Dawn has twice been listed among the top 101 lawyers in Tennessee by Tennessee Business magazine.  In 2004, she was named an Angel in Adoption by the U. S. Congressional Coalition on Adoption.  She writes gorgeous poetry and fries a mean chicken liver, as well.

And now she’s saving mountains. 

 The bipartisan, non-sectarian organization Dawn co-founded in service of those mountains and people who live on them is called, LEAF.  LEAF has continued to make great strides in changing the hearts, minds, and votes of our state legislators, and I would like to share Dawn’s beautiful work with you.  

Dear Caretakers of Creation:

We have lots of news this week.

Good stuff first — LEAF is proud to officially announce a star-studded concert, Music Saves Mountains, sponsored by the Natural Resources Defense Council at the Ryman Auditorium in Nashville on May 19th, to raise awareness about mountain top removal coal mining. Dave Matthews and Emmylou Harris are the featured performers, with special guests, Kathy Mattea, (LEAF’s much loved celebrity spokesperson) Patty Griffin, Patty Loveless, Buddy Miller and more.  Tickets go on sale March 5^th @10 am.  Prices from $ 45-300. For details:

LEAF only gets 10 tickets or I’d send one to each of you. Buy yours early so no one gets left out. If you can buy extra to share with VIPS or friends of LEAF, please do. LEAF runs on a shoe string and has no budget for that. It is long past time for us all to get together and just have fun.  Pat Hudson, Pat Chastain, and I will be there with our families. Please join us.

Now to the most critical issue — at this concert in May, will we be celebrating the first legislative ban on MTR in the country or will we be commiserating? I don’t know, but I do know the next several weeks and the position of Lt. Gov. Ramsey are decisive.   Honestly, Ron Ramsey has been the roadblock from the very first year. I didn’t say that publicly until now in order to give him space to reconsider and join us. Lots of LEAFlets and our sponsors have met with him. He understands the issue and our openness to talk compromise. He remains willing to spend his substantial political capital to stop us.

I am often asked, “Who on earth could be FOR blowing up our highest ridgelines for coal?” In the TN legislature, it is Ron Ramsey in the Senate. The next question I’m asked is, “Why?” I’ll have to leave you to your own speculation on that. The reasons they state change like a kaleidoscope. Last week, Ron Ramsey insisted, in the face of photos of decapitated Zeb Mountain, that we don’t do mountain top removal in TN.  (SB 1406 doesn’t use the words mountain top removal anyway and only talks about a ban on altering or disturbing ridgelines. It’s all a matter of semantics. What Ron Ramsey seems to be referring to is TDEC’s requirement that the rubble of the mountain be piled back on top. Certainly that is better than dumping it in a steam which is currently allowed in Kentucky and West Virginia. But this should not be a race to see which state reaches the bottom first. 

We at LEAF believe that when a man destroys a mountain he exceeds his authority, and when he tries to recreate a mountain he exceeds his ability. Only God can create a mountain.

So what’s the plan? To make sure that if Tennessee loses its mountains we at least get the fingerprints of those responsible. Maybe shining a bit of light will shame folks into doing the right thing. Stay on Ron Ramsey. If we can’t move him we are going to lose. Call [615-741-4524]  write [Lt. Gov. Ron Ramsey  1 Legislative Plaza  Nashville, TN 37243-0219] and email [Lt.gov.ron.ramsey@capitol.tn.gov] at least weekly.  Ask Ramsey to cosponsor SB 1406. Ask your friends and pastor to do the same. Modify your letter to serve as a letter to the editor of your local paper. Talk with your friends. Ask them to help. Sample letters from some of you are on our website www.tnleaf.org.

Ron Ramsey is running for Governor. That makes all Tennesseans his constituents. He may become willing to discuss compromise if the political costs get to high. We are counting on you to help him see the number of Tennesseans who care about creation. Christianity has a long history of speaking truth to power, beginning with our Lord. Now is our time to be heard.

So how much time do we have? Not much. SB1406 must pass the Senate Environment Committee before the committee closes and then we’ll need time to get it through the House’s two-tiered committee structure. We don’t know for sure when the committees will close but it is likely to be in April, maybe even early April. We have about a month.

Here is what we are doing. We have posted a You Tube video of Ron Ramsey’s response to a question about mountain top mining before the Brentwood Chamber of Commerce Feb 18^th. We have added LEAF’s commentary. It is pretty pointed. Please view it and pass it on to others who may be interested. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=i-WNSIsZl1U

As you may recall, twelve very prominent scientists wrote a blockbuster paper in the journal Science in January establishing scientific consensus that MTR is a risk to human health and that the ecological damage caused is permanent and irreversible. (LEAF’s paraphrase — “Only God can make a mountain..”)

Two of those scientists are scheduled to testify in Nashville before the House and Senate Environment Committees on March 9^th.If you are inclined to watch on the internet or to visit Legislative Plaza to observe our legislators in action, March 9^th would be a good day to do that.

We are in Legislative Plaza every week talking with policy makers and looking for an opening. We are always pleased for you to join us. We also talk with the press to build awareness of the urgent nature of the situation. Look for new stories weekly. We will keep you updated by Action Alert, Face book and Twitter. Of course we continue our work with churches and educational institutions spreading the message of Creation Care. And we, like you, keep this effort and the mountains in our prayers every day.

Thank you for your support.
Dawn Coppock, Legislative Director, LEAF

O,

How long it doth take

To scrape a single tablespoon of peanut butter

Across the vast and arid plane

Of one whole-wheat matzos.

But the good thing is

That such a tiny,

tiny

layer of God’s Greatest Gift

Will not fall, yea:

Shall not even drip

From that blessed surface

Even if held upside-down.

Which is good

As upside-down is the only way to eat it,

Lest the tongue

Miss the blessing completely.

————————————-
(p.s. — but I *am* down 10+ pounds!  Hurray, Weight Watchers!)

They’re a heck of a lot of work, kids.

But how I do love peeking into their funny little brains, and fortunately mine both still let me do that via their Facebook pages. Here’s the latest:

Almostgotit’s son: has suddenly, really rather abruptly, become a huge fan of “Ticket To Ride.” Awesome song.

Almostgotit’s daughter: I try to learn something new every day. Today I learned that spinning around in circles greatly improves one’s chances of crashing headfirst into the dishwasher.

Our dog Jerry also retains certain violent feelings about dishwashers, so we clearly have some things to work out at my house.

Night time temperatures are dipping again this week, but Jerry the Rhodesian Fridgesnack has great pyjamas…

Red Cross in Haiti (2008)

Want to help the victims of the earthquake in Haiti?  Relief organizations need your help, but want donors to know that some kinds of help are definitely better than others.

InterAction, a coalition of U.S.-based international non-governmental organizations (including the Center for International Disaster Information)gives these tips:

• Cash donations are widely recognized as the most efficient and effective means of relief in the established international disaster response community.

• While they may be well-intentioned, clothing, canned goods, and other in-kind donations are *not* the  preferred choice for humanitarian contributions to Haiti.  Consider reserving these kinds of donations for needs in your local community.

• Donate wisely!  Make sure your money goes to a credible responding agency for international emergencies.  InterAction is regularly updating this list of  member agencies who are responding to the earthquake.  For more information about how to choose a legitimate charity, visit www.give.org.

 

Non-starters in this week’s news:

• Why was it wrong for Harry Reid to say that Obama’s light skin and standard American dialect helped him win the presidency? The fact is, our country wouldn’t have elected a man who looked or sounded too black because our country never elects presidents who look or sound too anything, much less anything that is also TOO NEW.  (For the record: I voted for Obama.)

• Nor do I understand what’s so shocking about Sarah Palin’s saying she believed that running for vice president had been God’s will. Is there anyone alive who has not yet heard that Sarah Palin believes in God?  So wouldn’t it be more interesting to find out that she’d accepted a nomination she believed was AGAINST God’s will? (For the record: I did *not* vote for Sarah Palin.)

• And now, Avatar the movie, one of the most beautiful things I’ve seen recently, is coming under fire, and from weirdly opposite directions. However, anything so wildly popular is going to be criticized, if only to help journalists pay the rent. (For the record: no one is paying me a cent.)

First criticism: Avatar as anti-military.  The narrator TELLS us at the beginning that “this was not the military: these were hired guns.”  It’s IN THE SCRIPT, people: this is not an anti-military movie, it’s an anti-corrupt-mercenary movie.

And let’s not forget that the Na’vi natives are just as vicious with their knives, arrows and Large Strong Animals as the humans are with their machinery… vicious enough that the Pandorans actually BEAT the humans, after all. And did any of us hate those battle scenes? I rest my case.

Then there’s the “Avatar as anti-American”  critique. What interests me most about that one is the way these critics would have us all define “American.”

If “American” equals “Unrelentingly murderous, sadistic capitalists,” then I’ve understood these critics correctly, but few will  agree with them.   The rogue Jake Sully is the American hero we identify with, not his employers. I would venture to say that most Americans, conservatives especially, believe that America is the land of the free.  We LOVE that about ourselves, and when we go to war, the reason most conservative Americans will give – and the principal that most Americans in general are particularly passionate about– is the preservation of freedom and democracy. 

Not that Americans are always very good at preserving freedom and democracy when they go to war, but it would be wrong to conclude therefore that the entire country is sadistic enough to make the destruction of freedom and democracy its central purpose. 

So if the conservative critics are wrong, how about the liberal critics?  Is this movie racist?   True: the hero is white, and most of the Na’vi are played by (and resemble) people of color. However, I can’t remember if the other humans in the movie were predominantly white or not, though the American military (my strongest model, as I too am American ) is extremely diverse — in fact, it is one of the most racially diverse populations in the world. Therefore, I don’t remember the human invaders in Avatar as “white” but  as “human.” But is even a human vs. Na’vi contest race-neutral enough, given that it took a member of the advanced, imperialist human race to save the naive, native Pandoran one?   But were the Pandorans really so naive,  were the humans really so advanced, and did Jake Sully really represent “A White Messiah?” 

Perhaps it would have been more graceful if Jake Sully had been played by a black actor. I am willing to concede that point: I didn’t pay much attention to Jake Sully’s race, but that alone may be telling. Perhaps we all could use some fresher imagery.

What I did notice was that a 6 foot tall familiarly-colored person fell in love with a 10 foot tall bright blue person, and that seemed pretty multi-cultural to me.  

I also watched Jake Sully roll around helplessly on the ground, leaving his Na’vi wife and Pandora’s native deity to make  the decisive moves in the final battle. Which, as I’ve pointed out, they win.  If Avatar is indeed racist, it seems to be the human race that takes the hardest knocks in this movie.

No matter what some critics are saying, people of all political stripes are flooding the theatres in record numbers to see Avatar.  The real question about the movie, therefore,  is what makes it so much fun to watch?

Some people play faster than others, even when you put them in charge of moving Jesus’ picture around while the rest of us are Making Stuff.

That’s why we had two projects on our weekend retreat: story boxes, and tchotchke Christmas wreaths.  That’s mine, at the top, a sort of “Where’s Waldo” deal except I called it “When Pigs Fly” instead.

There aren’t any rules for making these, really.  Which is good, because hardly any of us on the retreat are good at following the rules, anyway.

First, we found the cheapest wreath forms possible.  Which you might think were the styrofoam ones, eh, except that you would be WRONG.  The wire forms were cheapest.  So some of us padded them out with newspaper and masking tape, then wrapped fabric or ribbon around the newspaper before gluing on our junk drawer and dollar store tchotchkes.

ML made this one.  She’s a professional ARTIST, it should be noted.   So please note her particularly artful use of a meat thermometer.

ML is the one who came up with the whole tchotchke concept.  She  originally suggested covering a wreath with identifiable objects and then spray-painting the entire thing (cream or white, which she felt were more updated than the gold she’d used in previous years. )

The problem was, these were so silly and wonderful after we put them together that we couldn’t quite bring ourselves to paint them.  Maybe when I pull mine out again next year, I’ll do that…

T-of-the-tiny-gold-boxes took another approach altogether.  After wrapping fabric all around the wire around the outside edge of her wreath, she pasted paper fans to the middle, topping them off with little star and butterfly trim doo-dads.  We called this one “Fan Dance,”  which also happened to be the name of one of her daughter’s ensemble performances.

After all of this whacky creativity performed somewhat under the influence of alcohol (to calm the inner critics, of course), I’ve been in withdrawal ever since, in more than one respects.

On our holiday retreat, some of the women decorated boxes.  I brought along some plain paper mache boxes and some other gift boxes I’d saved.  

One friend decorated three tiny boxes with gold spray paint and things that reminded her of each of her three daughters. 

Another found a gift box with a celophane window and covered it inside out with upholstery samples she’d brought along.  She’s VERY clever that way.

Truevyne took her box apart and made a shadow box out of the bottom of it, which she called “Lipstick sexy icecream”  (correct me if I’ve got it wrong, True)

Truevyne turned the lid of her box into this nifty mini-bulletin board.  An old ear ring makes a terrifically decorative thumb tack.

Sadly, the high school math teacher’s amazing black story box was not complete at press time! 

Next: our tchotke Christmas wreaths!em>