So, today is one of those days where I just rant. However, my rants mean something. I am not complaining to just complain. Well, maybe, but there is a deeper desire. It is one of ill-content. What comes with ill-content, is a need for change. And change is good. The desire for change is a most desirable thing. Which is why this rant has become a resounding gong in my head.
I am at Walmart. Right off the bat, I know that is where my problem lies. I am in this store that I abhorrently loathe. Why am I here? Because I am poor. Because I haven't enough money to do all my shopping locally and organically. However, today is different. I am walking down these aisles looking for food that is good for us. I am in the cereal aisle. I normally buy the same thing every week, a bag Honey nut Scooters, or a bag of Crisp Rice cereal. The equivalent of Honey nut cheerios and Rice Crispies of course. I buy them because I can get 39 ounces of cereal for about $4.70. That's pretty cheap. Today, I can't buy anything. Everything I look at seems toxic to me. I know that over half the crap in here is genetically modified in some way or another, and that just freaks me out. So I end up buying the Quaker old fashioned oats. It's what I normally buy along with the bagged cereal, but today, it is the only breakfast item I purchase. Even that makes me feel cautious. It is the healthiest product in the entire aisle. With only one ingredient, you know you are getting a quality whole food. Or do you? Is this a GMO (genetically modified organism)? Have these oats been altered?! I don't want altered oats. I want oats that my grandmother ate. I want oats that have heirloom quality. But how do I know what I am getting? There are no signs that say, "Hey, these here oats are missing part of their genetic makeup. But we added something else to it. It might make your daughters grow breasts at 8 years old, but we make one hell of a profit. " No, there are no signs. No labels. Nothing.
Does anyone else know this? Does everyone feel alright about putting all this crap into our bodies? I don't know where half this food comes from. I don't feel OK about it. I definitely feel weird about it. Weird, like science fiction weird, and I have never liked science fiction. Except Star Trek. Star Wars as well. And of course, Hitchhikers Guide...well, it's still weird. It is disconcerting. What to do... that is where I am. What do I do. What do I eat. The only thing I've eaten today has been two organic pears, and some fair trade coffee. Which isn't even organic. I can't find a bag of fair trade, organic coffee to save my life. It's either one or the other. I am about to eat two cage free eggs, but I realize that I don't even know what their standards are. I think of cage free, and I think of pasture. Even then, on the carton it says they are being fed a diet of high quality corn and soy products. The most genetically modified food out there. So, as a consumer I can't win.
If you want to know more about Genetically Modified food, please visit the following site. Read it thoroughly and act. With all the issues we are having with our food supply and the rising cost of food, it is time we rethink how we eat and what we buy. Communities must come together to form cooperative food networks so that people can eat healthy, sustainable food, and support local farmers at the same time. If my great great grandmother Ada was still here, she would wonder why we eat like we do. It would be nonsensical for her, that we were not growing and preserving our own foods. She would see all the problems we are having with ecoli and mad cow disease, and look at us as if we were idiots. Mass production of foods, factory farms where animals are fed their own by products and waste, genetically modified corn. We are idiots if we accept this as the norm. This is not normal. This is definitely weird.
www.responsibletechnology.org
9/12/07
My past home...hopeful future
Sitting in the living room of our 900 sq. ft. house, I have a 180 degree view of our property. The sun has just peaked over the horizon and a heavy fog rests upon the tall dead grasses of the fall. Naked trees, reaching skyward with their spiny arms, bask in the blue-gray tones of the morning. There is a quiet that pierces through every aspect of this place. A serenity that blankets us, as the fog blankets the earth. It is peace. To the south, the morning commute has begun. Even in this peace, I can still hear the rumbling of heavy trucks carrying goods for consumption. There are cars bustling here and there; people rushing off trying to capture the American Dream. Can they even hear this silence? Do they notice the peace that now surrounds me? As I sit here in this drafty old place, wood fire crackling, flames dancing and welcoming me this coming morn, I see luxury in this life. I see something that I believe others long for. Simplicity. Life unadorned by unwanted needs. Peace, serenity, and the ability to sit and feel not the weight of society upon ones shoulders, but the weight of the fog, creeping up towards the windows, welcoming you with silence. And a welcomed silence it is.
4/12/07
Poison in our Drinking Water?
I wrote this research paper a while back and published it on Helium.com, but I wanted to post it here for all my friends to read. Think about it. Do some research of your own.
Would you give your child rat poison? No? Well, what if you diluted it? Let’s say one drop of rat poison to a glass of water? What about one drop of rat poison to three gallons of water? Would you then let you child drink that water? Is the answer still no? My guess is that any amount of rat poison added to your drinking water would be deplorable. To many people it is, yet every day, millions of people in America are drinking essentially the same thing in hope of achieving proper oral health. People are brushing with it, and swishing it at dentist offices, in hopes of keeping their pearly white smiles. This sounds crazy doesn’t it? People don’t knowingly ingest rat poison, but every day in America, people are ingesting Fluoride. Fluoride is the same chemical that can be found in rat poison. How can this be? Fluoride is in every national brand of toothpaste on the shelves. Schools across America provide children with a “swish” of Fluoride almost monthly. We have even accepted it as an additive to not only our tap water, but we can buy it in bottled water as well. While Fluoride has been propagated as a necessary tool in the promotion of proper oral health, there are many hidden dangers associated with it.
According to the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, Fluoride is on their list as one of the many water contaminants in the United States. It is listed under inorganic chemicals along with Arsenic, Mercury, Cyanide, and Lead. As listed on the EPA’s website, the potential health effects from drinking water contaminated with Fluoride are bone disease and mottled teeth in children. The listed sources of this contamination include discharge from Aluminum and fertilizer factories, as well as an additive to drinking water to promote strong teeth. (EPA) Isn’t it strange that Fluoride is listed as a water contaminant and at the same time is purposely added to our drinking water to build strong teeth? Why is it that it is added to support strong teeth, when the possible health hazards include mottling of the teeth, or tooth decay? Bone Disease and tooth decay are not the only health hazards associated with Fluoride. Looking back at the history of Fluoride, it becomes even more questionable as to why it was ever thought of as a healthy additive in the first place, especially when there have been fatalities associated with the ingestion of it.
In 1992, in Hooper Bay Alaska, there was a problem with one of the town’s Fluoride pumps. The faulty equipment caused an abnormally high level of Fluoride to be pumped into the town’s drinking water, which resulted in the death of a 41-year-old man and illness of nearly 300 other people. While the level of Fluoride in the town’s water supply was increased greatly by the faulty equipment, “The level of dose causing illness…was 27 times lower than the dose previously reported” for causing illness. (Foulkes) This discrepancy among toxic doses is prevalent among most studies of the dangers or lack there-of, concerning Fluoride. Most governmental agencies declare Fluoride to be safe and that there is no concern regarding Fluoride. They deem it safe and a necessary additive to prevent tooth decay, despite the illnesses and deaths that are associated with it. However, there is one man that is speaking out against Fluoride.
In 1993, Dr. Robert Carton, a past President of EPA Headquarters Union in Washington D.C. filled a legal affidavit voicing his concerns about his fellow colleagues and their obvious cover-up of the dangers of Fluoride. In the affidavit, Dr. Carton explains his credentials as being an environmental scientist with the U.S. Army. He was employed by the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) from 1972 until1992. He spent approximately 15 of those years in the Office of Toxic Substances, managing risk assessments. For two years, he was responsible for writing regulations under the Federal Water Pollution Control Act. He was also program manager for compliance of new pollution sources with the National Environmental Policy Act. (Carton 1993) Carton explains in his affidavit that he has concerns regarding the “significant harm to public health from fluoridation and that it is unacceptable as a public health measure”. According to Carton, “There is evidence, ignored by the EPA…that exposure to Fluoride at 1 mg/l in drinking water over a long period of time may calcify ligaments and tendons, causing arthritic pains, and may be responsible for the alarming increase in cases of repetitive stress injury.” Carton also states that Fluoride is a known mutagenic, and that it certainly may cause cancer, but that the government continuously denies this fact regardless of the many studies that have proven it to be a mutagenic among laboratory animals. Skeletal fluorosis, Arthritis, tooth decay, cancer, and even death are associated with the ingestion of Fluoride, yet the EPA has done everything it can to cover up these facts.
In a report written by Dr. J. William Hirzy, Senior Vice-President of the National Treasury Employees Union, on why EPA Headquarters Professional Union opposes the use of Fluoride, he gives an astounding number of reasons to that exact question. According to Dr. Hirzy in a study done in 1995 on the effects of Fluoride in rats, those that were exposed before birth had a high incident of hyperactivity after birth, and it remained for the rest of their lives. It is important to note that according to the study rats are more resistant to Fluoride than humans are, and when given a relatively low dose of Fluoride, the effects were quite astounding which suggests that the effects in humans would be even greater. In the case of hyperactivity found in rats exposed to Fluoride in utero, the main reason for the dysfunction was that the Fluoride depleted certain chemicals found in the brain that form the membrane of brain cells. Dr. Hirzy reports of many other studies that suggest that Fluoride is responsible for a decrease in I.Q. levels in children as well as an early onset of sexual maturity. Hirzy also states that according to a CDC report, nearly 22% of American children have dental fluorosis (tooth decay). (Hirzy 1999) That percentage seems a little high, considering that the government adds Fluoride to our water to prevent tooth decay in our children.
While the government may never open up about all of the dangers of Fluoride, they have made it clear that too much Fluoride can indeed cause tooth decay rather than prevent it. It is also clear that too much Fluoride can cause bone disease. Both tooth decay and bone disease have been listed on the EPA’s website as side effects from Fluoride exposure, this much we know to be true. The question remains, are the possible risks, such as hyperactivity in our children, lowered I.Q., cancer, and last but certainly not least, death, enough to urge us to at least question our use of Fluoride? Our children’s health and our own are in jeopardy if we don’t open our minds and our eyes to possibilities that may not be as clear as our drinking water. We may have to look deeper into it, do a little research of our own, and find out for ourselves what the truth is. According to credible government employees, such as Dr. Carton, the dangers are big enough that it made him come forward and speak out against the very people that were employing him. We have much more to loose than Dr. Carton did when he risked loosing his job with the EPA, we have our health and that of our children’s at stake. If we refuse to look into the possible health hazards of Fluoride, we might as well give our children rat poisoning twice a day to brush with. Why not add it to our drinking water, the government obviously has no concerns about it, so why should we?
References
EPA http://www.epa.gov/safewater/contaminants/index.html
Foulkes, RG, http://www.fluoridation.com/poison
Carton, Robert 1993 http://fluoridealert.org/carton-affidavit.htm
Hirzy, J. William 1999 http://fluoridealert.org/hp-epa.htm
Would you give your child rat poison? No? Well, what if you diluted it? Let’s say one drop of rat poison to a glass of water? What about one drop of rat poison to three gallons of water? Would you then let you child drink that water? Is the answer still no? My guess is that any amount of rat poison added to your drinking water would be deplorable. To many people it is, yet every day, millions of people in America are drinking essentially the same thing in hope of achieving proper oral health. People are brushing with it, and swishing it at dentist offices, in hopes of keeping their pearly white smiles. This sounds crazy doesn’t it? People don’t knowingly ingest rat poison, but every day in America, people are ingesting Fluoride. Fluoride is the same chemical that can be found in rat poison. How can this be? Fluoride is in every national brand of toothpaste on the shelves. Schools across America provide children with a “swish” of Fluoride almost monthly. We have even accepted it as an additive to not only our tap water, but we can buy it in bottled water as well. While Fluoride has been propagated as a necessary tool in the promotion of proper oral health, there are many hidden dangers associated with it.
According to the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, Fluoride is on their list as one of the many water contaminants in the United States. It is listed under inorganic chemicals along with Arsenic, Mercury, Cyanide, and Lead. As listed on the EPA’s website, the potential health effects from drinking water contaminated with Fluoride are bone disease and mottled teeth in children. The listed sources of this contamination include discharge from Aluminum and fertilizer factories, as well as an additive to drinking water to promote strong teeth. (EPA) Isn’t it strange that Fluoride is listed as a water contaminant and at the same time is purposely added to our drinking water to build strong teeth? Why is it that it is added to support strong teeth, when the possible health hazards include mottling of the teeth, or tooth decay? Bone Disease and tooth decay are not the only health hazards associated with Fluoride. Looking back at the history of Fluoride, it becomes even more questionable as to why it was ever thought of as a healthy additive in the first place, especially when there have been fatalities associated with the ingestion of it.
In 1992, in Hooper Bay Alaska, there was a problem with one of the town’s Fluoride pumps. The faulty equipment caused an abnormally high level of Fluoride to be pumped into the town’s drinking water, which resulted in the death of a 41-year-old man and illness of nearly 300 other people. While the level of Fluoride in the town’s water supply was increased greatly by the faulty equipment, “The level of dose causing illness…was 27 times lower than the dose previously reported” for causing illness. (Foulkes) This discrepancy among toxic doses is prevalent among most studies of the dangers or lack there-of, concerning Fluoride. Most governmental agencies declare Fluoride to be safe and that there is no concern regarding Fluoride. They deem it safe and a necessary additive to prevent tooth decay, despite the illnesses and deaths that are associated with it. However, there is one man that is speaking out against Fluoride.
In 1993, Dr. Robert Carton, a past President of EPA Headquarters Union in Washington D.C. filled a legal affidavit voicing his concerns about his fellow colleagues and their obvious cover-up of the dangers of Fluoride. In the affidavit, Dr. Carton explains his credentials as being an environmental scientist with the U.S. Army. He was employed by the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) from 1972 until1992. He spent approximately 15 of those years in the Office of Toxic Substances, managing risk assessments. For two years, he was responsible for writing regulations under the Federal Water Pollution Control Act. He was also program manager for compliance of new pollution sources with the National Environmental Policy Act. (Carton 1993) Carton explains in his affidavit that he has concerns regarding the “significant harm to public health from fluoridation and that it is unacceptable as a public health measure”. According to Carton, “There is evidence, ignored by the EPA…that exposure to Fluoride at 1 mg/l in drinking water over a long period of time may calcify ligaments and tendons, causing arthritic pains, and may be responsible for the alarming increase in cases of repetitive stress injury.” Carton also states that Fluoride is a known mutagenic, and that it certainly may cause cancer, but that the government continuously denies this fact regardless of the many studies that have proven it to be a mutagenic among laboratory animals. Skeletal fluorosis, Arthritis, tooth decay, cancer, and even death are associated with the ingestion of Fluoride, yet the EPA has done everything it can to cover up these facts.
In a report written by Dr. J. William Hirzy, Senior Vice-President of the National Treasury Employees Union, on why EPA Headquarters Professional Union opposes the use of Fluoride, he gives an astounding number of reasons to that exact question. According to Dr. Hirzy in a study done in 1995 on the effects of Fluoride in rats, those that were exposed before birth had a high incident of hyperactivity after birth, and it remained for the rest of their lives. It is important to note that according to the study rats are more resistant to Fluoride than humans are, and when given a relatively low dose of Fluoride, the effects were quite astounding which suggests that the effects in humans would be even greater. In the case of hyperactivity found in rats exposed to Fluoride in utero, the main reason for the dysfunction was that the Fluoride depleted certain chemicals found in the brain that form the membrane of brain cells. Dr. Hirzy reports of many other studies that suggest that Fluoride is responsible for a decrease in I.Q. levels in children as well as an early onset of sexual maturity. Hirzy also states that according to a CDC report, nearly 22% of American children have dental fluorosis (tooth decay). (Hirzy 1999) That percentage seems a little high, considering that the government adds Fluoride to our water to prevent tooth decay in our children.
While the government may never open up about all of the dangers of Fluoride, they have made it clear that too much Fluoride can indeed cause tooth decay rather than prevent it. It is also clear that too much Fluoride can cause bone disease. Both tooth decay and bone disease have been listed on the EPA’s website as side effects from Fluoride exposure, this much we know to be true. The question remains, are the possible risks, such as hyperactivity in our children, lowered I.Q., cancer, and last but certainly not least, death, enough to urge us to at least question our use of Fluoride? Our children’s health and our own are in jeopardy if we don’t open our minds and our eyes to possibilities that may not be as clear as our drinking water. We may have to look deeper into it, do a little research of our own, and find out for ourselves what the truth is. According to credible government employees, such as Dr. Carton, the dangers are big enough that it made him come forward and speak out against the very people that were employing him. We have much more to loose than Dr. Carton did when he risked loosing his job with the EPA, we have our health and that of our children’s at stake. If we refuse to look into the possible health hazards of Fluoride, we might as well give our children rat poisoning twice a day to brush with. Why not add it to our drinking water, the government obviously has no concerns about it, so why should we?
References
EPA http://www.epa.gov/safewater/contaminants/index.html
Foulkes, RG, http://www.fluoridation.com/poison
Carton, Robert 1993 http://fluoridealert.org/carton-affidavit.htm
Hirzy, J. William 1999 http://fluoridealert.org/hp-epa.htm
12/22/06
Silent Teacher
My grandfather died this month after his yearlong battle with cancer. I've never been this close to death before. I lost the majority of my grandparents before I was 13, and went to about a million funerals, but this is the first time I have actually watched someone die. It was hard to see. I watched this man who influenced me in so many ways, waste away from a healthy and active man to a shadow of a person.
I saw him the week before he died and I tried to be strong, but I couldn't. I cried right in front of him. The week before I was fine. When I went to visit, he was in good spirits, and laughing. He told me how much he loved me and I said the same. I told him that the summers I spent with him were the best of my life. We reminisced about rock hunting on the beaches of Petoskey. We would fill five gallon buckets with rocks trying to find the most unusual and beautiful ones. We would eventually find a few Petoskey stones, and he'd haul those buckets up the hill to the car and we'd take them back to his house. I'd sit in the grass and go through them all. I would find the ones that I thought were worthy and take them back home with me and put them in my rock polisher. He was always so excited to see the finished product.
Three years ago my grandfather and grandmother became to old to live in their house, so we all went up there for the weekend to have an estate sale. In the garage I found our buckets of rocks. They were still sitting there. I roamed the property wandering through his beautiful gardens, and watched my children climb the trees that were too small for me to climb as a little girl. Everything had changed, but everything was still the same. I could see my grandfather setting up the croquet set in the front yard under the big maple trees. We'd play for hours and after we'd sit in the hammock and watch the birds. He taught me what the names of all the birds were, and what they liked to eat. I listened to them sing, and learned to identify their individual songs. Cardinals were always the easiest. But, those three years ago, the sound of their song seemed distant. The colors of the flowers were not as bright and his presence had already lifted from that place.
My brother and I took my kids to Horton Bay to swim. It was Labor day and the water was as warm as it was in the middle of July. I sat on the dock, and thought of the stories my dad told me about his grandfather living there. Horton Bay was a little village with a general store and a church. The church I went to all those summers I stayed with my grandparents. My fathers grandfather was friends with Earnest Hemingway, who had a little place in Horton Bay. My great grandfather and Hemingway would sit on a dock and fish. And as I sat on that dock, I imagined them sitting there debating religion and politics as they often did. My great grandfather was a preacher, and Hemingway had his own ideas about religion, that often didn't sit well with his friend the preacher. But they found a friendship on that dock, despite the religious divide between them.
December ninth I sat in that church in Horton Bay and said goodbye to my grandfather. I listened to his pastor talk about what a great person he was. What a great witness to Christianity he was. How he touched the lives of all the people he came in contact with. But I what I remember about him was the fact that he was a silent man. He spoke with gestures, and kindness. And although he had the strongest faith of anyone I'd met, he never pushed it on anyone. His testimony lay in acts and service, and through those acts of selfless service, he spoke of how it was meant to be, to have God in your heart.
I could see God all around me that Labor Day weekend as I wandered through his gardens. I could see how he nurtured all of the natural gifts that God gives us. I could feel his love for all things, both great and small, and in that garden I found solace for my heartache, for a life that was only lingering, and would leave in only three short years.
I think I said my goodbyes to him that weekend, and at that point, I distanced myself from his life. If I would have known how short those three years were going to be, I would have been present more in his life.
I learned about regret this year. I learned that I don't ever want to have that feeling again, and I learned that it is a hard thing to let go of; To forgive yourself for. I learned to see life as a fragile thing. A delicate flower, that at any moment could wilt, lose it's beauty and fragrance. But I also learned that even though my grandfather was dying, his passion and love were stronger than death. I could feel them in his presence. I could see life in his eyes, despite the lack of it in his body. I realized that it was God's presence in him that I was seeing. It was God waiting to take his child home. It was a proud father. Proud of his creation in this man. It was God's manifest love. It was in that moment that I realized that I still have so much more to learn from my grandfather. And he may never stop teaching me. What an amazing teacher he was. He taught me all these things that I hold so dear to my heart, without saying a word.
I saw him the week before he died and I tried to be strong, but I couldn't. I cried right in front of him. The week before I was fine. When I went to visit, he was in good spirits, and laughing. He told me how much he loved me and I said the same. I told him that the summers I spent with him were the best of my life. We reminisced about rock hunting on the beaches of Petoskey. We would fill five gallon buckets with rocks trying to find the most unusual and beautiful ones. We would eventually find a few Petoskey stones, and he'd haul those buckets up the hill to the car and we'd take them back to his house. I'd sit in the grass and go through them all. I would find the ones that I thought were worthy and take them back home with me and put them in my rock polisher. He was always so excited to see the finished product.
Three years ago my grandfather and grandmother became to old to live in their house, so we all went up there for the weekend to have an estate sale. In the garage I found our buckets of rocks. They were still sitting there. I roamed the property wandering through his beautiful gardens, and watched my children climb the trees that were too small for me to climb as a little girl. Everything had changed, but everything was still the same. I could see my grandfather setting up the croquet set in the front yard under the big maple trees. We'd play for hours and after we'd sit in the hammock and watch the birds. He taught me what the names of all the birds were, and what they liked to eat. I listened to them sing, and learned to identify their individual songs. Cardinals were always the easiest. But, those three years ago, the sound of their song seemed distant. The colors of the flowers were not as bright and his presence had already lifted from that place.
My brother and I took my kids to Horton Bay to swim. It was Labor day and the water was as warm as it was in the middle of July. I sat on the dock, and thought of the stories my dad told me about his grandfather living there. Horton Bay was a little village with a general store and a church. The church I went to all those summers I stayed with my grandparents. My fathers grandfather was friends with Earnest Hemingway, who had a little place in Horton Bay. My great grandfather and Hemingway would sit on a dock and fish. And as I sat on that dock, I imagined them sitting there debating religion and politics as they often did. My great grandfather was a preacher, and Hemingway had his own ideas about religion, that often didn't sit well with his friend the preacher. But they found a friendship on that dock, despite the religious divide between them.
December ninth I sat in that church in Horton Bay and said goodbye to my grandfather. I listened to his pastor talk about what a great person he was. What a great witness to Christianity he was. How he touched the lives of all the people he came in contact with. But I what I remember about him was the fact that he was a silent man. He spoke with gestures, and kindness. And although he had the strongest faith of anyone I'd met, he never pushed it on anyone. His testimony lay in acts and service, and through those acts of selfless service, he spoke of how it was meant to be, to have God in your heart.
I could see God all around me that Labor Day weekend as I wandered through his gardens. I could see how he nurtured all of the natural gifts that God gives us. I could feel his love for all things, both great and small, and in that garden I found solace for my heartache, for a life that was only lingering, and would leave in only three short years.
I think I said my goodbyes to him that weekend, and at that point, I distanced myself from his life. If I would have known how short those three years were going to be, I would have been present more in his life.
I learned about regret this year. I learned that I don't ever want to have that feeling again, and I learned that it is a hard thing to let go of; To forgive yourself for. I learned to see life as a fragile thing. A delicate flower, that at any moment could wilt, lose it's beauty and fragrance. But I also learned that even though my grandfather was dying, his passion and love were stronger than death. I could feel them in his presence. I could see life in his eyes, despite the lack of it in his body. I realized that it was God's presence in him that I was seeing. It was God waiting to take his child home. It was a proud father. Proud of his creation in this man. It was God's manifest love. It was in that moment that I realized that I still have so much more to learn from my grandfather. And he may never stop teaching me. What an amazing teacher he was. He taught me all these things that I hold so dear to my heart, without saying a word.
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