[Aaron]

I was thinking about the:

"Subdivisions named after the ecosystems destroyed to build them" idea...

Green Acres
Shady Pines
River Bend

And it occurs to me that this concept is more widespread.

Look at our houses for example. Paper-thin crap manufactured to look like they are constructed from more substantial material.

My first car, a big ole Buick, would turn a current Buick into paste in an accident.

Greenbelts which obscure the blight of industrialism from motorists with a paper-thin veil of trees.

And on and on...

The same is true of our cherished ideas.

Patriotism is now largely an economic concept.

Community is a branded commodity.

For entire generations of folks, charity begins in your pants.

Afraid of some anti-utopian Matrix dominating human society?

Welcome to the desert... of the surreal.

[Heineken]

For a while when I was a pimply teenager I lived in a wooded area with several large ponds. I spent several happy years studying the rich "biology" of the area. I even kept a nasty ol' snapping turtle in an aquarium in my bedroom!

Then one day they starting knocking down the woods, draining the ponds, and building acres of ugly "garden" apartments, which they named "Woodlake." On the Woodlake signs was painted the corporate symbol, a leaf.

I went back there a few years ago and the whole place is a drug-infested slum with trash everywhere.

This experience affected me deeply, and ever since my life has been a rebellion against simulation . . . and assimilation.

This morning I went hiking with my dog Jiffy on our 25 acres. It was raining hard and the stream was roaring. Our path was mushy with rich black mud and sodden, leathery, fallen leaves. Lots of dense smells for Jiffy to investigate. The trees shrugged their skeletal limbs in the drenching east wind. On the way back we picked some of the shiitake mushrooms I grow. We fried them up with our home-grown eggs for breakfast.

The simulated life can be at least partially escaped, but it takes constant planning and struggle and lifelong work, especially if one is not born wealthy.

You have to organize your whole life around your vision. And NOT around career, relatives, techno-gadgetry, and other entanglements.

It helps to have a strong back.

As the world's spreading infections converge in a fatal wound, it will soon be difficult for anyone to live as I do. And soon thereafter it will be impossible for anyone. And my own life will expire with the rest of it.

At least I will have taken my stand against the "Woodlake" way of "life."

[NEOPO]

Not a fundy but it sometimes seems we have sinned, died and are now in hell

[TommyJefferson]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('Aaron', 'F')or entire generations of folks, charity begins in your pants.

[coyote]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('Heineken', 'A')t least I will have taken my stand against the "Woodlake" way of "life."

[Heineken]

Thanks coyote. There is nothing so painful to me as seeing woodland cleared, because I know intimately what is getting crunched under the dozer's iron treads and burned in those towering piles. Needless to say, I've been in a lot of pain.

[shakespear1]

Yes, I could never understand when I saw them cut old trees to flaten out the area prior to building. Then they would plant shrubs and small tree. The big ones could have been left to provide shade and energy savings.

[WildRose]

In the city I live in, simulated "natural encounters" for urban dwellers abound. On the edge of town, golf courses with names like Wolf Creek spring up, the result being that the hares and coyotes whose habitat has been disturbed end up drifting into the city, in ever-increasing numbers. The city really isn't a good place for them.

Another popular practice is building new neighborhoods of large, expensive homes all around a man-made "lake" or "canal", which provides a beautiful view for the residents. These bodies of water start out clean, actually even with good growth of plants, but after only a couple of months they are littered with all manner of plastic and aluminum, unfortunate for the ducks and geese which are invariably drawn to these "lakes".

[uNkNowN ElEmEnt]

The first several formative years of my life were in what is now a ghost town called Hendrix Lake. Close to Boss Mountain was a long lake. for the 200 feet out in the lake, it was only as deep as an adults knee. This made it really warm, bathtub warm, suprising for a northern climate.

It streched out in two directions split by a thickly forested island. THis is where I and most of our little towns population learned to swim, but you would only even find maybe a dozen families camping at any time.

I went back as a teenager, and they had stripped logged all around it. The little area that was the park itself was protected but you could see the naked hills off on either side. Its not as though I've never seen strip logging living up here but it was ugly, completely ugly and nasty looking. The water was filled with sludge, tree bark and other debris. It broke my heart.

Its tough as a parent trying to steer your kids away from this constant barrage and expectation of using the currency of sex and sex appeal. Trying to teach them that there is more to a person than what is in their pants, and to look beyond at the person is, so far, interesting.

Mind you its even harder when the adults around are still "on the make"... why won't some people grow up?

[coyote]

There's a word I've come across recently: 'simulacrum.' It basically means an icon representing something that never existed. The map without the territory.

In our case, I think the icons with which we surround ourselves represent an ideal that never had much to do with reality. The lawns, the toy shrubs, cookie-cutter suburbia, all an attempt to see nature as something tame and boxed. But that is representation of something that never existed.

[MalcolmV]

There was an orchard in Port Perry, a town just north of where I grew up. It had the best apples, Macs, Spys, Russets. We had a couple apple trees at home but Mom would pick up the other varieties from them... Northern Spy for apple pie... We were overseas for a couple years, when we came back in '76 I went up to the orchard. It was now a tract house development. They called it Orchard Heights and left one apple tree in each back yard.

There is a word from philosophy that I like, haecceity; this-ness, the thing in itself. Authenticity; consumer culture tries to copy and market it but it is the one thing that can't be faked. It's what Christopher Alexander was talking about in "The Timeless Way of Building". It's the quality without a name that Pirsig talks about in "Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance".

Another example; we were shopping for vegetables, I bought some celery root from a supermarket. The poor girl at the checkout didn't even know what it was. Then we went over to Kensington market, it's not shiny or fancy, but the guy we bought our vegetables from owned the stall. We talked about the quality of his vegetables and the exchange was between two people, not a consumer and a corporation.

Last winter I had trouble with water in the fuel system of my tractor. I phoned a neighbour and he told me how to purge the lines and change the filters. It worked. When I thanked him he said why are you thanking me I didn't do anything. As a farmer he didn't confuse talking about something with doing something.

I'm not surprised that people living in modern cities go insane with sex and drugs and suicide. There is no there there. The layer of noise from modern life is distracting.

The real world is still here. Every year I try to go canoeing in Algonquin Park. Being with the water and rocks and trees reminds me of what is; haecceity.
An article by Pierre Trudeau on canoeing:
Exhaustion and Fulfillment: The Ascetic in a Canoe

[WildRose]

I thought of another example which could be described as "modern development simulating the perfect mountain getaway experience".

About 30 years ago, my husband (then boyfriend) and I started making yearly excursions to our nearest national mountain park. Never having much money to spend, we chose a very simple cabin resort which consisted of small cabins with just the basics - heat, extra blankets, a small fridge and stove - situated by a beautiful alpine lake. The establishment was owned and run by a middle-aged couple. We loved this place because it was quiet, simple and affordable. Over the years we have returned almost annually, along with our children, who have also loved our mini-vacations there.

However, the original owners turned the business over to their offspring some 10 years ago and the changes, or "improvements", to the establishment have been less than desirable, IMO. The accommodations are increasingly more luxurious, it's always busy (to the point of having to book a cabin a good six months in advance), and the children of the original owners are not as pleasant to do business with.

Of course, all the renovations and "comforts of home" added to the once-simple cabins have priced the place out of our reach. I guess it's progress and good business, but we'll remember the humble beginnings much more fondly.

[smallpoxgirl]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('NEOPO', 'N')ot a fundy but it sometimes seems we have sinned, died and are now in hell

[gnm]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('smallpoxgirl', ' ')Millions of people are starting to realize that California has become a giant sewer. They're all moving to Montana, where they immediately set out to replicate the thing they were running from. They're in the planning stages for building a monster subdivision in a little town near here. The subdivision is estimated to triple the population of the town.

[Heineken]

The comments in this forum remind me of why I am so glad I discovered this web site, and explain why I've hung around here so long.

It's remarkable to encounter people who share my own feelings on this matter---feelings that I have been mostly alone with since childhood. If only there were more of us, we could change this world.

[max_power29]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('smallpoxgirl', '
')I'm living in the middle of another paradox of the awakening process. Millions of people are starting to realize that California has become a giant sewer. They're all moving to Montana, where they immediately set out to replicate the thing they were running from. They're in the planning stages for building a monster subdivision in a little town near here. The subdivision is estimated to triple the population of the town.

[Zardoz]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('Aaron', 'W')elcome to the desert... of the surreal.

[TreebeardsUncle]

Hi.
Well, this is not surpising considering that the modern suburban American way of life consists of the following:
sitting,
ingesting artificiatial poisons,
while looking at bright flickering screens,
and listening to loud noise.

A couple things: Even if there were more like you Heineken, it wouldn't change the world, as the market values investment more than it values labor. As for why people replicate that which they escaped from the reason is that the disease expressed upon the landscape is within their own minds. The fundamental values of this country are not freedom and justice; they are separation, possession, competition, and profit in that order. That should help explain what you see in the landscape when you combine it with the ersatz indulgences of an impatient, materialistic, and belligerant populace.

[Zardoz]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('smallpoxgirl', '.')..California has become a giant sewer.

[seldom_seen]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('TreebeardsUncle', 'H')i.
Well, this is not surpising considering that the modern suburban American way of life consists of the following:
sitting,
ingesting artificiatial poisons,
while looking at bright flickering screens,
and listening to loud noise.