Hi guys.

I’m going to France on Thursday. I’m going to be living there for a little while. At least three months, but probably more like six, or maybe even a year. Maybe forever. France does that to people.

Ireland, Bridge in Glendaloch

I’m going to be traveling around and working with a number of different wineries, who, in return, will be temporarily admitting me into their families. I’ll be drinking a lot of wine, probably, and if I’m lucky, eating a lot of food. I’ll probably be speaking a lot of French, too, which is somewhat scary, but I’m hoping I’ll learn quickly. I’ll be meeting a lot of people and seeing a lot of cool stuff, like animals, and vines, and really old barrel rooms, and castles, and patisseries, and boulangeries, and, and, and… the list goes on. And because I’ll be doing all this stuff, too, I’ll no doubt be taking a lot of photos. And probably sharing a lot of them on here. Little missives and postcards from me to the world.

I’m kind of freaking out a little bit about this, so, to calm myself down (read: distract myself from packing), I’m going to share some photos I just got developed from some of my past trips to Europe. My sister probably deserves photo cred for a number of these, though I don’t know which ones, so I’ll just give her “generic photo cred”. All of them are raw and unedited–just uploaded onto the computer. Enjoy!

This slideshow requires JavaScript.

So guys. Recession: 2008-present. We still in it, and it don’t look like it goin’ nowhere. It stickin’ around for a wee little while longah. And how many of us have wished, at least once, perhaps occasionally, perhaps on a semi-daily basis, that it were over with? That we could return to the days when we could freely shop at the mall, and could go out to dinner several times a week? That we had steady, guaranteed jobs and could easily provide for both ourselves and our families?

I know I have. I graduated from college in 2010, and since then have worked for over six different companies, including restaurants, wineries, and my mom’s small publishing start-up company, doing whatever I could to keep my head above water. My work life has been anything but consistent; my salary anything but guaranteed; my income anything but reliable. I have wished, hoped, and prayed, at least once a week for the last two years, that the recession would be over soon, so that I could take my dream job with a successful, nurturing winery in a beautiful location in rural America. And yet, here I am, on April 26, 2012, and the Great Recession persists. We can argue about its causes, its cures, shift the blame around between parties and politicians, corporations and individuals, but, at least for the short-term foreseeable future, we are stuck with it.

And so, I think it’s time for a paradigm (para-DIME, get it? Ha ha!) shift in terms of our approach to the Recession. We could continue to think of it as a bad thing, as an impediment to commercial and economic progress, as a limit to personal success and happiness. We can endlessly argue about the best ways to claw our way out of it and in the meantime do our best to insult everyone on the opposite side of the line as us. OR, we could change our minds and flip the dime on it’s head. We could use this opportunity to change the way we think about economic and personal success.

In OTHER less noticed but equally (and perhaps more) all-encompassing news, has anyone noticed that we have a CRISIS of CONSUMPTION on our hands? (For more on this, check out the works of Chris Jordan, particularly his “Running the Numbers” series, at http://www.chrisjordan.com/gallery/rtn2/#gyre.) WOW! Can you guys believe how much shit we buy on a daily basis? How much trash we throw into landfills – and into the oceans? How many pounds of crap we have to throw out every year at “spring cleaning” time? How much oil we use (48,000 gallons per second globally) to create plastic bags, gasoline, and broken toys that ultimately just end up destroying our environment? WHOA. What the shit, you guys?

So. 1) We use coal, natural gas, nuclear power, and various renewable sources to create electricity and energy. 2) Using electricity and energy, along with mined metals, manufactured plastics, and human labor, we create factories.3)  These factories process more raw materials, including fabrics, chemicals, agricultural products and by-products, et cetera, to either perpetuate the industrial cycle (and contribute to the first two stages of the process) or to create consumer products. 4) These factory products, whether industrial or consumer, are transported via train, truck, ship, or airplane, to their intended destinations, thus consuming more oil/electricity in transport costs. 5) Industrial goods are factored back into the cycle (though, ironically, very rarely RE-cycled to avoid overuse of raw materials); Consumer goods go to large department stores, malls, grocery stores, dollar stores, etc., each of which require their own manufactured industrial parts to provide heating, air conditioning, lighting, and warehousing services to the consumers and support staff. 6) We buy the shit, and then, once it’s all been equalized, throw away about 4.6 pounds of that shit per person per day. (Just in America, mind you!)

Now, how does this have to do with the Recession? you might ask. Well, let’s say that, in 2007, I made 40,000 dollars per year. I would have most likely figured out ways to spend at least 90% of that cash on things that I wanted – i.e. consumer products. Food, house decorations, computer games, electronics, you name it – all things that would eventually, slowly but surely, be thrown away. Now, in 2011, my income was only 25,000 per year! Wow. I lost a lot of money. But you know what else I lost? The power to consume, and the power to throw away.

It’s quote time! This one is about how to control consumption from an economist’s point of view:

There is a simple economic law that might be called the growth imperative. Technical progress consistently makes it possible to produce more product per hour of labor expended. For example, hourly labor productivity in rich countries has more than doubled since 1970. The point is simple: to keep everyone employed at the current number of hours while productivity increases, it is necessary to simply produce and consume more. It is unlikely that scientific progress and increases in labor productivity are going to stop. Therefore in order to limit consumption to current levels (or lower), it will be necessary either to lay off a portion of the workforce or to reduce everyone’s working hours.

John de Graff, “Reducing Work Time As A Path To Sustainability”, State Of The World, 2009, 174 blogs.worldwatch.org/transformingcultures

Wow! So you mean that, if everyone worked a little bit less per week, and made a little bit less money, we would, like, not buy as much stuff? You betcha! Look at the difference between American and European work vs. consumption habits:

By contrast, most other industrial countries, especially in Europe, have used shorter workweeks, longer vacations, and other strategies to reduce working hours—sometimes significantly. Today, the average American puts in 200–300 more hours at work each year than the average European does. [...] A study conducted by the Center for Economic and Policy Research, a prominent Washington think tank, concluded that if Americans were to reduce their working hours to European levels, they would almost automatically reduce their energy/carbon impacts by 20–30 percent.

Ibid, 174, 175

Double whoa! So, does that mean that if we like, LEARNED from the Recession, then we could work less (read: be happier) AND cut our environmental impact by almost a third? It sure does. And what do people typically do with extra time to themselves?

Shorter working hours allow more time for connection with friends and family, exercise and healthy eating, citizen and community engagement, attention to hobbies and educational advancement, appreciation of the natural world, personal emotional and spiritual growth, conscientious consumer habits, and proper environmental stewardship.

Ibid, 174.

That doesn’t sound so bad, does it? Gosh, it almost makes me want the recession to continue! … Well, not quite.

What we CAN hope for, however, is that resulting downward changes in consumption habits become conscious, voluntary, and willing, rather than imposed by income drops and job losses. And, still better yet, we can hope that the recession may truly result in a paradigm shift, wherein people realize that their money – and time – may be better spent in ways other than the endless hoarding of money and junk.

If more of us valued cheer and song above hoarded gold, it would be a merrier world.

J.R.R. Tolkien

This last month in Oregon has been pretty revolutionary for me. For a number of reasons, not least of all my dramatically changing life plans due to my inability to find a job. Curse you, shitty job market! Curse you, unemployment rate! But “revolution” is a word that implies both upheavals and excitement, and Oregon has held a lot of excitement for me of late. I’ve seen some incredible sights. Done some awesome hikes. Met some pretty incredible people. Tasted some amazing wine. Eaten a lot of delicious food. Aside from the job situation, Oregon has been treating me well.

I’ve tried to capture some of those moments and places on film. I’m not a journalist – I’m not shooting to show things or events, necessarily, but to capture a spirit and an image. Unfortunately, my most recent roll of film has not yet been developed, and I won’t be able to do that until I get back home, but meanwhile, here is a scattershot of some of the things I’ve been shooting in this beautiful and complicated land.

None of these photos have been altered except for basic darkroom procedures (replicated via Adobe Photoshop in light control) such as contrast adjustments and basic cropping.

It’s been a long time since I shot B&W on film, so a lot of this roll was practice for me. Re-learning how to use light, how to expose the film correctly, and how to frame a shot to get something interesting. All in all, I don’t think it sucks.

“THE BROTHERS KARAMAZOV is a joyful book,” begins the introduction to the Pevear and Volokhonsky 1990 translation. These were the first words within the hard copy that I read when setting out on this adventure, and given what I knew about its subject matter, this seemed a strange and perplexing statement. How could a book that deals with the story of a son accused of killing his father be described as fundamentally “joyful”? I’ve read several other books based on court cases and murder trials - L’Etranger and Native Son being the two that stand out in my memory – and none of those books can, in any way, be considered “joyful”. What a strange word to describe such a dramatic and brutal story!

And yet, 776 pages later, I find myself in total agreement with Pevear’s word choice. Never have I read a book with such energy, power, clarity – and, dare I say it, joyfulness! Oh, there is tragedy, true. Indeed, that is the magnificence of the book: there is, in fact, far more tragedy than there is happiness (a murder, a suicide, a child’s illness, and a descent into madness, are just the most striking examples of tragedy in the book) , and yet the overwhelming spirit of the book is joyful, forward-looking, enthusiastic, emotional, passionate, and almost celebratory. As the lawyer Ippollit Kirillovitch says, there are “two abysses, two abysses, gentlemen, in one and the same moment,” one “above us, an abyss of lofty ideals” and the second, “the abyss beneath us, an abyss of the lowest and foulest degradation.” And that is exactly how it is. In the BROTHERS KARAMAZOV, both abysses exist simultaneously, feeding off of each other, the greatest of tragedies giving rise to the most beautiful of celebrations, sentiments of base degradation and of lofty nobility living in perfect symbiosis with each other throughout the novel. The BROTHERS KARAMAZOV, is, above all, a celebration of spiritual passion, sentimentalism, and, yes, the joys of life.

Such a characterization would not be possible if Aloysha were not the “hero”, as proclaimed by Dostoyevsky in his own introduction. Aloysha, whose perfect honesty, simplicity, and pure love for everyone he meets earns him a reputation as an “angel” and a “cherub”, is the emanation of the goodness and happiness in the book. Though he is the youngest of the three brothers, he serves, at various times, as a spiritual adviser, messenger, counselor, comforter, and facilitator to almost every other character in the book, and particularly to his two older brothers. Strangely, he plays little role in driving the plot forward–he is not so much an active character as he is a quiet source of inspiration for others’ actions or beliefs. He defends his accused brother Mitya incessantly, and believes in his innocence from the beginning, though all the evidence seems to be against him. His passionate, sympathetic response to a woman’s cruel speech and proud hostility brings her to her knees and induces a spiritual revolution in her soul. He speaks kind and gentle words to his father, Fyodor, that great “buffoon” who is reviled and mocked by nearly everyone else in society. And he stands up for a young, injured boy who is being bullied by his classmates–and then brings those same classmates together as friends to the boy’s bedside when he falls ill.

Indeed, the most truly “joyful” moment of the book is Aloysha’s, a moment of overwhelming beauty and love for the whole world.

“Filled with rapture, his soul yearned for freedom, space, vastness. Over him the heavenly dome, full of quiet, shining stars, hung boundlessly. From the zenith to the horizon the still-dim Milky Way stretched its double strand. Night, fresh and quiet, almost unstirring, enveloped the earth. [...] The luxuriant autumn flowers in the flowerbeds near the house had fallen asleep until morning. The silence of the earth seemed to merge with the silence of the heavens, the mystery of the earth touched the mystery of the stars….Aloysha stood gazing and suddenly, as if he had been cut down, threw himself to the earth.

He did not know why he was embracing it, he did not try to understand why he longed so irresistibly to kiss it, to kiss all of it, but he was kissing it, weeping, sobbing, and watering it with his tears, and he vowed ecstatically to love it, to love it unto ages of ages. ‘Water the earth with the tears of your joy, and love those tears…,” rang in his soul. What was he weeping for? Oh, in his rapture he wept even for the stars that shone on him from the abyss, and ‘he was not ashamed of this ecstasy.” (362)

Perhaps the most astonishing thing for me, reading this book, was how precisely Dostoyevsky elucidates all of his characters’ thoughts, emotions, personalities, and even speech habits, so as to create characters that are distinct and real in a way that I had never imagined possible. As the narrator walks the reader alongside and into each character’s mind, it is impossible not to sympathize and understand his every thought and action. Dostoyevsky created a psychology for each of his characters; he knew each of them as well, if not better, than I know my own father, mother, sister, or best friend. He can account for the smallest action–a sigh, a frown, a misplaced word–and explain exactly why that character made that motion at that precise time. This novelist must have understood the human condition–or, at the very least, the Russian condition–far better than any of our studied psychiatrists or psychologists do today, with all of our fMRIs and personality tests. Dostoyevsky was a master of humanity, in the same way that Michelangelo was a master of painting, or that Chopin was a master of the piano, and that mastery is profoundly demonstrated on every page of this book.

When I was starting out, my dad said to me: “That is one book where every word is valuable.” I didn’t realize the truth of his statement until the last one hundred pages, the grand closing arguments of the trial. The book opens with several chapters of personal history, explaining how each of the brothers came into existence, their upbringings, etc., and there are many chapters in the book that seem to be relatively unimportant (though always interesting) diatribes on religion or philosophy. As unimportant as they may seem at the time, however, it struck me during those last one hundred pages that without those chapters, the fullness and richness of each character, his interactions with the world, his personal and existential struggles, could not have been revealed without such depth and breadth of “background” information. The dialogue about the Grand Inquisitor, for example–one of the most famous passages in the book–seemed at first mostly like Dostoyevsky’s attempt to bring some of his own personal religious struggles to life through his characters; however, in the Fourth book, as Ivan is struggling with “brain fever” and descending into delirium, reflecting on Ivan’s dilemma with the Grand Inquisitor helps to justify, personality-wise, his developing insanity. This is only one example. Every word in this book is valuable–not just intrinsically, for its philosophical or moral worth, but also for its contribution, later, to the character development and the conflicts within the book. Every word is valuable.

I first read Catch-22, by Joseph Heller, when I was eleven years old. Since then, that book has remained constant as “My Favorite Book Of All Time”, the big #1. Twelve years is a long time to hold a book on a pedestal, and I think it may take some time to adjust to the idea of having a “New Favorite Book”–and I’m not even confident that that will, ultimately, be my judgment. Perhaps these two masterpieces can share the spotlight. That being said, however, THE BROTHERS KARAMAZOV is without a doubt the only book that has come close, in all those years, to replacing Heller’s place in my heart. This is a book that makes you want to run out to all your friends, beat each of them over the head with the whole eight-hundred page physical volume until he agrees to read it immediately, and then salivate with anticipation while you wait for him to tell you exuberantly exactly how much he loved it. It’s that kind of book.

The Brothers Karamazov has been around for close to one hundred and fifty years, so this review is really nothing new. There are countless other, far more in depth, professional, well-cited academic essays out there, written by people far more learned than I. So please, take this for what it’s worth: a casual reader and aspiring writer’s first thoughts on a manuscript that captured her soul and imagination. That’s about it. That being said, I hope that if you have read the book, you enjoyed and/or agreed with this post; and if you HAVEN’T read it, I hope that this will have convinced you to go out, buy/borrow/steal a copy immediately, and enjoy one of the finest pieces of literature ever written.