The Web of Connections

This week I have the pleasure of hosting Marian Van Eyk McCain on my blog. She is a long-term permaculturist, co-editor of GreenSpirit Journal and has recently published a book, GreenSpirit: Path to a New Consciousness.

When my daughter was four years old, she stopped one day in the middle of what she was doing and looked around the room, slowly, thoughtfully, at everything in her surroundings. For a moment or two she was quiet. Then suddenly she said, with a kind of wonderment in her voice, “Mummy, the world’s all stuck together.”

She was right of course. And I sort of knew she was, even way back then. But in those days I was still planting vegetables in orderly rows and learning yoga and meditation and I didn’t realize that there was any connection whatsoever between my spiritual life and my veggie garden. I never understood just how right that little girl was about how everything—and everyone—is stuck together. ‘Ecosystem’ was a word still foreign to me in those days. And ‘bioregion’? What’s that?

It was not until the year that same daughter turned 26 that everything changed for me. That was when I signed up for a Permaculture Design Course under the masterful tutorship of David Holmgren, Hugh Gravestein and Andrew Sheridan, (brilliant teachers all three of them). From them I learned to read the landscape. From them I learned how to observe and understand – and to move with – the dance of sun and rain and wind and frost, the rhythm of the seasons, the complex patterns of interaction between living organisms. And from David, Hugh and Andrew I learned that within the thirty acres of Australian bush my partner and I had recently bought, every inch of soil and every life form was connected and interdependent. Every atom was part of a molecule, every molecule was part of something bigger and everything was part of a system.

I learned that we, too, and our inputs (our work, our energy, our love and nurturing of the land) and our outputs (our productivity and our waste) were all an integral part of it also.

Those teachers taught me that Permaculture is about whole systems, at every level, from atoms to galaxies. A bee, a beehive, a garden, a smallholding, a farm… each is a system, nested within a larger system and that nested holarchy of smaller systems  makes up the master-system we call Gaia, our Planet Earth.

As I toiled each day in the sun, making mud bricks to build a house, carrying water from the rainwater tanks into the caravan that was our temporary home, planting trees, creating a garden and an orchard, making compost, setting up solar panels, I found my love of the land growing. The experience of living so close to that land and to the other creatures with whom we shared it – the kangaroos, emus, cockatoos, wombats and all the rest including snakes – was gradually moving me into a new kind of spiritual practice that suited me better than yoga. It was a spiritual practice of learning to live every moment in full connection with the Earth’s rhythms and with full awareness and appreciation of my surroundings. I became increasingly in awe of the elegance of ecosystems and I marvelled anew every day at the fluid, ever-changing patterns of Nature.

One of my teachers, Andrew Sheridan, had inspired me to create a composting toilet system that not only worked perfectly in that warm, dry climate but was constructed almost entirely from recycled and scavenged materials and cost the Aus$ equivalent of less than £20 to build. The first time I carried a bucket full of what had once been human shit (but was now a dry, odourless, pathogen-free powder) into the orchard and scattered it around the trees, it felt – I kid you not – like a religious experience. A circle had been completed. I, too, was fully integrated into the system.

I published an article, last year, about how I still miss that composting loo all these many years later at age 74. And I remain ever grateful to Andrew for his part in my ‘orchard epiphany.’

He and my other Permaculture teachers really got it through to me that I must think holistically – not just about the garden but all the time and about everything. Because everything is connected to everything else and whatever we do to one part of this amazing and awesome Earth system affects other parts – and thus affects the whole. Unless we understand and appreciate that, we don’t fully realize how every action we perform, every move we make in our lives, whether big or small, helps either to destroy or to heal those very systems on which all life depends.

This is why I asked Maddy Harland to write about Permaculture for the new anthology which I have edited, GreenSpirit: Path to a New Consciousness. The book has chapters on cosmology, economics, law, ecopsychology and a host of other things, including education. I see education – our own and our children’s – as an important key to creating a green, peaceful, just and sustainable world, one in which people of all ages are aware of the web of connections within which we live. The world is, indeed, all stuck together. If, through our ignorance, it should end up falling apart, we would never be able to put it back together again. And I think that’s something we are finally beginning to understand.

Marian Van Eyk McCain is a columnist and free-lance writer who has published articles on many subjects, from mind/body/spirit and women's issues to environmental politics, organic growing and alternative technology. She is the author of three non-fiction books and the co-editor of the GreenSpirit Journal, Editor of the ‘Elderwoman Newsletter’ and Secretary of the Wholesome Food Association.

2010 sees the publication of her new book GreenSpirit: Path to a new consciousness 
(O Books, 2010). This is an anthology of writings by thirty contributors who all believe that a deep love of the Earth is necessary if we are to survive as a species and to live in a peaceful, sustainable world.

Come and see Maddy Harland and Marion in Southampton
at the Edmund Kell Hall, Belle Vue Road, Southampton, SO15 2AY. Thursday June 3rd from 7 to 9pm
Enquiries to: Chris Clarke on tel: 02380 552 546 or Joan Angus on tel: 02392 599299.

There will be book launches all over the UK from the end of May onwards.

Don't Let Work & Obligation Be the Thief of Love & Innate Joy

Over a month ago I found a lump in my breast. I put off a visit to the GP for a week or so. I was practicing the very human art of denial but after a couple of worried nights I decided that resistance was futile. I made an appointment with the GP.

I decided that a lack of drama was critical and I only told my husband, Tim. What was the point of worrying my beloved daughters? It might be nothing. Also ‘energy follows thought’. I didn’t want people worrying about me and feeding the possibility that I had breast cancer.

I went to the GP on my own. The visit was sobering. She basically said she could not tell whether I had cancer or not and immediately referred me to our local hospital’s breast screening unit and a consultant.

During that waiting time I simply carried on as usual. I probably ate more healthily and I caught up on my sleep. I became kinder to my body. I started taking more care of myself and I tried to avoid stress.

The appointment came through in days and I only had to wait two weeks. Synchronously my brother wanted to visit on the day I had to go to hospital and I decided to tell him. His wife has had similar and her lump was benign. I felt their quiet support from coastal Suffolk.

I was self-disciplined about my thoughts and tried not to project into a dark future of cancer diagnosis but the visceral edge of fear inevitably unveiled itself in the depth of the night. A work colleague suffered a loss: her boyfriend’s mother died of breast cancer and they had to organize the funeral during my waiting period.

It is interesting what went through my mind. I realized those simple truths that people speak about in extremis: that dying wasn’t so bad but that I, aged 51, haven’t really learnt how to live yet. Sure I have worked hard. I have set up an international publishing company. Permaculture has become more known due to our efforts, I have helped set up Gaia Education, the Sustainability Centre etc etc but that is not really living. Living is loving more fully. I love Tim but I have yet to spend days walking in the hills with him, savouring life and communicating on the most intimate level. We seem to be mistakenly saving that soul communion until ‘later’, until we ‘have time’. There may never be time.

Most poignant of all, the idea of not sharing my children’s life was unbearable. They are beautiful, wonderful souls and I want to watch them grow into women. I want to be there when they marry, give birth, find their paths in life. How rich and full life is potentially and how I, in my busy-ness and striving, have placed an invisible barrier that prevents life fully flowing through me. Suddenly, I really wanted to live, but with a different emphasis. Ambition seemed like a total folly.

The mechanics of breast screening itself is amazing. I was given a two hour appointment and told I would have to wait for diagnosis that day. I went in and had four mammograms – top and side of both breasts. The radiographer was Australian and very soothing. She smelt faintly of cigarettes and it felt like playing Russian roulette on the wheel of fate. Maybe doing that kind of job needs fatal gamesmanship.

I was aware of my fear that day. It was tangible, a strange involuntary animal scent. Mammograms themselves aren’t that bad, especially if like me you are 'well endowed'. It’s just rather a squash. So I urge anyone reading this not to avoid them if they are necessary.

Then I had two ultrasounds with a consultant. At that point she confirmed that I had a lump on one side and a cyst on the other but she thought neither was cancer. I felt like I had got out of jail free.

But it wasn’t over yet and I had to wait another three hours to see another consultant for further examinations. They are very thorough you see. I watched women of all ages (and one man because men too can get breast cancer) come in for examination and to plan treatment. It was plain to see who was being diagnosed with cancer, who was booking in for treatment and surgery, and who was being sent away clear. It seemed unseemly to be so thumbs up cheerful but some women were. I felt huge compassion for those who had a darker diagnosis.

And now? I have to go back in two months to be checked again. I know that something subtle in my life has got to shift and it is a positive. I have to take care of myself.

Life deals out ironies. Tim and I went the next day to The Bristol Happiness Lectures where we launched Dr Chris Johnstone’s book, Find Your Power. The whole evening, sponsored by the NHS, was funny and interesting with upbeat presentations by three doctors who have studied the psychology of happiness and who teach their patients (and notably themselves) the techniques of how to be happy and avoid taking anti-depressants which often don't work.

(Photo courtesy of Nadia Hillman)

With one in two of us likely to suffer from depression at some time in our lives and millions on pounds spent of anti-depressant prescriptions in the UK annually, this is good work. Happiness is a skill we can all practice. We don’t have to wait until we think we might die to really live.

I felt deeply happy that night and I vowed that I would take this opportunity, a punctuation point in the intense flow of my life, to hold on to that awareness and not allow the trivia and illusion of work and obligation to be the thief of my love and innate joy.

Maddy Harland is the editor of Permaculture Magazine – inspiration for sustainable living. To read a sample copy click here. To support this independent publications please subscribe digitally for just £10 (approx $13.40) or subscribe to the printed edition (which will save you at least 20% of the cover price).

Rambling with Clare Balding and Mates on the South Downs Way

At the risk of this becoming a permaculture mag meets celebs blog, I thought I’d tell you about my unusual day.

It started off in bed with a cup of tea giggling over post-election jokes with Tim (“No milk for breakfast? Aw, the Tories are back in power.” And, “ David Cameron has just appointed Nick Clegg as his deputy PM. It’s still called fagging at Eton.”) But we quickly threw on some walking trousers and boots and went off to the Sustainability Centre to meet Clare Balding, BBC presenter and former jockey, and Radio 4 producer Maggie Ayre.

The plan was to walk from the centre along the South Downs Way, through the Old Winchester Hill nature reserve and down into Exton for BBC Radio 4’s Ramblings programme. Beside Clare, Maggie, Tim and myself were Mary Lewis, who manages the Sustainability Centre, Alan McVittie who manages the Old Winchester Hill and the Beacon Hill Beaches nature reserves. Andy Gattiker who looks after the South Downs Way trail also joined us.

We had a wander around the Sustainability Centre first and showed our guests the woodland burial site. That is always a keen area of interest. What kind of coffins? What sort of people? What varieties of ceremonies? The answer are: totally biodegradable – bamboo, wicker, wood (no veneers and brass fittings), even cardboard and shrouds – all sorts of people, from Christians and other religions to bikers and pagans, and a wonderful array of ceremonies and celebrations. We have had High Church, secret Egyptian (strictly no peeping!) and gorgeous Harley’s with sidecar carrying the bier. Brilliant.

We also talked about sustainability and energy and how micro-renewables like our biomass and photovoltaic systems here can make a serious contribution to our energy needs. The subtext is: just because we have a centralised energy system doesn’t mean we have to replace it solely with one. Bring on diversity of renewable generation that matches an area’s resources.

Having solved some of the problems of the world, we began our walk along the South Downs Way, which runs right past the Sustainability Centre. This is exquisite country with gentle rolling hills, arable fields, pastures full of frolicking lambs and woodlands full of bluebells under beech and hazel. We even have some remnant yew stands – dark, quiet stands of secret groves where little light penetrates and nothing grows on the rich brown earth beneath the trees.

 

Old Winchester Hill is a special place all of itself, an Iron Age Hill fort dotted with tumuli and an occasional dewpond. At this time of year it is carpeted with cowslips. 

We also came across early purple orchids (the one below was taken in my nearest woodland and not on the pasture, but you get the picture – literally), wild thyme, speedwell, early signs of yellow rattle and St John's wort.

We sat on one tumulus with a 360º view – the silver thread of the Solent glimmering in the distance, and patches of fields and woodland all around us. Swallows dives, skylarks sang and even a red kite graced us with its majesty, floating on the thermals. The hills gently fold into the landscape. You would never know that the vast expanses of Portsmouth and Southampton are in the distance.

We had good chats – about the landscape, biodiversity, the future of farming, sustainability and permaculture. It was good to be with people who appreciate the pleasure of walking and have a keen interest in the future of our world. Clare Balding was obviously feeling very relaxed. So much so she put her hand on some very squishy sheep poo, washed it clean and then dried it on my little border terrier’s coat. Bluey didn’t mind – but we teased her about the misuse of dogs, being a Cruft’s presenter!

Coming down off the hills, we walked by the river Meon, a chalk stream that rises in the valley by the Sustainability Centre. In a world that can feel so broken, I love the chalk streams and rivers of Hampshire. They are pristine aquatic environments, full of trout, perch and grayling with waters often so crystal clear that you can clearly see each fin of every fish. It feels primordial to see such abundance. I feel blessed to live here in this quintessentially English countryside and it is good to talk to people who are interested in permaculture and in what our collective future may hold.

It pleases me too that this place is an hour from London by train. The whole point of the trails and ways, the South Downs National Park and The Sustainability Centre, with its low cost hostel and campsite, is that it is open to people who want to simply put on their boots, grab a sandwich and get out into the wilds with all its magic and adventure.


The Ramblings programme we will be on is the last in a six part series on BBC Radio 4 which we believe is scheduled to start towards the end of May.

Maddy Harland is the editor of Permaculture Magazine  – inspiration for sustainable living. To read a sample copy click here. To support this independent publications please subscribe digitally for just £10 (approx $13.40) or subscribe to the printed edition  (which will save you at least 20% of the cover price).

For more information on The Sustainability Centre 

(By the way, that's Mary and her daughter and partner on the cover, taken at the centre.)


This Ramblings will be broadcast on Saturday 26th June and repeated on Thursday 1 July at 3 pm on BBC Radio 4.