Scope of this blog

Like Realizing Ordinary, this blog will include research for the details that bring the Village of Ordinary to life. Is the cornucopia of fruits and vegetables we enjoy in our world today available in a fully sustainable society such as Ordinary, for example. What varieties of fruit trees can they grow? Do they raise tomatoes, squash and cauliflower? Are there bars in Ordinary? Churches? Where and how do they make steel and glass, and what materials do they use to pave their roads?

Then there are the questions of transportation, clothing, housing, and spirituality. How do they get about? Do they weave their own cloth? What building materials do they use? What holidays do they observe? What about natural phenomena? How do they handle fire season, for instance?

But there is much more to discuss now that we are actually building Ordinary in our daily lives. You'll see more about the steps my family and I are taking to live consciously and make more sustainable choices. How can we reduce the number of plastic bottles and cardboard packages we stuff into our recycling bin every week? How can we further reduce the pounds of garbage we schlep out the door a couple of times a week? What other steps can we take to reduce our carbon footprint, our water footprint?

While Realizing Ordinary contained a good deal of the personal, this blog will be more so. But it won't be just about me. I'll ask you to share your ideas and wisdom as I explore ways to live more sustainably now and, eventually, to live in a sustainable community while growing an ever more sustainable world. I need your support and encouragement, just as I imagine you need mine. Wherever you are on the path, I need to become acquainted with you, learn from you, work with you. We must build an ever-expanding circle of like-minded, like-focused individuals.

Because individual changes are the beginning, but not enough, I will be writing and working for long-term, systemic, cultural changes as well. You will see more action-oriented posts going forward--calls to sign petitions, write your congressional representatives, make your voice heard, calls to stand for peace in your life in some small way every single day. If that change so many of us voted for in 2008 is to come to pass, it will be because we never stopped demanding it, never stopped contributing to the process.

Soon, I hope to have the time to begin writing Ordinary posts again on a regular basis. While the subject matter in Building Ordinary will swing widely, I'll not necessarily be examining every minute detail before posting anew in Rose's journal. I must trust that this living document can bear revisions down the road as we all learn more. The broad picture is what's important now. That and taking action.

Ordinary is a work in progress. Writing it in this public way gives an opportunity for you, my faithful readers, to nudge me in one direction or another when you think I err. Perhaps you have expertise in native plants or straw bale construction and can alert me when I've made an error. Perhaps you've a link to an amazing new passive energy technology that will revolutionize the off-the-grid movement and would be a perfect energy resource in Ordinary.

You can expect to see more Ordinary Heroes as I discover them, too, but I won't post them every Thursday any longer. I will give myself time to vet each hero well before I post. In the past, finding three independent sources of information about a prospective subject has been difficult in the relatively small time I had for researching and writing the articles. This go-round, I'll publish when the pieces are ready.

Those are my major areas of research and development over the next several months: Exemplary eco-villages, food, sustainability, political action, and getting to know the ordinary people who are already building Ordinary in some fashion--you and people I've yet to learn of or meet, that we might inspire each other to continue our work, each of us in our own way.

Are you with me? If so, I ask you to contribute to this work. Tell us what you're doing today, any small step you're taking, any long-term plans you're making, to build a world more like Ordinary. Did you recycle instead of dumping this week? Are you carrying a reusable water bottle to work? How are you making peace in your daily life? What are you learning about your personal impact on the earth? What legacy are you planning?

If there is to be an Ordinary in my lifetime, I need your support. Keep on writing, talking, moving, building, one small step at a time. Our collective efforts are more powerful than we know.

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We make peace in a million small ways every day.

All text and images, unless otherwise noted, copyright L. Kathryn Grace. All rights reserved.

Disclosure

One day, I hope to earn my living writing, so I experiment from time to time with affiliate advertising on my blogs. Ads you see on my blogs have not yet, but may one day contribute to my income.

Currently, as an Amazon Associate, I post links to products on Amazon.com. In the sidebar, I advertise products I feel strongly about, such as the reusable water bottles in my current ads. Within posts, when I mention a book, piece of music, or other item I feel strongly about, I sometimes post a link to the Amazon page for that item as well.

Like most commercial web sites, Amazon tracks people who visit their site. For information on how they track visitors from this blog, see the Amazon.com Associates Privacy Notice.

That's it for now. I'll update this as things change.

Last updated: 03/30/10

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We make peace in a million small ways every day.

All text and images, unless otherwise noted, copyright L. Kathryn Grace. All rights reserved.

Gratitudes

None of us do anything by ourselves and without help, no matter how isolated we may feel at times. Here is where I acknowledge the people and organizations who help to make this blog possible. This doesn't mean, of course, that I won't miss someone, but I hope to catch you all here. Supporting one another is the most basic of Ordinary principles. Here we go.

• Firstly, of course, are the readers who support the vision of Ordinary by returning to both blogs again and again and who encourage continued research and writing through their comments and, delightfully, through occasional offers of help.
  
• Secondly, were it not for the kind folks at Blogger, this blog would not be possible. They provide the software and the servers absolutely free to most of us. I give gratitude for their service and commitment to keeping the Internet free and available to absolutely everyone.
  
• Jim at Tips for New Bloggers and Greenlava of Blogger Central, both give generously of their precious time to write hundreds of instructional articles to help the web-challenged among us. Through them I learned how to build a three-column blog (TfNB) and how to make the menu that points to this page (BC), and to the "About," "Ordinary Heroes," and "Copyright" pages. Don't be surprised if you see more acknowledgements of their guidance as time goes by. Update 12/28/10: So many people were adding their own tabs to their blogs, that Blogger finally gave us "Pages" and tabs to link to them. Sometime this last year, Blogger also gave us the ability to design our blog layout, including the use of three columns. I suspect the assistance so many of us received from Jim and Greenlava had something to do with that.
• Webweaver provided a dandy little code generator with easy-to-follow instructions for making a copyright notice that automatically updates every year--an invaluable time saver come New Year's Day.
• Wanda of What Would Wanda Do?, whose blog informs and nourishes me in so many ways, posted a quote from the Dalai Lama On December 26, 2010, in I learn a lot from my cats. Deeply moved and inspired, I changed my blog description to  "Imagine the world without anger, without greed." Nothing so exemplifies the world of Ordinary as that clear vision. To emphasize the importance of the vision, I added those words, in bold font, to my blog synopsis as well.
  

  Imagine the world without anger, without greed. We have the power, the tools, the skills and the resources right now to build a peaceful world, where people live in harmony with the Earth and each other. This blog explores ways we are doing just that, one post, one change, one day at a time. Join me. Tell your stories. Ask for help. Spread your ideas for making the vision real and, well, ordinary.

This post is updated periodically, and not nearly often enough, to acknowledge the kindness and support of others whose moral, spiritual, emotional and technical support make the blog possible.

Last updated: 12/28/10.

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We make peace in a million small ways every day.

All text and images, unless otherwise noted, copyright L. Kathryn Grace. All rights reserved.

Ordinary Heroes

They are everywhere. In corporate high-rises and in remote villages miles from cell phone towers. They're sitting next to you on the bus. They're building schools in Africa. They're pounding the marble halls of Congress, seeking protection for our children, our health, our food, water, air and planet.

They save heirloom seeds, plant organic gardens, teach the rest of us how to adopt sustainable lifestyles in our throw-away, buy-more culture. They save the forests, rivers and oceans without which we cannot survive.
Their work brings the vision of the Village of Ordinary a little closer to reality every day. They show us how wonderfully possible it is to live in a world much like the Village right now. They are our Ordinary Heroes. If you are reading this, very likely, you are among them. I tell their stories, your stories, on this blog frequently, because it is people like them, people like you, who are building Ordinary.

Who are the heroes honored so far? This first batch is from the Realizing Ordinary blog. These are the latest on Building Ordinary.

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We make peace in a million small ways every day.

All text and images, unless otherwise noted, copyright L. Kathryn Grace. All rights reserved.

Copyright Notice

Occasionally, the blogger utilizes images from other web sites under Creative Commons license or with direct permission from the owner. Quotations of text are attributed with a link to the page on which the text was found. Images are attributed with either a caption, inline commentary, or a notation near the bottom of the post. A link to the page on which the image was found is also provided.

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We make peace in a million small ways every day.

All text and images, unless otherwise noted, copyright L. Kathryn Grace. All rights reserved.

About Building Ordinary

Building a peaceful world, much like the Village of Ordinary,
one post, one change, one day at a time.

Ordinary people like you and me must assure a bright future for the world's children
Image by Darinka via Flickr, CC BY 2.0

On June 14, 2005, when I wrote the first post for the Village of Ordinary, I was overwhelmed with sadness and a tremendous fear for the future my grandchildren would inherit. The world, it seemed, was at war, and my government was in the thick of it. My country--Land of the Free--routinely spied on its citizens, listening in on our telephone calls, intercepting our e-mails, and perusing our bank accounts and credit cards at will. While they undermined and outright stole our civil liberties, our leaders declared war on two countries in the name of democracy and freedom.

They paid mercenaries in foreign lands to turn in their friends, acquaintances and enemies for cash and a claim that they might be terrorists plotting to harm Americans. Whether there was evidence to back these claims seems to have been irrelevant, and hundreds, perhaps thousands of men, women and children were detained for years without counsel or rights. Some were tortured (ACLU video interview with former Guantanamo prisoners), breaking international and our own laws. Some were tortured unto death. Some who survived were lost to their families and loved ones, possibly forever. Many remain in the custody of our government to this day. No country wants them. Because of what we've done to them, our own people fear them and refuse to take them.

Brokenhearted, I struggled to find ways to cope with these horrors. I participated in a few peace marches, but felt shattered when too many marching with me carried signs and shouted slogans advocating violence, even death, against the warmongers and torturers. How can more violence bring peace, I asked?

If we can visualize it, we can make it real.

In the depths of despair, I began to visualize a world at peace ...

• A world where people have no need for jealousy, covetousness, power over others, or hatred;
• A world where every child is born and raised in an atmosphere of total love and acceptance that she or he might grow to a strong, healthy, self-actualized adult who understands how intertwined we all are with each other, how much we need one another, and how much more we can accomplish with cooperation and love than with bitterness and anger;
• A world where we respect ourselves as much as each other, where we respect our land, air and water as much as ourselves, and where we respect the other creatures with whom we have the privilege of sharing the planet as much as each other.

At first, I believed that if I could visualize a world at peace, perhaps others would join me. Perhaps one day, possibly in my lifetime, we might begin to live in that world. So I began visioning and telling the story of one very ordinary woman, in one very ordinary village, much like every other village on the planet--a planet at peace. I told the story through her journals--little snippets of daily life that point the way for us. If we can visualize it, we can make it real.

To underscore how very common this way of life can be, I named the village Ordinary, and in the world of Ordinary, what is so usual, so normal is that people live in harmony with the earth and with each other. Sounds utopian, right? Before you yawn at the impossibility, know this: From the beginning, one overarching principle has guided the work: I write nothing utopian. Every detail of the story either exists or has existed somewhere on the world at some time. What has been can be again. What is now can grow. We have the power to build that peaceful world right now--if we choose.

Gompa-Phyang Monastery, Ladakh
Image via Wikipedia

My guide and primary example has been the people of Ladakh, in Northern India. Known variously as Little Tibet and The Roof of the World, Ladakh has existed for thousands of years. Once a bustling stop on the Silk Road, and tucked in the high mountains between Pakistan, Tibet and China, Ladakh has been the nexus of land and trade wars for centuries. Adventurers have delighted in its stunning vistas and isolation for just as long.

Despite the factions warring to control their roadways and passes, until recently, the people of Ladakh lived peacefully. Their society knew almost no violence. They produced no more than they needed. They were highly efficient in controlling their population and not overburdening their land. They used absolutely everything and wanted for nothing. They enjoyed trade with their neighbors, and they partied for weeks at a time during the harshest winter months long after the planting and harvesting are done.

As air travel and tourism have increased in the last few decades, Western encroachment, with its improvements and modernizations has nearly destroyed this ancient culture, but many individuals are working to preserve and renew it. I pray they succeed, for if they can restore their culture, there is every hope that we can build as beautiful a life for the rest of the world.

To help me better research and vision the world of Ordinary, almost simultaneously I published the first posts in a companion blog, Realizing Ordinary. I imagined a cadre of contributors to the blog, people who wanted to build the vision with me. I take responsibility for failing to build that community. Along the way, though, I met in cyberspace amazing individuals, each working in their own way to build a more peaceful, more sane world. Many of them are mentioned in blog posts. Some are designated Ordinary Heroes.

What I have learned in the last four and a half years is how plentiful are the people working for the common good, working for peace and justice, working to build that freedom some of our leaders have bandied so cavalierly in their speeches and jeopardized with their actions.

But Realizing Ordinary no longer meets my expectations for the Village of Ordinary. I no longer research simply to write a more authentic tale or to develop the vision more accurately. I intend to live in a village much like Ordinary, and at sixty-plus, I don't have much time to realize it. I must begin to build it.

So.

Now we are building. Will you join me?

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We make peace in a million small ways every day.

All text and images, unless otherwise noted, copyright L. Kathryn Grace. All rights reserved.