Arthur was making a sign. It said Bikes Washed…Good as New, 25 cents.
    “There is no soap or Brillo,” said Violet. “We have to buy some.”
    Arthur put his money in a bag and they went to the store.
                                            from Arthur’s Funny Money
                                  written and illustrated by Lillian Hoban
                                                       Harper & Row, 1981

    My grandpa (Mom’s dad) had a banker’s set that my brother and sister and I played with when we visited. It was hinged metal and folded out to a three-sided “banker’s window.” A drawer was full of play money, and we’d take turns counting and sorting the coins and bills. Sometimes we’d pretend to buy stuff from each other. 
    Grandpa taught us how to save money. He taught me about interest, too, the money the bank paid me for letting them use the birthday and Chanukah gifts I added to my account. I was little, and I didn’t get how they used it. Giving my money to the bank so someone else could buy a house or a car didn’t make sense to my six-year-old brain. Grandpa never got into the part of the interest equation where the house-buyer or car-buyer had to pay the bank for using its money, which when you think about it could have been mine.
    And when he convinced me to put my collection of silver dollars into my bank account, I did it. I gave my ten silver dollars to the bank teller. He stamped my book with the amount of the deposit. I’m still sad that when I wanted them back, well, let’s just say I learned a little about how you don’t get back the exact same money you put in. I still had ten dollars, but I never saw those beautiful, silver women in their flowy dresses again.
    I like the feel of cash in my wallet and the heft of a pocket full of coins. It is real, solid, tangible. My husband likes to buy everything with his credit card. When he gets his statement, he pays in one fell swoop. Everything’s in one place. One payment and he’s done. 
    When I buy new shoes or have lunch with a friend or a get my car washed, I like to pay with cash. I feel in control. 
     An amusement part a couple of hours drive from my house announced that beginning this season it will no longer take cash. All purchases: parking; rides; food; are paid by credit card or debit card. When your credit card bill comes, you’ll be days or weeks away from the amusement park experience. All you’ll have left are your memories. So, maybe it’s the memories that we are really buying when we spend money to go to a baseball game or a concert or an amusement park.  That’s pretty nice, actually. 
    Cashless venues are becoming more common.
    It’s more convenient, I agree. But most people who rely solely on their credit or debit card spend more than they would if they spent cash. Turns out, a lot more. According to shiftprocessing.com consumers spend 83% more on credit cards than they do with cash. The average credit or debit card purchase is at $112, while the average cash purchase is just $22. Factor in, though, that most people spend cash on small purchases while most large-ticket items go straight to a credit card. 
    Spending cash is final. No debt, no interest accumulation, no paybacks. Spending cash might be safer than using credit, too. In 2018, the identity of 14.4 million Americans was stolen. Stealing credit card information is the way most of this happens.            
    And what about all the people who don’t have access to a bank?
    The latest FDIC (Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation) statistics (2019) show 6.5 percent of U.S. households did not have a checking or savings account. In order to access credit, they need to use an alternate source like payday loans, check cashing services, money orders, pawn shop loans, or borrowing from friends or family. Most of these options come with a heavy interest cost. So while using cash instead of using credit usually means spending less overall, some people just don’t have enough cash. That’s a subject I’ll have to save for another time.
    Now there’s a new way to pay. Actually, it’s not so new. people started talking about cryptocurrency on the internet in 2008. In August, the name bitcoin.com was registered online. Bitcoin’s mission is to create more economic freedom in the world by providing choices regarding a one’s own personal resources. Bitcoin’s complete Mission Statement is here. 
    Enter Satoshi Nakamoto. Maybe a single person or maybe a small group of people, no one knows for sure, Satoshi Nakamoto circulated a white paper (an in-depth report that explains a complicated topic and provides a solution) in 2008, to describe the powerful banks and banking institutions and the public’s distrust of them during the financial crisis. 
    Instead of depending on a bank or lending institution, transactions can use cryptographic proof to verify the movement of money from one person to a corporation like Amazon or a seller on Ebay or Etsy without using a bank or third party as an intermediary. So no check to write. No debit card amount to keep track of. No need to pay off credit card debt.
    “Bitcoin was created so people don't have to rely on government or financial institutions to make financial transactions.” (usnews.com Feb. 4, 2022)
    But cryptocurrency itself is complicated. And extremely volatile, worth thousands of dollars one week, and crashes to almost nothing the next. It’s almost impossible to know how much you have. 
    So, while I don’t have those beautiful, silver women in their flowy gowns in a tangible form anymore, I keep my checkbook balanced and try hard to stay within my means.
                             -—stay curious! (and responsibly generous)

Come Mr. Tally Man
Tally me bananas
Daylight come an’ me wan’ go home.
                                                                    “Day O” 
   from The 2nd Raffi songbook : 42 songs from Raffi's albums 
                           piano arrangements by Catherine Ambrose 
                            design and illustration by Joyce Yamamoto
                                                  Crown Publishers, 1986
     Also watch live performances on YouTube (if you love Raffi)

    Ever since my mom fed me solid food, bananas were on my rejection list. I spit them out every time. There’s not much that I hate, especially when it comes to food, but bananas—yuck! I don’t like the smell, the texture, or mostly the taste, but I love the color. All my grandkids think this is the funniest thing! How can yellow be my favorite color when I hate bananas? They’re yellow! I don’t know, is the answer they always get.    
    My oldest grandson’s favorite color is green. He loves everything green except green beans, okra, spinach, pretty much all the green vegetables.     
     When he was really young, maybe 5 or 6, I had an idea. I told him I’d take a very small bite of a banana if he’d try a green bean. He ate his green bean and waited patiently for me to live up to my end of the bargain. Boy, was that hard. The smell. The squishy-ness. The awful anticipation. 
    I took the smallest nibble I could get away with. YUCK! It was the first time in my life (and the last!) that I actually swallowed a banana, a microscopic bit to be sure, but still.
    So why should I care that bananas might go extinct? 
    The demise of the banana would effect the economies of some of the world’s poorest countries. Colombia, Ecuador, Costa Rica, and Guatemala all depend heavily on their exports of bananas. For export, these countries and virtually all other exporters grow the Cavendish variety exclusively. It is the only kind you find at the grocery store. 
    But that was not always true. Before the Cavendish replaced it, most of the banana exports were the Gros Michel variety. Most people thought the Gros Michel was tastier than the Cavendish. It was definately more difficult to bruise. But in the 1950s, a strain of banana wilt hit the crop so hard that a banana emergency was announced. The Gros Michel variety was declared commercially extinct in 1965. Commercial extinction is when a particular species is so depleted that it is no longer profitable to harvest. 
    The fuel for the helicopters and fixed-wing planes used to spray fungicide and the fungicide itself harm our environment. Pulling off the affected leaves and burning them can (and does sometimes) promote  fungal spread by sending airborne some particles that find their way to unaffected areas. The disease that started in Central America quickly spread to most of the world’s commercial banana plantations. There was no choice but to destroy whole plantations.
    And so the replacement. Cavendish bananas at first seemed resistant to the fungus that wiped out Gros Michel. But now the Cavendish banana is the only species currently being produced commercially, and now it is threatened by a different strain of the same fungus, Panama Black Sigatoka, that thrives in hot, humid conditions. 
    Bananas are the most popular fruit in the world and rank 4th in commodity exports after rice, wheat, and milk. World banana trade totals $2.5 billion annually. An acre of land on a banana plantation can yield 30,000 pounds (15 tons) of bananas per year. With over 1,000 types of bananas, the global market is made up of Cavendishes, exclusively. Cavendish bananas are clones. They are genetically identical. New banana plants are cultivated from an existing root or propagated from a “pup,” a small shoot near the bottom of the plant. They don’t have seeds. 
    Wild bananas *do* have seeds. Black, inedible, unappetizing seeds. Here’s the inside of a typical wild banana. (Scroll about 1/2 way down)   
    Countries that grow Cavendish for export grow some of the other varieties for consumption at home. Some are too fragile to ship. Others ripen too fast to survive the journey. 
    Research scientists are working on a grafting technique that could save the Cavendish. Banana trees lack an internal tissue called the vascular cambium. It is this tissue, from two different plants, that fuse together to propagate a new plant. Now scientists are doing a work-around by grafting the seeds and roots of a banana plant instead for the propagation. If it proves successful, a fungus-resistant banana could be in our, well make that your, future.
    My family likes bananas. When the kids come to visit, I buy bananas for them to snack on or add to their oatmeal. They like banana pancakes, but that’s a step too far for me. Most of the time, one or two bananas are leftover. I peel them and stick them in the freezer till I have enough for banana bread. Here’s the banana bread recipe from my old Settlement Cookbook. (Simon and Schuster, 1965)
    (Almost) everyone loves it! We mark up our recipes. This one has a happy face, a star, and “yum!” next to it.

BANANA BREAD
2 cups sifted flour (I have never sifted flour. The recipe is fine with
          flour straight from the bag.)
2 teaspoons baking powder
1/2 teaspoon baking soda
1/2 teaspoon salt
1/4 cup butter (I only ever use real butter.)
1/2 cup sugar
2 eggs
2 medium ripe bananas (if you use them from your freezer, let them
          thaw first. Use the liquid.)
1/2 cup sour milk or buttermilk (I use what I have, usually almond milk and add 1/2 teaspoon vinegar or lemon juice.)
    Sift flour, baking powder, soda, and salt. Set aside. Cream butter and sugar. Add eggs, mashed bananas, and milk. Gradually add flour mixture to dry ingredients. When well blended, pour into a greased loaf pan. Bake 350 F for 1 hour. Toothpick or butter knife will come out clean when it’s done. May be doubled. 
                            -—stay curious! (and try something new)

At night, of course the dark went out and spread itself against the doors and windows of Lazlo’s house. … But in the morning, the dark would be back in the basement where it belonged. … and without the dark, everything would be light, and you would never know if you needed a lightbulb.
                                                       from The Dark
                                         written by Lemony Snicket
                                            illustrated by Jon Klassen
                                             Little, Brown & Co., 2013
   
    I usually wake up before the sun. I can use the bathroom, turn on my coffee pot, feed the cats, and find my way to my reading chair before I turn on a light. If I’m lucky enough to have a book downloaded on my Libby app, I can read on my phone or iPad and not turn a light on all morning.
    It’s not that I have anything against electricity or that I prefer the dark. Even though he did not act alone, Thomas Edison was really onto something when he invented the lightbulb. Roads and stores, barbershops, playgrounds, and sidewalks are safer if we can avoid trippers and other hazards as we move through our day. 
    But, let’s step back into history. Remember that kite and key experiment we all learned about in elementary school? Well, turns out Benjamin Franklin didn’t really discover electricity after all. According to an article on the Franklin Institute’s website, people were aware of electricity for thousands of years before that famous experiment. What Ben Franklin (and his son) proved by flying a kite in a thunderstorm was the connection between lightning and electricity.             
    Franklin’s kite was a simple square. He attached a wire to the top to attract lightning to his kite. He attached a length of hemp to the bottom and a silk thread to the hemp. He attached a metal key to the silk thread. Then he waited for the thunder and lightning. When lightning struck the kite, it traveled through the hemp, soaked by the rain, to the silk, kept dry in his hand. When Franklin noticed that the loose hemp strands stood out in every direction, he moved his knuckle toward the key. He felt an electric jolt. Fortunately, he had brought a Leyden jar, a container with conductors on the inner and outer surfaces that become positively and negatively charged. When it is charged, the jar holds electricity. Franklin “collected electric fire very copiously,” as was recounted by a contemporary British scientist, Joseph Priestley. 
    The first constant electric light was demonstrated in Great Britain in 1835. For forty years, scientists and inventors from around the world made improvements to the incandescent light. Basically it works like this. A filament, a slender, threadlike fiber, is attached to the base of a glass bulb. The filament is heated by electricity passing through it. When the filament is hot enough, it glows. It emits light and heat. Only 5% is emitted as light. The other 95% is generated as heat. What a waste! But it was the best we had for a long time. Those early lightbulbs were expensive to produce. The filaments burned for a very short time. 
    Thomas Edison looked for an improvement. It is said he tested “no fewer than 6,000 vegetable growths, and ransacked the world for the most suitable filament material” (Franklin Institute) as he looked for a much longer-lasting bulb that was much less expensive to produce. When asked about his many, many tries to find a better material for his filament, he’s quoted saying, “I have not failed 10,000 times—I’ve successfully found 10,000 ways that will not work.” (Smithsonian Magazine )
    Edison made a carbonized filament of uncoated cotton thread that could last for 14.5 hours. But he and is team continued to experiment with filament fibers. He settled on one made from bamboo that gave his lamp a lifetime of up to 1,200 hours. He received a patent for his bulb that used carbon-coated bamboo filament on January 27, 1880. He continued to use the bamboo filament for 10 years. 
    In 1904, European scientists invented the tungsten filament. Tungsten is a metallic element with an extremely high melting point. Tungsten filament bulbs burned brighter and lasted longer than carbon filaments. Placing an inert gas like nitrogen in a lamp doubled its efficiency to 10%. The vast majority of energy was still being lost as heat. By the 1950s, researchers began to focus their own energy on finding a more efficient solution. 
    The march of progress included neon lights, florescent lights, and CFLs (compressed florescent lights). At first, CFLs were expensive and bulky. Now you can buy a four-pack for less than $2.00. They last about 10 times longer and use about 75 percent less energy than incandescents.
    Enter LED, a light emitting diode. They don’t get hot, which is proof of their efficiency. Their energy is converted to photons, not heat. They last up to 30 times longer than an incandescent bulb. They can be made with epoxy lenses instead of glass, so they’re much less likely to break. (The discussion of epoxy requires a blog post of its own!)
    And now new rules put LEDs in the forefront of energy conservation.
    Joe Biden’s Energy Department will require manufacturers to sell energy-efficient light bulbs. Incandescents will not be available after July 2023. Besides saving money on family utility bills ($100/year), businesses, schools, and factories will save billions of dollars. The Department’s rules are projected to cut planet-warming carbon emissions by over 7,000,000 metric tons per year.
    Even though merchants will be allowed to sell incandescent bulbs until July 2023, why in this wonderful world would anyone want one?
                       -—stay curious! (and look on the bright side)

David’s mom always said…
No, David!
No, David, no!
David! Be Quiet!
Don’t play with your food!
I said no, David!
Davey, come here.
Yes, David…
I love you!
                                                           from No, David!
                               written and illustrated by David Shannon
                                                    Blue Sky Press, 1998
    I don’t remember it this way, but I think my childhood was fraught with negativity. Here are some phrases I remember:
        Give a hoot! Don’t pollute.
        Just say no!
        No pain, no gain.
        Don’t smoke.
        Don’t forget to brush your teeth.
    Where are all the positive statements? I just don’t know. But with Earth Day in the rearview mirror (April 22 each year) and the 150th anniversary of Arbor Day coming up this Friday, April 29 (always the last Friday in April), I started thinking about this Earth we share. My thoughts tend to travel down the path to recycling, so I decided to investigate how that’s working out; I’ll call it The Great American Recycling Experiment. If that sounds a bit skeptical, it is. I’m trying to stay positive, but, that childhood. Hmmm. 
    In November 2021, the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) issued a 60 page downloadable booklet filled with lots of goals and objectives to make our recycling system more economically circular. From the EPA booklet, “A circular economy is an industrial system that is restorative or regenerative by design.” It is the opposite of the linear system we have now. That kind of system mines, harvests, or extracts resources, makes stuff, then throws most of it away. The object of the circular economy is to use less materials and re-use more, so there’s less to throw away.  
    The booklet is full of goals and objectives, color photos, and charts. To give you an idea of the contents, here’s the last part of the first paragraph of the introductory letter. “…it’s time to transform the United States recyling (sic) system.” 
    Two good things come immediately to mind. First, the government is aware of pollution (air, land, and water), energy waste, and inefficiencies. And second, government workers are studying the multi-faceted problem and writing about it. (I only found that one typo.)
    ComfyLiving.net, a website that advises consumers on remodeling and redecorating projects, has weighed in on consumer issues regarding recycling. I found some interesting facts on a page they call “29 Recycling Statistics We Need to Be Aware of in 2022.” Here's the link.

• In 2018, (the latest available data from the EPA) the recycling rate was 32.1%.
• Of that 32.1%, metals made up about 12.62%, plastics about 4.5%.
• About 68% of paper is recycled.
• Every 3-foot-high stack of newspaper that’s recycled can spare a tree.
• About 1 billion (1,000,000,000) plastic bags were used in the US every day in 2014. (No wonder so many flap like stuck birds fluttering in branches along the highways.)
• People around the world buy 20,000 plastic bottles every second. We use 50 billion in the US every year. 
• Only about 12% of the plastic generated is recycled.
• Plastic needs about 1,000 years to degrade if it’s thrown in a landfill or lays in the gutter or lands on your lawn. 
• By 2050 (less than 30 years from now) the oceans will have more plastic in them than fish.

    In the United States, only about 28% of what could be recycled is actually recycled. Recycling is more expensive than throwing our trash in landfills. The cost of recycling is $147 per ton while dumping it in a landfill costs $28 per ton. And the recycling industry creates more and higher paying jobs than the solid waste management industry.
    But much more than money is involved in keeping ourselves and our planet healthy. 
    There are many reasons to reduce, re-use, and recycle. Recycled materials can replace raw materials so there’s less need for mining, cutting down trees, and other extraction processes. Recycling reduces the amount of raw materials needed to be processed, and statistics confirm it. Recycling solid waste reduces air and water pollution.
    But Reduce (use less stuff) Reuse (up-cycle, keep single use items and make something else from them) Recycle (put your stuff in the correct bin, after you make sure it is clean and really is what can be accepted) only goes so far.
    My fourth R is Refuse. Refuse styrofoam, especially. Also Refuse single-use plastic bags, bottles, straws, single-serving sized anything. REDUCE the amount you buy in the first place. RE-USE whatever you can. When you RECYCLE, play by the rules. Some areas separate cans, glass, and paper. Rinse cans and bottles. Only put in containers what your recycling center allows. They can’t take everything. When we play by the rules, everyone wins.
    Remember my fourth R: REFUSE. (And remember you heard it here first!) 
    Did you know that if you stress the first syllable of a word you have a noun, but if you stress the second syllable, it’s a verb. So contest/contest, object/object, refuse/refuse are called heteronyms. Here’s a whole list from the University of Michigan.
    If you refuse the single-use throw-away thing-y you’re offered, it will NOT become refuse.
    Chief Seattle might have been the first to say, “We do not inherit the earth from our ancestors, we borrow it from our children.” 
    A little later, Kofi Annan quoted an African proverb, “The world is not ours, the Earth is not ours. It's a treasure we hold in trust for future generations. And I often hope we will be worthy of that trust.”
                                -—stay curious! (and use less plastic!)

    “Real isn’t how your are made,” said the Skin Horse. “It’s a thing that happens to you. When a child loves you for a long, long time, not just to play with, but REALLY loves you, then you become Real.”
    “Does it hurt?” asked the Rabbit.
    “Sometimes,” said the Skin Horse, for he was always truthful. “When you are Real you don’t mind being hurt.”
                                             from The Velveteen Rabbit
                                    written by Marjory Williams Bianco
                                          illustrated by William Nicholson
                                Doubleday, Doran & Company, Inc., 1922

    Miss Kimack, my Kindergarten teacher, was probably well aware of the power magical thinking held over her classroom of 5-year-olds. When she asked us, “Who forgot to put the crayons away?” or “Who left the restroom light on?” or “Who spilled water all over the floor?” we’d all look at each other, but no one spoke. Not wanting to be accusatory, she’d throw up her hands and say, “Well, it must have been Mr. Nobody.” Someone would be assigned the particular task, or we’d work together. 
    I’m sure she had no idea that my little brother would engage so thoroughly with the Nobodys. When I suggested Mr. Nobody forgot to hang up my jacket, my mother didn’t believe me, but my brother conjured up a whole family. They might even have had a dog. Mr. and Mrs. Nobody and their little girl, Karen, and her siblings whose names I’ve forgotten, lived with us for a long time. They weren’t naughty, but they helped us stay out of trouble.
    The Nobodys were not True, but they were Real. And the question What is real? is different from the question What is true? Truth can be proven. Grass is green. Fish depend on oxygen in their water. Washington DC is the Capital of the United States.
    Mathematics depends on proofs. Statements of reason and deduction follow each other in a logical order to prove a conclusion is true. Scientific premises are determined through experiments that can be replicated. Geographers and cartographers use calibrated measurement tools to show where on Earth a land mass or a mountain or a wild animal preserve is in relation to other formations and places. (This same idea also works in inner and outer space.)
    Reality is a bit more subjective.
    The Skin Horse told the Velveteen Rabbit “…[O]nce you are Real you can’t be ugly, except to people who don’t understand.” Red Blond, my older daughter’s babydoll used to be pretty. Now, Red Blond’s beauty lives within my daughter, alone.
    Just like the Velveteen Rabbit and his friends, lots of kids have closets full of toys that party when the lights go out, and suitcases full of cars that zoom and zip around after everyone is asleep. 
    Magical thinking is a psychological term used to describe a young child’s belief in their ability to control their immediate environment by wishing a thing was really so. A young child might believe that holding a special stone will cause pizza to appear on the dinner table. Or they might believe their stuffed rabbit can really talk. A research study conducted several years ago concluded that magical thinking helps children be more creative. 
    Sadly, for most of us reality becomes much more concrete by the time we’re about 10 years old. Wishing won’t make me thin or graceful. Grasping a stone will not ensure someone else will cook and serve dinner. I know my cats can’t really talk. 
    But I can pretend. 
    Truth is true facts, mostly. Even though it’s a theory, gravity is an example of Truth. Given the right conditions, an oak tree will grow from an acorn, never from a maple seed. Death in all its complexity and simplicity is True, too.
    Reality is more subjective. Beauty is defined differently in different cultures. The meaning of a poem or a symphony depends in large part on the creator and the participant. And a little boy’s sawdust-stuffed rabbit can believe it is Real. 
    While Truth endures because of its particular qualities, gravity, magnetism, and such, Reality endures because of its emotional connections formed by people with similar beliefs. 
    The Velveteen Rabbit has endured for 100 years (and has never gone out of print and doesn’t show any signs of doing so) because Marjory Williams Bianco still gives adults, far away from the magical thinking of our childhoods, another chance to feel the pure emotions of childhood and gives us the opportunity to share that magic with a child, if we are lucky. 
    The games a boy plays with his toy rabbit and the comfort that the toy rabbit gives back to his boy are undeniably, unfalteringly, and unconditionally Real. 
    The University of Pennsylvania has digitized the text of Mrs. Bianco’s story and William Nicholson’s original illustrations. Enjoy them here. 
                  -—stay curious! (and keep believing in what is Real)

…you can’t really see atoms, either: But you can think of them as extremely tiny building blocks that make much bigger stuff, like stars and planets.
    Yes, exactly like Uranus, or Jupiter, or Mars.
                                       from How to Bake a Universe
                                                written by Alec Carvlin
                                              illustrated by Brian Biggs
                                         Norton Young Readers, 2022

    Last Friday, April 8, 2022, Axiom launched Dragon from SpaceX’s site on Cape Canaveral. A little less than 27 hours later, it successfully docked with the International Space Station. Their plan is to stay at the ISS for eight days then return to Earth in a splashdown off the coast of Florida. It’s a first for an all-civilian crew. 
    The four international astronauts will conduct over 25 experiments in preparation for building and running a private space station. The research will include collecting information from “human health considerations to novel infrastructure and design for our future homes away from Earth…” from Axiom's website While Axiom is its own company, it is working in partnership with SpaceX.
    Using TESSERAE technology, one experiment will focus on different methods of self-assembly to produce necessary components of the Space Station. They will also investigate the effect of a microgravity environment on cancer cells. A Japanese company will demonstrate the ability of light to enhance air quality to “convert volatile compounds in the air into carbon dioxide and water…” from Axiom's website 
    A variety of health data will be collected from each of the astronauts and centralized in a research database. They are expected to find how long-distance and long-duration space travel will affect human health and how to prepare for the demands made by long-lasting and faraway trips including to the Moon and eventually, to Mars.
    Axiom’s long-term goal is to build privately owned Space Stations within Earth’s orbit. According to their website, they want to sustain human growth away from Earth and to provide untold benefits for all humans everywhere. 
    That sounds like science fiction to me. Thinking about robots, holographic transport, and AI feels like I’m stepping off the universe, ungrounded, incredibly exciting and unbelievably scary at the same time. 
    I struggle with finding balance in my life. I love being able to see my grandkids and kids whenever I want, sorta. FaceTime, Zoom, sending silly and beautiful and inspiring photos makes my life wonderful. At the same time, I’m very OK with my dumb TV (without cable), a grocery list I keep on paper with a pencil that I actually sharpen, and lights that I turn on and off manually. I like the TV clicker, even though I don’t have a clue about why it works.
    And I love my solar panels! (See this space on June 9, 2020 for my over?simplification of how they work.)
    An English professor of mine once explained Chaucer in his time; he had one foot in his century and his other foot on a banana peel. Chaucer was born in 1342 or maybe 1343, just before the Black Death killed 1/3 of the population (1348-1359). He died in 1400, at the precipice of Richard II’s turbulent reign. So, Chaucer, like all of us moderns, lived during a time of great societal change. The Peasant’s Revolt, corrupt religious institutions, and pervasive ill-health all influenced him and his writing. He coped as we all do by looking for meaning in his everyday. He wrote about it.
    But change is inevitable. And necessary. It’s the current pace of change that makes living with it difficult for many of us.
    I remember when a long distance phone call was complicated and expensive. Now astronauts communicate in outer space, with each other and with us. I remember when a phone had a dial and a dial tone, and a chord, but no camera, internet connection, or Solitaire. Everyone watched "The Ed Sullivan Show" and "All in the Family" at the same time each week. Weekly magazines kept up with the news. Real journalists told the truth as best as they could understand it. 
    We are being catapulted into a future almost faster than time itself. My coping strategies: Breathe deep, spend time in nature, and enjoy the ride!
                         -—stay curious! (and embrace the future) 

    “I never found one before,” I said, surprised. “How’d they get here, in our field?”
    “How do you think, Reb?” Amos went back to chopping at the dirt. “This was Indian land long before it was ours. How do you reckon arrowheads got here?”
    Finding that arrowhead had a powerful effect on me because I had never before thought about Indians living on the same ground where we lived now. …looking at that little gray-colored arrowhead gave me a peculiar feeling.
                                               from Crooked River
                                                  by Shelley Pearsall
                 Random House Children’s Books/Yearling, 2008
    
    I’m sometimes accused of being opposed to progress. If progress means ripping trees out by their roots to plant a one-stop grocery/big box retail store, or finding more uses for plastic, or passing legislation permitting more and more deadly weapons in our towns and cities, I am opposed to progress. 
    But, what if Ohio becomes home to a UNESCO World Heritage Site? I’d call that progress.
    Last month (March, 2022) the National Park Service announced that the Hopewell Ceremonial Earthworks is being considered by the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization's World Heritage Committee as a UNESCO World Heritage Site. The Earthworks has been on The Tentative List since 2008, and has just received its place in the Nomination File. The site will be reviewed by the Advisory Bodies in 2023, and, if approved, the Hopewell Ceremonial Earthworks will take their place alongside the Pyramids of Giza, the Great Wall of China, Australia’s Great Barrier Reef, Stonehenge, and the Everglades, the Galapagos Islands and the Taj Mahal.  
    Over 1,000 World Heritage Sites are divided into three categories. Some are cultural, some are natural, and some are a combination of both cultural and natural. UNESCO's website says “[t]o be included on the World Heritage List, sites must be of outstanding universal value and meet at least one out of ten selection criteria … The criteria are regularly revised by the Committee to reflect the evolution of the World Heritage concept itself.” You can find the current list of criteria here. Click here for their list of sites.
    In 1972, the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) drafted an agreement to document a plan to conserve natural and cultural properties around the world.   
    The sites are all more than special. They are important markers of human civilization, places of extraordinary natural formations, and homes to unique and in many cases endangered plants and animals. 
    The Hopewell Ceremonial Earthworks is really a complex of several locations in central and southwestern Ohio. The nine different locations are now archeological sites. They were originally constructed by the Hopewell people during the Woodland Period (1-1000 CE, in the Common Era). It is believed that the massive, geometrical structures were used for ceremonial purposes. They were probably also a way to calculate astronomical patterns and mark time. 
    Along the Scioto River near Chillicothe in southwestern Ohio, you’ll find geometric structures made of earth. Over 2,000 years ago, indigenous peoples met here, traded here, used the place for sacred ceremonies. You can see examples of tools the Hopewell made and used, learn which crops they grew, and what kinds of animals they hunted. A wide variety of many types of finely crafted objects have been discovered during excavations of the various mounds. 
    Southwestern Ohio is also home to Fort Ancient. Here the people used deer and elk shoulder bones, clamshell hoes, and digging sticks to move approximately 550,000 cubic yards of soil to build 18,000 linear feet of earthen walls. It took 19 generations to complete the work. Inside the linear walls, four circular mounds accurately predict the 18.6-year lunar cycle. 
    Several huge octagon- and circle-shaped earthworks in central Ohio are 1,200 feet in diameter. Their five- to 14-feet high walls surround a moat that is between 8 and 13 feet deep. The Newark Earthworks includes the Octagon Earthworks, a structure of eight 550-foot-long walls which are five to six feet high and enclose 50 acres of land. The Octagon was also used to record the complicated rising and setting cycles of the moon and track the 18.6-year lunar calendar.
    The Hopewell Ceremonial Earthworks are the largest earthworks in the world not used as fortifications or defensive structures. As stated in the Newark Earthworks Center blog, “Their extraordinary size, beauty, and precision make them outstanding examples of architectural form, landscape design, and human creative genius.”     
    The Great Serpent Mound is expected be part of the next group of sites to try for the UNESCO designation. It was built several hundred years after the Hopewell Mounds. Only about three feet high, its 1/4 mile length makes it the largest surviving example of an effigy mound. Although not used for burials, the Serpent may have served as a shrine. A 120 x 60 foot oval at the western edge of the mound has been interpreted as the snake’s head, its eye, or maybe an egg it is holding in its mouth and points directly to the Summer Solstice.
    If the Earthworks is selected as a World Heritage Site as expected, archeologists, anthropologists, geologists and tourists will come. And stay. And spend money on hotels, food, and entertainment. It is expected that tourism in the area will at least double in just three years. We current residents of Ohio have the opportunity to showcase the extraordinary cultural contribution made by Native Ohioans. 
    We can conserve the monuments they built and honor the land we took from them if we are careful not to overbuild those hotels, restaurants, and entertainment venues. 
                           -—stay curious! (and honor your heritage)

At last 
Dad says it’s 
time for us 
to pick 
cherries.

We’re 
going
to make
a pie!
                                                 from Pie in the Sky!
                               written and illustrated by Lois Ehlert
                                                       Harcourt, 2004
    I always wondered if the Japanese gifted the United States with cherry trees to replace the tree young George Washington famously chopped down. The short answer is “no.” The longer answer is “it’s complicated.”
    Turns out the story is, well, just that, a story made up by a traveling minister and bookseller, Mason Locke Weems. After Washington’s death in 1799, the public was hungry for information about his life. Weems wrote the cherry tree story, but did not include it until the fifth edition of his extremely popular biography. A minister, after all, Weems included the story to illustrate honesty, one of Washington’s “Great Virtues.” 
    The marketing aspect was not lost on him either. He knew if he wrote a popular book, it would have a high sales volume. “Weems knew what the public wanted to read, and as a result of his success he is considered one of the fathers of popular history.” www.mountvernon.org 
    Many years later, William Holmes McGuffey re-wrote the tale as a children’s story and included it in his series of Eclectic Readers. 
    The story has endured for more than 200 years and is a tribute to good story-telling and the high value we Americans place on telling the truth. (The irony is not lost on me. I take exception with the values of our former president and his ardent followers.)
    The real story of Washington’s cherry trees winds through our history. It begins with Eliza Scidmore, the c is silent. Among her many accomplishments, Eliza successfully convinced the United States Government to plant cherry trees in the barren land surrounding the Capitol.
    In 1885, Eliza traveled to Japan to visit her brother. She was smitten with the people and the beauty of the land. She wanted more than anything to plant the beautiful cherry trees she saw there around the Tidal Basin surrounding the Capitol in Washington DC. Her idea was rejected when she presented it in 1885, and time after time for 24 years.
    David Fairchild, a prominent horticulturist and botanist, was an official in the US Department of Agriculture. In 1906, he imported 100 cherry trees to test their viability in the Maryland environment, especially around his home in Chevy Chase. A year later the experiment was a confirmed success. Two years later, to celebrate Arbor Day, Fairchild gave saplings to children in the Washington DC school district to plant in their school yards. He closed his Arbor Day speech with the announcement of his wish to transform the Tidal Basin into a “Field of Cherries.”
    Eliza Scidmore had found her advocate. She immediately began a fund-raising campaign to purchase trees and donate them to the city. She appealed to First Lady Helen Taft. Mrs. Taft, who was very familiar with the beautiful cherry trees, responded by assuring Eliza that she was promised the trees and would like to “make an avenue of them.” 
    The day after she wrote Eliza of her plan, Dr. Jokichi Takamine, a Japanese chemist, asked if Mrs. Taft would accept a donation of 2,000 more trees to fill in the area. Since he was in New York visiting the Japanese consul at the time, the deal was quickly made. The mayor of Tokyo agreed, too, and the trees were on their way.
    In December 1910, two thousand trees arrived in Seattle and one month later they arrived in Washington DC.
    A few days after their arrival, an inspection team from the Department of Agriculture discovered the trees were diseased and infested with insects. To protect American growers, the trees had to be destroyed. About a dozen affected trees were set aside for study. The rest were burned. All parties, East and West, were disappointed but determined and Tokyo’s mayor approved another shipment. This time they sent 3,020 trees in 12 different varieties.
    On March 27, 1912, two trees were planted, one each, by Mrs. Taft and the wife of the Japanese Ambassador. Those two trees still stand where they were planted and are marked by a large bronze plaque. Between 1913 and 1920, workers planted cherry trees of the other 11 varieties. 
    Throughout the years, cherry trees continue to be planted. Grafts are taken and grown to ensure the lineage of the original trees. 
    In 1982, when a river flooded in Japan and destroyed an embankment of Yoshino cherry trees, Japanese horticulturists collected about 800 cuttings from the Tidal Basin trees to help restore their flooded grove. 
    In Japan, the cherry tree has become a symbol of restoration and renewal. Even though the beautiful blooms last only a short time, the beautiful memory has staying power. Since 1927, (except for the years of WWII) the annual Cherry Blossom Festival is a continual a celebration of friendship between the two countries. 
    Even though the trees in Washington DC do not bear edible fruit, they have borne a lasting friendship between allies which remains strong. 
                   -—stay curious! (and treasure your friendships)

    By spreading her flower seeds far and wide, the Ogress grew a field of flowers that increased every year. The bees increased along with them. The more the Ogress gave, the more she had. This magic was everywhere.
                                 from The Ogress and the Orphans
                                                       by Kelly Barnhill
                  Algonquin Young Readers/Algonquin Books, 2022

    Mom and Dad were not rich, that is in the money sense. We always had what we needed, even though maybe not always what we wanted. I haven’t checked with my brother or sister, but I suspect they would agree that we never felt deprived of material needs.
    We were taught that it is better to give than receive, and that’s a hard lesson for a little kid. We learned that when you point a finger at someone else, three fingers point back at you. 
    Mom liked to tell us that if we asked for something, we wouldn’t get it, especially when we went to the grocery store. That kinda kept us from asking for cookies, candy, and every other kind of goody. I always wondered how she’d know what we wanted if we didn’t tell her, then remind her a few more times. But usually, she did.
    When we were growing up, Daddy went to work, and Mom paid the bills. It’s just what they did. I don’t remember anyone talking about “enough” or “not this week” (or month). Those conversations didn’t involve us kids.   
    When I grew up, no one was talking about abundance vs. scarcity, the theory of reciprocity, or even gratitude. 
    In 1968, a book review of The Discovery of Abundance: Simon N. Patten and the Transformation of Social Theory, reviewer Joseph Dorfman pointed to an advisor of President Franklin D. Roosevelt, R. G. Tugwell. As the New Deal got under way, Tugwell said, “the people and the government must realize that the nation had long passed from a ‘deficit’ economy to a ‘surplus’ economy.” The terms surplus and deficit, used this way point even further back, to Simon N. Patten (1852 - 1922), a well-respected professor of economics at the University of Pennsylvania. 
    But it wasn’t until The Discovery of Abundance was published in 1967, that Patten’s theory of abundance bumped a little closer into main stream sociology and popular economics. Then in 2013, Robin Wall Kimmerer published Braiding Sweetgrass: Indigenous Wisdom, Scientific Knowledge, and the Teachings of Plants. She combines the theory of abundance with the theory of reciprocity to explain how all the parts of the world are connected to each other. Her surprise of a blockbuster book showed everyone who read it the importance of giving back, especially to Nature. 
    In today’s quote, the Ogress has a reciprocal relationship with the bees. She uses their honey and wax, and gives back seeds which grow into the flowers the bees need for nectar. 
    I think the whole world is like that.
    I enjoy birdsong and return the favor by keeping their feeder full.
    Even though (or maybe especially because) I don’t save their seeds to replant, I always thank my tomato plants (and parsley, basil, and chives) before I harvest. I nurture the plants. I amend their soil with compost, which is its own form of reciprocity. I pull out their competition (weeds), and make sure they have enough to drink. They give me, well, they give me themselves.
    Being in reciprocity with Nature comes from an internal belief in abundance. Maybe Robin Kimmerer said it best. Here are a few quotes from Braiding Sweetgrass.  

• “In some Native languages the term for plants translates to those who take care of us.” 
• “Action on behalf of life transforms. . .As we work to heal the earth, the earth heals us.” 
• “Ask permission before taking. Abide by the answer. Take only what you need. Take only that which is given.”
• “This is really why I made my daughters learn to garden—so they would always have a mother to love them, long after I am gone.”
• “I choose joy over despair. Not because I have my head in the sand, but because joy is what the earth gives me daily and I must return the gift.” 

    Bravery comes from an Italian word that translates to bold. The word courage is related to coeur, the French word for heart. 
    It takes courage, for sure, to foster the attitude of abundance and to practice reciprocity. As I have said before in this space, (12/7/21) “Courage is the ability to feel fear, but act bravely anyway.” Many of us hold onto an idea of scarcity. We might run out of oil, clean water, or clean air. We might not have enough money. 
    It takes courage to trust. To trust in the Truth of reciprocity. We can create abundance by giving back to Earth, giving kind words, and doing kind acts for each other, and forgiving ourselves for our own limits.
                           -—stay curious! (and promote positivity)

When I collected this stuff, I didn’t know if I’d submit it all, but sometimes you need to hear a lot of points of view to get the whole story. Journalists have to pay attention to things like that.
                                                        from Breakout
                                                       by Kate Messner
                                                       Bloomsbury, 2018
    I came home and enrolled in my local Community College after my first quarter of Sophomore year at a small university. I volunteered to write for their fledgling newspaper. It’s called Tri-C Times, now, but back then it was less than glossy and not as comprehensive. Even though I was an English major, I had never taken a journalism course and decided it would be a good idea. One of our first assignments was to interview someone we found interesting. It could be a family member, friend, or someone we did not know. The written article did not need to be lengthy, but it was supposed to be thorough.
    I made mine up. It was pure fiction, not even based on someone real and my teacher did not appreciate my creativity. 
    I did not do well in that class, but was assigned weekly editorials for the young paper, opinion pieces, as everyone knows, but based on verifiable and reliable sources. Even that long ago, I wrote about garbage and the importance of recycling (which was a pretty new idea). 
    Although I enjoy many different styles of writing including non-fiction, I’ve never been drawn to journalism. It has to do with the way the information is gathered, not in reporting it. I sensed interviews and steered clear.
    Journalism, like any good piece of non-fiction, reports facts. It is “the collection and editing of news for presentation through the media. It is reporting characterized by a direct presentation of facts or description of events without an attempt at interpretation.” merriam-webster.com 
    Journalism depends on a free press, “a body of book publishers, news media, etc., not controlled or restricted by government censorship in political or ideological matters.” dictionary.com  Since newspapers and news magazines, TV and radio stations are not owned by the government, their journalists are not restricted in their reporting. 
    An informed listener or reader can usually identify the direction a particular outlet leans. Although the best reporters strive for balanced articles by sharing true statements with their audience, many others skew across the spectrum from raging right to unlimited left. Here's a chart prepared by Ad Fontes Media, a news literacy company. Charts like these are becoming more and more popular. It’s helpful to see “your” source’s reliability score and see where it lands on the left to right bias spectrum.
    I like to believe that we all want to know that the news we hear and read is true. But undisclosed bias is real and unless a journalist’s sources are listed or referred to or identified, it’s difficult to tell if what we’re reading is true. That’s where Media Bias Charts are helpful. 
    You can find a list of fake news websites on Wikipedia  (not my favorite source, but it’s much better that it was at its beginning). 
    And there’s confirmation bias. We tend to process those articles that match what we already think is true. We are more likely to remember (and repeat) information that is consistent with our beliefs and forget or ignore information that is not.
    Confirmation bias is dangerous when people discredit the science showing the efficacy of vaccines, or try to disprove that we are in a climate catastrophe, or claim our elections are unfair and full of fraud. 
    It is a difficult task to purposely seek an argument that disproves our own biases. It feels like holding two opposite ideas in your mind at the same time. A good place to start is to ask why you believe a certain “fact” is true. An honest answer is hard to find, but probably very reliable.
    That’s why fake news is so long-lasting.
    The purposeful use of lies, half-truths, and rumors to influence public opinion, or promote a particular political cause is propaganda. 
    Propaganda is a form of disinformation. Lies are spread to gain political power. Hate speech drives fear. Rumors foment anger. Propaganda causes harm on purpose. The person spreading propaganda knows it is false and wants to deceive their audience usually to gain power or status, or both.
    Misinformation is told by someone who’s spreading a mistake. The intent of the person telling the story is to inform their audience. The information is incorrect, even though the person telling it really believes it is true. Examples abound. Earth is flat. The climate is not changing. President Biden lost the 2020 election. Misinformation can and often does cause harm, but that is not its purpose.
    Confirmation bias is one way misinformation and disinformation make stories so sticky, so long-lasting, even in the face of reliable evidence like science and eye-witnesses.
    In today’s Russia, calling Putin’s “special military operation” in Ukraine a war or an invasion can land the teller a fifteen year jail sentence. 
    A free press is the backbone to a working democracy.
                         -—stay curious! (and check your sources)