It Will Be A Great Adventure
by Elizabeth Sawin
— 1 May, 2002 —
Just now despair lives close to the surface in many of the people I know. It leaps out at surprising times.
Walking up a hill with my neighbor Phil, a bottle of milk in his arms, my daughter on my back, I’m thinking how warm the spring day feels when he stops suddenly and speaks. [...]
Homeplanet Security
by Elizabeth Sawin
— October 31, 2001 —
“Sobs racked the body of a middle-aged man as he cradled the head of his baby, its dust-covered body dressed only in a blue diaper, lying beside the bodies of three other children, their colorful clothes layered with debris from their shattered homes.”
I held this sentence, from a Reuters report on the civilian casualties [...]
Living Up To My Beliefs — For My Children And The Children of Afghanistan
by Elizabeth Sawin
— October 15 , 2001 —
Here in Vermont it is daytime.
Here my baby mashes banana in her hair and talks about the moon. Moonnna. Mooonnnnaah.
Here my daughter, just home from preschool, holding a purple painting of a tree, pirouettes around the living room in a sunbeam.
Here my husband serves lunch — warm potatoes with butter, parsley and basil. [...]
Ethnic Cleansing in the Chicken Coop
by Donella Meadows
— June 23, 1999 —
I didn’t plan it this way, but I have birds of three different sizes in my chicken coop, which is a bad idea.
The coop has a floor-to-ceiling chicken-wire divider down the middle. One on side are 40 full-grown layers plus a handsome Buff Orpington rooster. All is peaceful there, except for a constant low [...]
Why Kosovo is a Battleground Again
by Donella Meadows
— April 1, 1999 —
Surprised citizens are flooding Congress with calls asking how this Kosovo mess came about and why we’re involved in it.
When I heard that, my first thought was, “Where has everyone been?” This storm cloud has been darkening the horizon for weeks, as genocide broke out in Kosovo and negotiations dragged to a predictable impasse [...]
