers, and critics. perhaps the most important thought to fill me, so far, is that answers are no answer. i plan to live my questions and indeed to continue asking them. maybe, 'one day, without even noticing it, i will live into my answers.'

my friends, i love you, god bless, and i love you
timm

"we want you to be for us, like the shade of the tree"

A Thumbnail Sketch of My Brain

My love affair began in 2005 when I finished high school and moved to Montpelier, Vermont to serve as an Americorps member. I swear, love was literally in the air. The green rolling hills that turn bright orange and red before being overtaken by sheets of white; the small towns that have one post office, one town hall, and eleven beautiful old churches; and the multitude of cows that seemingly outnumber humans at a ratio of 10 to 1 make New England my personal utopia. Although the Pioneer Valley of Western Mass has its own personality distinct from the rest of the Northeast, the land has nevertheless renewed my deep-seated passion for rural New England.

The Five College Consortium (Smith, Mt. Holyoke, UMass, Hampshire, and Amherst) is situated in the Pioneer Valley. The Valley is essentially a vast area of farmland dotted with small towns, which are populated by back-to-the-landers and participants in the Five College Consortium. Intellectual discourse permeates every physical and abstract space here with specific attention paid to food politics, globalization, and environmentalism. Unfortunately, broad focus on national and global systems sometimes overshadows localized issues of homelessness and racism, and those who do not have the privilege to climb the ivory tower are left disillusioned by the so-called progressives.

I digress. I am not sure how I got off on that tangent when I wanted to talk about my intense love for this land. I guess the truth is that I am aware that this region is not everyone's utopia and therefore cannot truly be a utopia. I have been meeting with community organizers in town who advocate for the homeless population here, and they have uncovered for me some important narratives that have been previously pushed under the rug. I am also enrolled in a community based research class that applies theories of globalization, global land politics, and objectives of transnational feminist movements to a very small farmer's market, which is located in a low income neighborhood 45 minutes south of here. The professor is incredible and the course coincides perfectly with everything that I want to be doing, but I still cannot help feeling that the process of fitting a localized movement into big theories of global systems can only result in a contrived product of intellectual masturbation. In the professor's defense, she is conscious of all inherent power dynamics and possible disconnects that may be a part of this research, and she leads clear discussions about the ways in which we can navigate these issues so as to make our work useful to the community.

While I am on the subject of classes, I want to briefly mention my other three classes. I am taking micro-econ, which is pretty self-explanatory. The timing for taking an econ course could not have been better since my professor will spend entire class periods lecturing on current events. I actually feel like I have some vague idea of what is going down on Wall Street. I am also taking a seminar with seven other students, which meets once a week and is primarily based in outside research. The topic for this class is "Women in World War I." We are specifically studying the Smith College Relief Unit, which was a group of 47 Smith alums who made up the first women's relief unit from the US to go into Europe at the end of WWI. This course is very cool, because we are doing research in the archives, which I have never done before, and we will be learning more about the school's history. My final class is a class about Zionism and Israel. The topic is cool, and the professor is very smart, but I think she is having a hard time teaching to a group of students who are new to the topic. I have recently realized how difficult it is to study politics and government of a region without first studying history.

Incidentally (completely), my bike and I are developing quite the bond. Yesterday, I rode down the bike trail from Northampton to Hadley, where Tyler lives, and then we rode together to Amherst. The bike trail is incredible. It is a converted railroad track, so there are no cars, it is almost completely flat, and the entire route is shaded by big trees. Just past the rows of trees are endless acres of small farms. At one point, the bike path intersects with the Connecticut River, and the trail continues onto an old steel bridge that offers beautiful views of the river below. Tyler and I wound up staying later than I expected at Amherst, because we were invited by a high school friend of mine to eat at the Amherst dining hall. So, we wound up riding home in complete darkness (with the exception of Tyler's bike light). That ride was amazing. We saw one other person for the entire 8-9 mile ride. The cool night air was so refreshing, and our leisurely pace gave me some time to relax before facing my ever-accumulating list of homework assignments.

I know that this blog entry is very scattered, but if I tried to structure my thoughts into any kind of linear form, I would never finish this post. I have way too much on my mind, and I want to write about everything.

Thank you to everyone who has been posting recently. Keep it up. Hales, I forgot to mention how much I laughed when you reminded us of the hula hoop night. That was classic.

Oh yea! Tyler and I introduced BGB to Smith College on Thursday night. I have to say that the reception was lukewarm, but I got into it...

Peace to the world,

Sars