Back to Truth...

My lone post on this "third version" from a couple months ago really left me thinking, and actually I have to thank you guys for responding because there were a lot of great things said in the comments section. That, coupled with this past term on my way to a BA (Hopefully by the Fall of '10?), is what has kept me from posting and also responding. But with some new perspective I'm going to give my response.

I had said that "we all have our own truth", and unfortunately the rest of that post didn't delve deeply enough into that statement and it made me seem too passive. I stressed a link between pride and truth, and although there are ties, that isn't the place I wish to have gone. But, I do stand by that statement.

Truth is based on perspective which is based on morality which comes from either religious, scientific or a mixture of the two belief systems which are rooted in what a set of people have decided are conditions that some or all humans or other animals should be able to live by. And yes this is a cycle, morals influence religion or science also, but still the basis of all truth is our moral foundation. Not a single decision made, in the end, really matter unless you have a certain set of moral codes or beliefs.

This is where I was going, and it's important to say that I have my own moral beliefs that cause me to believe that probably most of what the "Bushwack" guy thinks and does are wrong. It wouldn't be worth living a conscious existence without a set of principles and standards or truths. But nature has no truth, nature has no set of religious or scientific principles, and to find truth is to separate ourselves from nature.

Now obviously, you may find fault in my assessment, after all my hypothesis isn't any good at all without someone telling me I am wrong. But let me finish with one last thought: isn't truth and morality just a means to no end, a way for us to continue our species in a manner that certain individuals or collectives or people have determined is best. I think that social injustices are horrible detriments to our human race, and I believe that preserving the environment is necessary to continue human existence on the planet. I believe these things like you do because of a certain quality of life that I wish to maintain. But to the earth do these things really matter? To the universe? I don't know, everything will still go round, moon around the earth, the earth around the sun, the solar system through the galaxy and so on...

Update: I quickly wanted to tie this conversation up with my reasoning behind the importance of realizing, at least for myself, that truth is human based.

Truth can lead to very disastrous consequences, Nazi Germany, global warming, you name it and personal or collective truth is probably a direct cause. But if we don't recognize that no one person's truth is above anyone else's there is no way to to fix these perceived problems. We need a collective voice full of everyone's truths to advance and improve quality of life.

It's important to recognize that you are not completely right most of the time. Jim, Todd, Tim, Beth, Bushwack, Dez, dad, self, etc... Self-righteousnos does not not solve anything, and personal arrogance is more often destructive than not regardless of the best intentions. We all have the best intentions.

I am a vegetarian

Well, that statement isn't entirely true. Actually I am a pesco-vegetarian, one who eats fish but no land mammals, and I have been for over half of a year now. Hmmmm, that's not entirely true either, I've had exactly one bite of poultry or some other land mammal maybe 5-6 times in the past 6 months, and I had a meatball at my grandmother's when I was home on vacation. And I have eaten a handful of marshmallows in the past few months. So I guess you can call me a pesco-pollo-meatball-marshmallow-itarian. This labeling system can get a little crazy. I feel like a vegetarian, and I have a diet almost completely consisting of vegetables, legumes, fruits, some seafood, and some dairy that is all grown and produced locally or at lest regionally. Also these products are purchased either at farmers markets or the local co-op. But in many circles, I still might not be considered a vegetarian, and sometimes this bothers me. Sometimes I don't feel like part of the club.

This labeling system based on diet is one of many that we give ourselves so that social groups can accept us. Let's see... what am I?

I am a:
White-Male-Straight-Italian-American-Secular-Liberal-Democrat-Cyclist-Accountant-Vegetarian

And look how proud my people are.

Where does this sense of pride come from? Really, if we think about it, it's a feeling of privilege, of feeling that we are better than those who don't meet the same classifications. Why is that ok?

Now, don't get me wrong, it's helpful for my relatives to hear that I am a vegetarian, because then they know that I am not going to eat their baked chicken. And yes for identification purposes I am a white male. But why do we take these general descriptions of ourselves so seriously? How many social problems are caused by doing this?

Before you come at me with an argument for why you are proud to belong to one of these groups, understand that I too get excited because I know the benefits to myself and the earth of being a vegetarian, I know why I am a liberal, and I know that living the cyclists life has many, many advantages. But the thing is that every meat eating, conservative, SUV driving person does as well, and they have their own reasons for thinking that I am wrong. And no matter how foolish I believe those reasons are, they are very personal reasons and who am I to judge them and tell them I am right... everyone has their own truth.

All I'm getting at is that maybe we should stop putting so much weight into these labels and start realizing that we are who we are. I'm not vegetarian, I'm not a pesco-vegetarian, and I'm not a pesco-pollo-meatball-marshmallow-itarian. I'm Sal, and I'm very happy to be me.

Welcome to Version 3

Hey all,
After over 1 year, I'm back and ready to get rolling. My format has changed a bit, you'll notice the new look. Also, I won't be writing much about my own personal life, or anything regarding my favorite sports teams. No, I'm sticking strictly to social commentary, and I'm hoping to really get some conversations started on here so please leave your thoughts in the comment section, I'd love to read and respond to them.

Also, I'll be setting up an e-mail address for any suggestions or questions that readers would rather not ask in the comments section.

I'll be back either later tonight or tomorrow morning with my first post.

-Sal

Edit: Also, there might still be changes going on to the site as I get going, I'm still tweaking things but I'm ready to start writing. -Sal

Edit 2: I chose to delete all of my previous posts except for 3. I just couldn't stand to get rid of those three posts, so if you have the time and would like to go ahead and read them, or re-read them. They aren't going anywhere. -Sal

I'm bad-ass too!

Editors Note 7/25/08: Since this time the bike that I talk about has been stolen and I currently own 3 bikes. 2 Klein bikes, each purchased used by me for $1000 a piece and one fixer upper Cannondale.I commute to work everyday and have attempted numerous long rides including 2 hundred mile rides. It's safe to say, I'm bike crazy.

I want to ride my bicycle
I want to ride my bike
I want to ride my bicycle
I want to ride it where I like

I just went on an afternoon bike ride with a co-worker and I feel so great.

About a month ago I bought my bike and I've been riding it to and from work everyday since. It's about a 3 mile ride each way, so a pretty easy and short ride. It only takes 15-20 minutes each way, compared to a 40 minute bus ride. Also, it's hundreds of dollars cheaper than a car and is only about 5 minutes longer a ride than driving a car.

Kayla (my sister) was my motivation for riding. She is the most bad-ass person that we all know and we tell her so too. She rides this little cheap children’s BMX bike that's probably 10 years old. It's falling apart, the handlebar brakes don't work, she pops tires left and right because she rides on the sidewalk (even though she isn't supposed to), it's rusted out, and it weighs a ton. Kayla has also been hit by numerous cars and has brought this damn thing across the country and back. The bike probably cost her less than $50. We tell her everyday that she should get something new but she has the Costello stubborn gene in her, so she needs to be right and refuses to admit defeat even though it's clear to everyone that her bike is complete garbage.

So after months of talking about getting a bike I finally did. It's a $600 bike from REI that cost me $400 because it was a 2006 model. I opted to buy a new bike instead of a used one for two reasons:

1. REI has a 100% guarantee on everything they sell to members of their co-op, of which I am a part of. This means in 2 years I can tell them I don't like the bike anymore and get my $400 back towards a new one. This works, they don't even ask questions, and you can do it anytime. My friend Lauriel returned boots 4 years after she bought them originally and they gave her a full refund.

2. I really wanted something I could rely on for a long time. I'm going back to school in the fall and so my funds are going to be tight again, so I want something I can depend on.

I've loved the freedom of having my own form of transportation again. I haven't had this freedom since I last owned a car, about a year and a half ago. I have to say I missed it.

I'm Sick

I haven't posted in over a week, which really isn't a big deal when you consider the last stretch of non posting was about 8 months, but I assure you there will be multiple posts today. Why? Because I am sick and staying home from work, so what else am I supposed to do? Also, I have a whole bunch of thoughts just floating around in the old noggin after this week, and so I need to open them up to the world... or to Todd, Tim and Michelle (who, I would assume, are the only folks who take the time to read this shit).

So right now I'm sitting at La Crema, a coffee shop about 5 blocks away from my apartment. I just had some quiche and a Mexican mocha latte and I'm just thinking... WOW! I took a sick day and I am out of my bed, out of my house, and it's ok. No trouble here. It's very weird to me, I haven't really taken a sick day from work or school since high school. That was almost 5 years ago! Sure I've been sick, but I've never in that time taken a day off because I was sick. Sure I've skipped classes in college and taken personal days in AmeriCorps, but really I haven't actually called in sick to work for 5 years.

When I did stay at home because I was sick in high school I felt obligated to stay in bed. That is what was expected by my mother. But today I'm out at a coffee shop on my computer. This is a new step in adulthood for me.

This new step is helping me reflect on where I've come in the past few years.

5 years ago I was just graduating high school and I had virtually no real direction in life. I was going to be a computer science major, I don't even know why. I guess just because it was something I knew a little bit about and showed a bit of an interest in. I really didn't know anything yet. Really I don't know if I was ready to go to college right after high school. I had no real reason or motivation in life at the time. I don't know why. It always seemed like my friends in high school knew what they wanted (for the most part they actually did, isn't that weird, how often does that happen) but I never did.

So I spent a year and a half in community college barley scraping by and highly uninterested by what I was doing and where I was living. I remember sitting in my room night after night trying to imagine a future for myself, but I really had no clue as to what that would be.

Everyone knew I was unhappy with where I was going. My grandfather kept pushing for a change in major. He and my grandmother thought I should be a theater major like my friends. I was slightly more interested in that but knew it was only because of my friends that I was even considering it. It wasn't right for me and I knew it. My father caught wind of this and instead tried to persuade my to go into the Peace Corps. I didn't know anything about it and was honestly very scared about leaving home for an extended period of time, so I looked for a way to let my father down carefully, I found that there was a bachelor degree required.

My father is not easily dissuaded though. He found AmeriCorps and suggested it to me. Hesitantly I agreed to apply, not sure what I would do if I got in.

This was a very important and sometimes turbulent time for me. I had a girlfriend, Caity, who was very in love with me. I also had some very close friends that I knew if I left, I would probably grow apart from. I also knew that I needed to do something about my life. AmeriCorps was my only option at that time, I needed to learn more about life.

I think that's something some people don't understand about me back at home. I needed to leave. That was my only option, I had no motivation in life, no direction, and I didn't truly care about anything. I needed to believe in something, in myself. Everyone else was moving forward in their lives and I was stagnant in mine. So I left and I fell in love with being gone. I fell in love with being part of a community that cared more about American progress than about who was getting voted off of American Idol.

Anyways, back to my story, AmeriCorps NCCC was a huge step for me. Being in a completely different part of the country and doing service for communities for 11 months made me realize how much more was out there and that I didn't just have to live and then die. There is actually a whole bunch that you can do in between. Actually after that year I enjoyed Habitat for Humanity so much I wanted to be a carpenter.

After my first year I went back with the plan that after Christmas I was going to move down to South Carolina with my friend Brain and build houses for a volunteer organization. This was a great plan except that it never happened. The friend that promised the job fell through and left
us in a tough spot. So I decided to move out to Denver with no plan. I was just going to find a job and a place. Maybe I would eventually go back to school. One month into living on my friend's couches an opportunity to do another year of AmeriCorps came up and I took it. This was all the way in the northwest, where I had never been.

I was an environmental education team leader who knew nothing about the environment, and looking back, wasn't much of a leader either. But I learned about the environment and developed some of the strongest relationships I have ever had in my life. After that year I knew I was ready to live on my own, but I was still missing something.

Back home I went for 6 months. I was ready to go back to school. I knew the direction I wanted to go finally. I did a semester back at home, finally enjoying learning for the first time in my life. This is no joke, I have never enjoyed going to class as much as I did that last semester back at home. I was taking classes that I liked and even the ones I didn't have any interest in I still excelled at. In June I moved out here, to Portland.

I have settled back into "normal life" in the past few months, but this is temporary only until school starts in the fall. Now I have goals, I know how to reach them and know to expect sudden changes in those goals at anytime. This is what I was searching for 5 years ago, being an adult.

None of this might have made sense to anyone but me. Hell, maybe no one will even make it all the way through this post. But I'm sick so cut me some slack.

Great Profits, Oil, and Us

The news this morning of a 49% profit increase for Chevron is sure to enrage a lot of people today. This obviously is due to the dramatic increase of gas prices in the latest weeks, but what is the excuse for this, why are oil companies recording record profits while our gas prices are going up and soccer moms around the country are paying $70 to fill up their huge SUV's.

What you aren't being told from the majority of the mainstream media, and what most oil companies are keeping secret is the coming oil crisis. We are reaching a critical time in our society, where supply is getting much closer to being shorter than demand, this is called peak oil.

Remember in the seventies (I don't, I wasn’t born yet) when we had a similar problem and gas prices went through the roof. That was because at the time a majority of our oil supplies came from our country, and our demand was too much for our supply. What was the solution; get more oil from the rest of the world. Well this time the supply from the rest of the world is getting too small from the still increasing demand. This means there is no chance of going back; as long as our demand keeps increasing we will never see lower gas prices.

US Oil Demand

World Oil Demnd

What are the solutions, what will replace oil, what about the Alaskan Wildlife Refuge?

I'll start with the refuge. It's true that there are billions of barrels worth of oil up in Alaska, but before you sign on you should know some things:

-At our current rate of demand the oil would only last about 6 months before it was depleted
-On average after oil is found it takes 10 years before it's actually usable and we will see it in our gas tanks
-over 1,000 scientists say that the effect on the caribou could be tremendous, forcing thousand to migrate to other areas where they are much less likely of surviving

This would be a short term solution at best.

So what are the solutions? I'll summarize it in three words, "There aren't any". This actually isn't totally true. Most likely we will have to find a combination of alternative energies, but there is not one single alternative energy that scientists have found that can meet our current demands.

What does this mean? It means that we have to curb our consumption of almost everything. Corporations like Wal-Mart that rely on wide distribution are going to be in huge economic troubles, which means higher prices, which means that you will have to stop buying all of the useless shit that you get from there. We will see ourselves coming together again in our communities, start growing some of our own fruits and vegetables, and maybe learning a lesson or two about the environment.

The peak in oil isn't coming, no, it's here already and we have to get ready for some possible changes to the way we live our lives.