Blog Transfer

So, I've found that Wordpress.com has a better platform for blogging (a MUCH more attractive interface, as well as being MAC friendly). So, please check out my blog from here on out at http://roansreveries.wordpress.com/.

Thanks! See ya at wordpress!

Go Away With Me

I learned this from Alice Gerrard last week in the Country Music Singing Class at Blue Ridge Old Time Music Week!

Go_Away_With_Me.mp3

Blue Ridge Old Time Music Week, 2007

Wow! I had a wonderful week at Blue Ridge Old Time Music Week!!! It was great to reconnect with many of the wonderful people I've met over the last 4 years. I really enjoyed meeting new folks and seeing new faces, hearing new tunes! I had the wonderful opportunity to take Alice Gerrard's Country Music Singing Class, and learned quite a few new great songs.

I'm joyous and singing like a lark!

Mountain Top Removal

Here's an image for those of you curious about what exactly Mountain Top Removal is. This photograph was taken on a recent flyover of MTR sites with Southwings, at Mountain Justice Summer Camp. The photographer, Liz Veazey, has a whole slew of photos on her flickr site.

According to the US Environmental Protection Agency, the definition of mountaintop removal is:
“Mountaintop removal/valley fill is a mining practice where the tops of mountains are removed, exposing the seams of coal. Mountaintop removal can involve removing 500 feet or more of the summit to get at buried seams of coal. The earth from the mountaintop is then dumped in the neighboring valleys.”

From the EPA's Website:
Why Should We Be Concerned?
Mountaintop removal began on a small scale in West Virginia in the late 1960s. Beginning in the 1990s it became the dominant coal-mining technique for several reasons:
*Americans' demand for electricity has jumped 70 percent in the past 20 years;
*The demand for clean-burning, low-sulfur coal by utilities shot up after Congress passed the 1990 Clean Air Act; and
*The development of massive "drag line" equipment has made it possible to shear off mountaintops to get at multiple seams of coal.

The impact of mountaintop removal on nearby communities is devastating. Dynamite blasts needed to splinter rock strata are so strong they crack the foundations and walls of houses. Mining dries up an average of 100 wells a year and contaminates water in others. In many coalfield communities, the purity and availability of drinking water are keen concerns.

Blasting and shearing mountains have added to the damage done to underground aquifers by deep mines.

Appalachia's waterways are among the regions's most valuable tourist attractions. Canoeists and fishermen come for the pleasures of rivers meandering under umbrellas of green or dancing in sunlight. The valley fills bury streambeds and contaminate streams with sediment from the mines.

The forests covering the Mid-Atlantic region are unique - the largest contiguous temperate forest in the world. The land is rich with wildlife and native plants. But in mountaintop removal areas, the native plants are being destroyed, and the wildlife chased away.

~EPA's Website.

Mountain Justice Summer, 2007

So I spent Wednesday night to Sunday up at Narrow Ridge Earth Literacy Center, camping out with tons of other folks involved with Mountain Justice Summer 2007. It was a wonderful four nights, five days with a pretty diverse group of people. It was amazing how well everybody got along. We had lots of workshops and trainings on mountain top removal issues, climate change, direct action, non violence/civil disobedience, media work, mountain music, plant identification, Appalachian history, etc. It was wonderful! There were wonderful impromptu swims in a nearby TVA lake (we were near Washburn, Tennessee), and the temperature was JUST right. We had magnificent food all week, (thanks to Joe and Scott, field cooks extraordinaire) and great music (For the Long Haul, Mountain Women Rising, Jake Legged Stompers, and the talent show wonders). I met so many wonderful young people (and older folks too) who were driven with strong minds and hearts for the mountains of Appalachia. I was inspired at the eagerness and willingness by the group, and motivated by the critique and dialogue concerning the movement.

I have upped my commitment to working to end mountain top removal as a result of this past week. I am hoping to continue to find creative ways to bring mountain top removal issues to the forefront of the minds of those I interact with, and hope to find new mediums to deliver this message. I also am looking forward to serving MJS Virginia is multiple ways this summer. Some great photographs, taken by Liz Veazey, can be found at http://www.flickr.com/photos/tags/mountainjustice/

I will post on the CCC/KKK rally we attended in Knoxville at a later date. I'm still processing all the emotions I had in confronting the racism and fear that I am insulated from in my everyday life. It was very disturbing.

Foxie

Okay, so I have to brag on how cute my nephew, Fox, is. Don't you agree? He's almost one! I can't believe how time flies, and how I've loved every second of my first year of aunthood...

This Is What You Shall Do... From Leaves of Grass, by Walt Whitman

Love the earth and sun and the animals, despise riches, give alms to everyone that asks, stand up for the stupid and crazy, devote your income and labor to others, hate tyrants, argue not concerning God, have patience and indulgence toward the people, take off your hat to nothing known or unknown, or to any man or number of men-go freely with powerful uneducated persons, and with the young, and with the mothers or families-re-examine all you have been told in school or church or in any book, and dismiss whatever insults your own soul; and your very flesh shall be a great poem, and have the richest fluency, not only in its words, but in the silent lines of its lips and face, and between the lashes of your eyes, and in every motion and joint of your body.