The Green Goddess Ponders the Energy of Money

Ah, the Green Goddess has decided to take on a Big Topic! She has been visited at night recently by a wide-mouth frog owl (not that there seem to be frogs in the grounds of Castle Green--unfortunately, but the owl is probably enjoying the fat rats which still manage to dig underground to the compost heap)! As an aside, before the Big Topic, the Green Goddess was at first unaware that it was an owl visiting in the garden--she sounded more like the water pump from the tank down the bottom of the garden; so the Man of Action, the Green Goddess' beloved, lept out of bed to fix the offending item--it was then that the owl was discovered!

Now the Green Goddess understands fully the sybolism of the owl: she represents wisdom. (A message from the Kingdom of Nature for the Green
Goddess to use some of her own).

The Greek Goddess, Athena, is one of the Green Goddess' great inspirations--she carries the spear, and has the owl on her shoulder. Athena was the child of one of the wives of Zeus. Interestingly, Zeus was afraid of having a son who would overthrow him. As fate would have it, Zeus had a daughter called Athena who was born fully armed with a spear in her hand! Now we all could have the spear in our hand and an owl on our shoulder if we decided to harness our "personal power".

The Green Goddess feels that too many people now equate personal power with money, instead of money just being energy. What money does buy is the access to opportunity and quality in goods and services--it does not buy "powerfulness". None-the-less we chase this elusive money energy frantically as if it were some new kind of god.

It seems in life that everything is either time or money. We in the west do the money thing well--although we do not seemed to have learnt much from that journey. It would be a most insightful and worthwhile journey if we now tried the "time thing". Let us discover its value.

There are many reasons why the Green Goddess, a servant of the nature sprites that she is, would like to try the "time thing". First of all, it would involve less consumption, less "bigfoot" which would be great for the planet. Secondly, all the people who rush from place to place in grey suits and endlessly catching aeroplanes might get to know themselves a little better. The Green Goddess knows that this can be a worrying prospect; but in the long-term it sorts out the real issues like what is really important in life. Finally, there are the joys of the simple pleasures and leading a life of integrity--the Green Goddess' favourite catch phrase.

Simple pleasures--our overburdened senses seem to have forgotten what these are eg reading a good book, smelling a rose, spending time with the family (and not just "quality" time--the junk time as well where lots of stuff happens), picking vegetables from the garden, and having a bath (a high-ranking pleasure in our drought-affected land).

Now, don't get me wrong, the Green Goddess knows that time has a price--it is just a matter of what price you are prepared to put on it. We have consumption choices every day, it is just that we don't normally pit them against time choices. Or we feel that we do not have the choices at all. If we let go the power hold that money has over us, and think a little about our personal power instead, we may find we do have the choice where before we thought we had none.

Footnote: this has been the Green Goddess' personal time choice for the last hour or so--and what a luxurious and delightful one it has been! Time now to give the owl a brief nap and to go out into the world, spear in hand to fight on, with the nose to the grindstone to earn more time to have a "personal power moment"!

The Green Goddess and her Heroine Jane Austen

Jane Austen, as they say, "lived in interesting times". During her life there was the French Revolution, the Napoleonic Wars and the issue of slavery was beginning to be fiercely debated. Interestingly, Jane Austen's novels make almost no comment on any of these political issues of the day, although her books are peppered with military men--as she mentions in "Mansfield Park", she has known admirals "both rear and vice"!!!

It is little known, for instance, that Jane's cousin Eliza married a French officer. Eliza moved in the highest circles in Paris, so much so that she was able to describe Marie Antoinette's outrageously opulent Turkish dress at a ball she attended. Eliza's husband was a fervent royalist, and was later arrested and condemned to death by the guillotine.

While this turmoil was happening in the world, Jane Austen was describing more domestic battlegrounds--marriage vs spinsterhood, poverty vs a comfortable life, and marrying for love vs a marriage of convenience, were the sagas of her heroines. And for her heros: marrying a woman of suitable status or, if not the eldest son, the choice of career in the military, the clergy or (the career of?) marrying the wealthy woman. It is their very domesticity that makes these tales classic.

It seems to the Green Goddess that nowadays people have forgotten how to have a domestic life. They are out in the world vying for their position--being at home is only a transition until the next foray into the melee. Where is the Goddess Hestia, keeper of the home and the hearth, so there is a sanctuary from the world and a training ground for being in the world? At Castle Green, the Green Goddess is queen--and there is beauty and order in her universe there. It is not to be forgotten that the Goddess Hestia, because she was keeper of the fire, is also the keeper of the consciousness. It is the raising of this consciousness which is needed in the world if there is to be beauty and order in the universe on a much grander scale.

When in "Pride and Prejudice" did Elizabeth Bennet first realize to herself that she was in love with Mr Darcy (perhaps a long time after the reader!): it was when, as she was coming up its sweeping drive, she saw Mr Darcy's stately home of Pemberely! And it was as Mr Darcy's housekeeper was showing Elizabeth and her aunt and uncle around Pemberley and speaking in glowing terms of its "master" did she get insight into the real man and his universe. A universe which she now wanted to share with him.

And do we not all, in some way aspire to that universe--it is not just about the money and priviledge that comes with it--but the history, the culture, the belonging to place of the family for generations, and the beauty of the house and its surrounds.

As James Lovelock says in "The Revenge of Gaia"--how achingly beautiful was the world in 1800. It is well known that Jane Austen died of consumption before middle age, and many of her sisters-in-law died in childbirth, and close friends died in horse accidents. Today, post industrialization, we have added more opportunities (especially for women
thank heavens!! as women had been undervalued for centuries), longevity and safety to our lives--but we have paid the price in the form of ugliness and our lack of connection to the land. The pastimes of journal writing, sewing, painting, reading, playing a musical instrument and performing plays amongst ones circle--ie the arts of the domestic scene--are all but gone. It is true that other pastimes, often more ennervating, have taken their place. Let alone the opportunity of continual consumption...

None-the-less, the Green Goddess wonders what it must have been like to have the priviledge to see a world of such "aching beauty". Something we can only see in the min's eye nowadays.

The G8 and the Ruler of the Land of the Free

The winds of change are blowing through the Sunburnt Land--the Green Goddess watches the leaves and the snow swept up in its vortex. At least the snows have come!

In the far off Land of the Cherry Blossom, the "Eight Great" lords of the eight great lands have met. Although little, there has been some progress regarding the carbon footprint of the human race upon our wearied mother--the earth. Mother Earth has a temperature and is not well--how hot are we going to let her become?

At this meeting in the Land of the Cherry Blossom, the Leader of the Land of the Free, the most powerful lord of all, has agreed to carbon emission cuts by 2050. The Green Goddess remembers how the Leader of the Land of the Free previously did not "believe" that the earth was heating, (the Green Goddess has always dealt in facts rather than beliefs). In earlier days as the topic began to be raised in the Land of the Free, his Republican Lords even managed to coin the phrase "climate change" to make the process of global warming sound less urgent and dire. It has now come out that the Leader of the Land of the Free's second-in-charge lord also tried to change scientific reports so that less of the earth's woes could be blamed on man's footprint. And then the Leader of the Land of the Free invaded a country with oil bursting at the seams--oil the engine-driver of the last century, as coal was the engine-driver of the century before. The invasion, Operation Iraqi Liberation (OIL) had to change its acronym for obvious reasons!

In the season of Spring, more than two years ago, the water was sparkling on the great harbour of the Sunburnt Country. Here the Green Goddess and a small group of Warriors for the Planet met to hear a former lord of the Land of the Free speak of the perils of our changing climate. This Lord with the Face of the Eagle, (sumbolizing not only the Land of the Free but the symbol of the spirit), had had an epiphany on the road to Damascus. He had wanted to be the Leader of the Land of the Free, thought he was, and then it had slipped through his hands. Fate had another plan for him--the Lord with the Face of the Eagle was here to preach an "Inconvenient Truth" about the planet.

The small group of Planet Warriors brought the Lord with the Face of an Eagle to the Sunburnt Land. As he spoke, and as he taught others how to speak, something happened. Something changed in the ether of the Sunburnt Land--even its Elder Statesman Howard began to hear, and began to know that it was truth. The Lord with the Face of the Eagle felt it too--felt hope rather than defeat, and he felt that the Land of the Free might finally hear too.

That day, the Green Goddess shook the hand of the Lord with the Face of the Eagle--one earth warrior to another--a Lord sensing maybe his plan could be possible, and a Goddess realizing that she also had to believe it was possible, and to live on a day to day basis as if it were possible. It was that day that the Green Goddess made a solemn vow in front of the nature sprites of the harbour that she would go to battle daily for the Great Mother of Creation. No matter that the Green Goddess' stage is mostly at Castle Green--there is always the pebble in the pond reaction.

More than two years and many seasons on, the Leader of the Land of the Free has changed his stance. May the winds of change continue to blow.

As the Green Goddess now contemplates the snows that fall up at the mountain lodge, she contemplates the irony of life. The Sunburnt Country, mostly desert as it is, could power the whole of the energy needs for the whole planet for a whole year from the energy that falls on its land from the sun's rays! The deserts of the interior, so renounced by the more recent immigrants to this great brown land and who have chosen to settle on its more forgiving green fringes, may prove to be our salvation. It is funny the way the worm turns...

The Man of Letters and the Staff of Life

The Man of Letters, the Green Goddess' "pen pal" from the Far Off Verdant Isle, sets a high standard. He keeps the Green Goddess on her toes: firstly, he wears only tweeds grown on the backs of the southdown sheep of that very isle, he rides his bicycle from place to place, (or if journeying longer, he trains to his hideaway in the Yorkshire Dales), and he distributes leaflets on the benefits to the planet of vegetarianism ie he is a paragon of virtue in the eyes of the Green Goddess.

Strange things have happened recently at the Institution in Praise of the Famous Saxon Warlord where the Man of Letters teaches. There has been a chink in the door of the heroic armory--the Man of Letters has made small inroads! Recently, during the time the Page of Coins (Gold) was undertaking his apprenticeship at this famous institution, he reported to the Green Goddess how the Man of Letters had brought his religious zeal to the institution's chapel. (Here the Green Goddess must make a brief notation: whatever his more established religious beliefs may be, the Man of Letters shares with the Green Goddess a more pagan religion of the ancients whereby they worship at the alter of the Gods of Nature). As the Page of Coins related, on this particular occasion the Man of Letters brought with him to the alter some dough, and had students knead it in front of the congregation while he gave a sermon on the benefits of artisan food as opposed to the multinational variety, and the benefits of home grown to save on food miles! (This certainly gave a new spin to the "breaking of the bread" and the drinking of the altar wine).

With the above in mind, the Green Goddess reminds herself that from acorns oak trees grow--so the Green Goddess and Fairy Cupid (her youngest daughter and protege) have been baking bread. This has proven to be a creative and wholly (holy?) satisfying experience, and Fairy Cupid is a whizz at kneading. The bread has been topped by the "mummalade" (also known as marmalade) of the Green Goddess from her home grown cumquats--what an exquisite culinary experience! And one that many no longer share having had their taste buds desensitized by multinational food "flavours", so called.

The inhabitants of Castle Green have tasted and approved the first few offerings of the Green Goddess and Fairy Cupid--multigrain bread with a cupful of oats thrown in for good measure. But this has only got the taste buds going--and the Goddess is now off to Farmer Bill's shop to buy barley flour (barley has other uses apart from beer), rye flour (to go back to Captain Carbon's teutonic heritage), more oats (great for the arteries), and spelt flour (the grain of the ancients--so much easier to digest ). Updates on the baking to follow.

Despite this baking accomplishment, the Green Goddess feels she has not quite attained the sacredness of the kneading at the altar of the Man of Letters. She ponders that one of Fairy Cupid's loaves needs to be placed at the altar of the Goddess Demeter, her Harvest helpers, and the Gods of Nature. The sacred place: a copse of snowgums amongst the wombat trails.

Captain Carbon's Mission to the World's Carbon Capital

When the gates are shut at Castle Green, the Green Goddess can retreat into her haven. Within the castle walls are apple trees, cumquats, a lemon and an apricot tree, two limes, as well as the Green Goddess' herb and vegetable plot. Retreat she might, but the Goddess knows that she has to be in the world to change it.

The Mission: to see the World's Carbon Capital in the Land of the Orient, the former land of the Ruthless Emperor Mao at the former Emperor's Court.

Man of Action, Noble Knight that he is, Captain Carbon rose to the challenge to visit this smoky city. His apprentice and Carbon Champion (!) himself, the Page of Coins (Gold), son and heir at Castle Green chose to accompany the Captain on this mission.

Meanwhile, the Green Goddess had found a noble scholar to escort her menfolk: Scholar Nicholas from the Verdant Isle Across the Sea (Nicholas having sacrificed remaining at the Verdant Isle to seek out the smoke stacks of the East to further his studies). Following much touring, Captain Carbon noted with disappointment that after Emperor Mao's war against the Intelligentsia of the Land of the Orient, their scholars seemed to need to be mostly imported!

The Green Goddess mounted a flock of greenies in the Murray Darling Basin Catchment to plant trees to offset the travel of Castle Green's Carbon Champions--the Beloved and the Son. Plant as they might, Captain Carbon sorely felt the insignificance of the action when faced with the claustrophobia of the smoke of the Carbon Capital. Although feeling both unease, and at times despair, he was comforted by the words of the Green Goddess that he had protected her from undertaking such a traumatic trip. (The Page of Coins was comforted that he had been on a trip at all)!

Scholar Nicholas galantly took the Castle Green envoys to the two great cities. Captain Carbon looked for culture and the great gods of the noble classes--beauty and truth. These latter pillars, he reported to the Green Goddess were bitterly lacking--seemingly having been lost in the Great Cultural Crusade of the Emperor Mao. The Yuan now seems to be king--all the glories of the early noble dynasties lost to the new god.

The Green Goddess contemplates the "Great Satanic Mills" that once sullied the north of the Verdant Isle. These are now gone, apparently moved to the Land of the Orient where so much is produced that ships sail from its ports to provide goods to countries around the world. The solution: not to buy the goods and to buy only quality, and to try and buy from home. A hard task the Green Goddess knows--but how virtuous she feels in her merino underwear (!) (not scratchy) and her possum fur vest--avoiding petrochemicals in her clothing footprint.

As the Green Goddess contemplates the issue of embedded carbon in every product, she sips tea--the most noble of all beverages in her eyes. A beverage which provides solace even when considering this the most difficult of problems. A beverage discovered by a long ago Noble Dynasty from the Land of the Orient. The Green Goddess studies the tea leaves for further insight....