To celebrate the glimmer of hope that is the Waxman-Markey bill to address global climate change (and the loss of biodiversity, economic stability, shorelines, etc. that will come with it), I bought more plants today.

Ok, that is not actually true. It was just a coincidence that today I was finally able to get to the 50% off sale at the Linder's popup a few miles north of my house. The garden is already pretty full, and I wasn't sure where I put be able to put these things, but I picked up: a coneflower, a gallardia, and packs of snapdragons, petunias, and poblano peppers. I still don't know what I'll do with the white petunias.

The coneflower and gallardia have been planted. There is a thin stretch of grass between the driveway and the neighbor's yard (with a chain-link fence). These were planted a few feet in front of two tree stubs. The roots of one (an American Elm that got the disease and thus got the ax a few years ago) got in my way a bit, but thankfully I had a troweling tool that was able to hack through and get me a big enough hole. I'll have to remember to put up pictures once they get bigger. In the meantime, how about the bleeding heart that keeps getting bigger every year (from mid-May)...

The op-ed, Is My Marriage Gay? in the New York Times (5/11/09), describes the unusual state of affairs surrounding marriages where one partner has legally changed gender after the marriage was recognized by the state. The country is patchworked with statutes and laws that make such a marriage anywhere from fully recognized to partially tolerated to anathema. And this makes no sense to me, except in recognizing that people are afraid of what they do not know. Well, go hug a transgendered person today (in person or virtually if that's what it takes). Get to know her or him.

Elements in the U.S. have been eager to make sure that only the right kinds of people can marry each other. This determination is based on "tradition" and religious belief. These should have limited or no role in governance. If "tradition" were allowed to define governance, we would still have blue laws that kept everything closed on Sundays; women would not be allowed into the voting booth; and African Americans would still be kicked to the curb in the North and enslaved in the South. Tradition is important: stare decisis when there is no reason otherwise. But when it comes to expanding freedoms and looking out for the well-being of all its citizens, governments should be willing to stand up against the oppression of a few and put tradition aside. To quote the Prof. Boylan's op-ed:

"Whether a marriage like mine is a same-sex marriage or some other kind is hardly the point. What matters is that my spouse and I love each other, and that our legal union has been a good thing — for us, for our children and for our community."

In February I began reading Rushdie's Midnight's Children — a strange sort of historical fiction —but a trip in early March inserted Orhan Pamuk's My Name Is Red before I could finish. Two things I've loved about Rushdie, at least in the two novels I've read: his use of the English language, and his ability to credibly, smoothly bend reality into an absurd yet moving other world. In these he is master. These are so clear that I won't dwell on them (ok, that's actually because my wife has the book up at work so I can't refer to it for examples).

As someone who is passionate about both interfaith cooperation and environmental action, I couldn't help but be struck by the project in Uganda that was highlighted in the recent URI Voice of the Youth newsletter. Today's New York Times has an article about the importance of solar cookers for mitigating the impacts of global climate change. It should have also touched on the problem of cooking & heating being a major factor in causing deforestation, and hence in resource conflicts.

• Love and Rockets - So Alive
• Sisters of Mercy - My Lucretia
• The Cure - Charlotte Sometimes
• Joy Division - Dead Souls
• Echo & Bunnymen - Killing Moon
• Bauhaus - Bela Lugosi's Dead

If a new law passed by Afghanistan's Parliament, and supported by its President (Hamid Karzai), is anything like the critics claim, then it is a sad day for women in Afghanistan. The document has not been published, but those who have read it –such as critical members of Parliament, and the United Nations Development Fund for Women –say that it will roll back women's rights to a state worse than under the Taliban. This should not be tolerated by the world agencies and governments that are supporting post-Taliban Afghanistan. Our governments and agencies must speak out against this deplorable law.

Got out to the car on Thursday morning, looked up into our postage stamp yard, and there was the retaining wall, in pieces in the yard. Extremely minor personal tragedy, or opportunity for growth and development? Both.

The retaining wall in summer of 2008

The retaining wall yesterday

Labels can be useful. Obviously they can also become ridiculous and pigeon-hole us into camps of undeviating ideology. But if the usefulness is doubted, just think: which evokes the stronger reaction?

1. John, Paul, George, and Ringo, or
2. The Beatles