ColumnSome people experience overwhelming awe in church, some on magnificent mountaintops, some in elegant equations. But some of us tend to get “it” when witnessing stunning examples of our human footprint. If that sounds like you, you just might be a humanist—something with very down-to-earth implications.  

“I was blown away.” The phrase is used so often it’s a wonder we’re all not aloft. “Awesome!” A term so ubiquitous, you might find yourself yearning for the run of the mill. Indeed, if every OMG! were an honest-to-god conjure of what’s holy, His/Her/Its omnipresence would be completely and finally undeniable.

Of course it’s easy to pick on our culture’s most overused overstatements. (OMG aside, the above are certainly part of my vocabulary). But if we dial down the hyperbole for a moment and honestly think about the things that make us dizzily reach for the nearest handrail, we’re likely to learn a lot about who we are and what makes us tick.

Consider that second glance, the super serious one, that says, “No, really! I was blown away!” This usually features earnest and pleading eye contact that begs you to believe and embrace the gravity of what the speaker is gushing about. The subtext: “I’ve experienced something beyond words.” (So to speak.)

For most of us, the varieties of religious experience are evidenced as many. (I use the term “religious” advisedly, requesting some latitude from my fellow nonbelievers.) We know this because, hopefully, we know a variety of people. I, for one, have dear and respected friends who have been knocked off their horses by the Judeo-Christian King of Kings, both with and without the help of his also-divine son. Other believers I know have experienced more creedless, less-moderated Big Moments with what they perceive to be supernatural forces. Alas, such supernatural events have never happened to me.

Others tend to have their wow episodes in or considering nature, sitting on a mountaintop, watching the ocean’s waves or simply staring up at the vastness of the cosmos on a starry night. These happenings reportedly include a number of overwhelming sensations (smallness, bigness, existence, nonexistence, self, non-self) and a feeling of oneness with the universe. For a range of folks, from Buddhists to Gaians to Newtonians, our natural world offers up awe like candy, if we only take the time to look, pay attention and feel.

Unlike being touched by the supernatural, these natural episodes have happened to me. It would be something if they didn’t, living as I do in Northern California where a four-hour radius from my front door offers up glories like Yosemite and the shores of the Pacific. Over my lifetime, too, I’ve had the great fortune of experiencing marvels ranging from the Arctic Circle to the Gobi Desert. I’d have to be pretty thickheaded not to have been occasionally swept away. I, too, can be floored by the awe and joy of being a part of the universe and it’s clockwork workings, whether known, yet to be known or forever unknown. Yet despite its power, nature, per se, is not my biggest mind blower.

To Each His Swoon

The name of this column, HyperKulture, refers to a psychosomatic phenomenon that presents “rapid heartbeat, dizziness, fainting, confusion and even hallucinations when an individual is exposed to an experience of great personal significance, particularly viewing art.” In its debut, “In Swoon’s Way,” I wrote about a recent trip to Europe during which I had experienced a number of such events (healthily upright though I remained). Today, looking back at those moments and holding them up alongside similar events throughout my life, a pattern has emerged.

What sends my mind off its rails are the awesome things we humans do. (Yep. Awed. For real.) This goes back to what prompted my first swoon—Neil Armstrong setting foot on the moon (though this is probably a swoon-after memory of a memory given the fact that I was only 5 when it happened). In fact, I remain blown away by that historic feat; just conjuring it in my mind for more than few moments can make me dizzy and if I really push it, even a little teary. I mean, the dude left the earth and walked on the moon. WTF?!

Over the course of my lifetime, I’ve had a number of these man-made experiences. Visiting Atelier Brancusi, listening to the Beatles’ “Dear Prudence,” reading Leo Tolstoy’s “Anna Karenina,” enjoying a dinner once prepared for me by Chef Paul Prudhomme—all head-spinning. Even imagining indirect experiences—Lincoln’s Emancipation Proclamation, MLK’s Dream, the idea of Amelia Earhart taking off into the ether—can totally spin me out when I give them more than just passing thought.

Don’t get me wrong. It takes a lot for someone or some deed to set me off—and sometimes it’s unpredictable. Why did that Caravaggio at the Met that one day spike my BP and send me running out to the street for air when all the other masterpieces I saw before it left me relatively unshaken? And what was it about that one time at the Jefferson Memorial in Washington? Why was that visit so different than all the other times I stood inside its colonnade? Who knows what kind of perfect brainstorm has to occur to rock my world?

In any case, to my religious friends: Some of your prophets. Holy shit! The idea that actual people have had that kind of impact on the world? That their ideas would hold such power and sway? Wow, man. It still baffles me that the Buddha came up with what he came up with. And to my science-focused friends, about those elegant equations that so turn you on? Given that the math is way above my pay grade, it’s the scientists themselves who suffered and slaved to arrive at such beautiful truths who ignite my wonder. Newton. Einstein. Hawking. When I think about what these people accomplished and the impact they’ve had on how we live every day—oh my!

Yep. For me it’s the humans. How about you? Have you been set asunder by Homo sapien heroics? World-renowned feats of wonder aside, are there people in your life who have done the unimaginably awesome? Your grandfather’s charity? Your mother’s unconditional love? Your aunt who lived gracefully with disease and died with strength and dignity? Maybe the person with whom you shared your first kiss? For those of us who have this mortal-creature-based swoon pattern, may I suggest that perhaps we have—heaven forbid!—an ism.

Us and (Just) Us

There’s no simple, all-purpose definition of humanism. Its many facets include historical, academic and philosophical angles dating back to well before the term came into use during the early Renaissance. But for these purposes, let’s use one that seems to be recurring and general enough to get the job done: “A system of thought that focuses on humans and their values, capacities and worth.”

Of course, there’s nothing in those words about the type of “religious” experiences I’m speaking of here. In fact, most definitions of the philosophy (or worldview or whatever you choose to call it) allude to it being distinctly rationalist and secular (big draws for me). But if we can agree with the idea that there are instances of experience in our lives that at least seem to be transcendental, then perhaps it’s okay to go ahead and give humanism its religiousy due.

Einstein here: “The most beautiful emotion we can experience is the mysterious. It is the fundamental emotion that stands at the cradle of true art and science. He to whom this emotion is a stranger, who can no longer wonder and stand rapt in awe, is as good as dead, a snuffed-out candle. To sense that behind anything that can be experienced there is something that our minds cannot grasp, whose beauty and sublimity reaches us only indirectly: this is religiousness. In this sense, and in this sense only, I am a devoutly religious man.”

The great scientist was speaking broadly and, of course, addressing rapture emanating from far beyond our actions on the ground. And let’s be clear: No one would go so far as to call humanism a religion. But for those of us who ascribe to this philosophy in its secular form, we can indeed point to our very own swoons and appreciate our awesomeness in what some might go so far as to describe as a spiritual way.

However you characterize the idea of humanist rapture, if you’re going to go ahead and claim the ism there are ramifications of such a throw-down—there is no doubt a yang for this yin. While most definitions of the philosophy speak to our ability (and even inclination) to make the world a better place, there is another side of the equation that speaks to something darker about our ability to achieve.

Yes, our capacity for evil is awesome too. While there are heroes who can truly make us swoon, just watch and listen and know about the bullies, as well. The beheaders, the fundamentalists, the reactionaries—know that the visceral shudder you get when you see their “achievements” is just rapture turned upside down. We humanists can’t offload the sublimely destructive on a less-than-benevolent god, the weather or the downside of an equation. If you’re anything like me, this dark side of our awesomeness can be as mind-blowing as the brilliant side. Oh, the humanity—and the voodoo that we do.

Scott Adelson is EcoSalon’s Senior Editor of HyperKulture, a column that explores opening cultural doors to initiate personal change. He is also the author of InPRINT, which reviews and discusses books, new and old. You can reach him at scott at adelson dot org and follow him @scottadelson on Twitter.

Related on EcoSalon

HyperKulture: Beyond the Algorithms – Don’t Look Now, But You Are What You Click

HyperKulture: Multiple Personality Order – Embracing Your Inner Yous

HyperKulture: Living in the Past – You Can’t Go Back… Why Would You Want To?

HyperKulture: Making Space for Your Inner Homebody – A Case for the Great Indoors

HyperKulture: You May Ask Yourself, ‘How Did I Get Here?’ – The Pitfalls of Passion Drift

Images: Aldrin Apollo/Public Domain (top), Smithsonian Institution (middle), Footsteps on the sand from Shutterstock (bottom).

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I never knew how much I would regret not camping on a weekend jaunt to Yosemite. I’m reminded of it every second of the day as I feel the burning and itching sensation up and down my arms and other parts where the sun don’t shine.

I was attacked by bed bugs at the sprawling Yosemite Lodge, tiny hitchhiking demons the hotel saw the day I checked out. Combine them with the hordes of mosquitoes on the upper Yosemite Falls hiking trail, and you’ve got scads of unsightly scabby blotches that put Chicken Pox to shame. It’s so embarrassing, I should be exiled to a bed bug colony.

“We did locate a couple of the bugs in the headboard of your bed,” explained Anna, the sweet desk clerk who aided me when I begged her to fetch me Benadryl from the nearby clinic, explaining I was crazy allergic. I had come to the mountains to hike and roast marshmallows with my daughter’s school. I did not come to be food.

I never thought good old Yosemite would shelter pests imported by guests from New York or Europe. Recently, the bugs have been detected not just in hotel beds but also at department stores, and it has been suggested a decreased use of pesticides is causing the return. It’s a huge price to pay for trying to go poison free. Although there are some viable eco-friendly solutions if you find them in your own home.

The lodge, which is no Ahwahnee, seemed unaware of the bed bug problem when I called after noticing the bites. We are told infestation is not related to fleabags, but upon checking in, I did notice my room had a filmy layer of residue, the bedding was cheap and greasy (old spreads are magnets for germs) and I asked that they remove a stained chair which had a wet ring on the cushion. A hotel handyman with an uncanny resemblance to a dark haired billy goat plunged his face into the stained chair seat to sniff it, much to our amazement. “Nope, this doesn’t smell like urine,” he assured us.

As far as what was eating me, I had a few clues. The Bay Area isn’t listed on the top 15 US cities infested with bed bugs, but I know the critters hitch rides from one destination to the other, basically fiendish hobos that cling to luggage and clothing. For that reason, hotel guests have been warned by the experts not to unpack clothing or put anything out on the beds and to vacuum our bags and wash our stuff in hot water the moment we arrive home.

“Has anyone complained about bed bugs?” I asked the lodge, informed by the parade of recent articles on the resurfacing of the age old pests in hotels – including four star lodgings. I had heard you should never put your suitcase down on a bed, which I didn’t, and perhaps tote your own bed linens, which I didn’t. They said they didn’t know of a problem but a security person could drive me to their clinic for treatment. That is when it sunk in: I should be in the tent. Safe. Protected. Earthy.

Camping has always proven a good way to go at Yosemite, since it is cheaper than hotels ($60 for a few nights versus $200 a night at the Lodge) and you get to use your own sleeping bag, pillows, towels and air mattresses. Your canvas is sealed at night so no unidentified flying objects can invade. The biggest challenge is ensuring all of your food is out of your car and tent and has been bear proofed in a lock box.

Why didn’t I join my husband in the tent? Like many other national park visitors, I opted for the comforts of my own bathroom and shower and the convenience of a dining hall across the road. I opted for driving for six hours in traffic rather than taking a bus, opted for the droning sound of the idiot box to lull me to sleep rather than the subtle calls of the wild under the stars. I owe apologies to John Muir who would have recommended the camping route, and to Roderick Nash, my wilderness instructor at UCSB, who would be appalled by this story.

My dermatologist, Dr. Megin Scully, shot me in the tush with a steroid and dabbed nuclear strength cortisone ointment on my sores, saying it should be better by the next day. I went home and sucked down more Benadryl, soaked some more, and reapplied the ointment. This is my new routine. Have coffee, pack lunches for the kids, take meds, rub on ointment, and so on.

“You should try rubbing Vicks VapoRub on the bumps, that is what we Asians do,” I was told by a Filipino pest control guy back home in San Francisco, when I called to arrange a visit to make sure my home was bed bug free. He said Vicks clears up the problem right away. “We don’t call the doctor like you do, in America,” he said, laughing. Did I hear a smirk?

I asked my husband to run down to Walgreens and pick me up some of that Vicks. It did soothe the itching and perhaps will clear the swelling and redness in a few days. I have my bumpy fingers crossed.

Meantime, I reek of Vicks and am feeling awfully sorry for myself. And like any victim of a health crisis, I keep asking, why me? Why me, with the broken middle finger from boogie boarding that now also features a big red bite that I cut open while driving? If there is a god, why did he make bed bugs and mosquitoes, and why do they choose me? Sound familiar?

The answer lies somewhere in the deep unknown, a mystery as difficult to solve as reaching the top of precarious Half Dome. I now realize that opting for a hotel visited by the masses is a slippery slope that should be avoided by those not fully armed with their own bedding, insect repellent, a mosquito net, and a canister of Terminix.

I think you will agree, it all makes pitching and taking down a tent seem effortless and putting up with dirty hair an acceptable flaw when doing the nature thing for a few days. Maybe the bed bugs are trying to tell me something. “You’ve got to get yourself back to the garden,” they’re singing, sounding a lot like Joni Mitchell. Hey, shut up, stop bugging me. The Vicks girl gets the picture.

Images: Paul Lowry; National Park Reservations;Luanne Bradley

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He’s baaack!

You’ve all heard of Richard Pombo, right? For 14 years, he represented a real-life version of the smoke monster from Lost to environmentalists everywhere. The Tracy, CA cattle rancher was even given a cute nickname by President George W. Bush: “The Marlboro Man.” From 1993 to 2007 Pombo represented the 11th Congressional District, which runs from Morgan Hill to Danville along the east side of I-680, including farm towns like Manteca and Lodi.

So why is he so toxic?

Pombo introduced bills to expand offshore oil drilling (“Drill, baby drill!”), rewrite the Endangered Species Act (“Die, Bambi, die!”) and increase logging on public lands (“Fell, baby, fell!”). He even advocated more commercial whale hunting (I guess dolphins and baby seals weren’t big enough game), and infamously that environmental regulation “owes more to communism than to any other philosophy.” Seems reasonable. I could swear the last time I went hiking that the wind in the willows seemed to be whispering Marxist propaganda at me.

Then came 2006. Environmentalists spent more than $1 million to help Democrat Jerry McNerney, a former wind energy executive, upset the rootin’ tootin’ pollutin’ Marlboro Man. But this week it appears that Pombo will be coming out on top and reinvigorating his political career – and worse, his political agenda. He’s running in the Republican primary in what may be California’s hottest congressional race of the June 8 election.

His district will include, wait for it, Yosemite National Park. That sound you’re hearing is a thousand woodland creatures screaming collectively.

Pombo and the other three candidates, state Sen. Jeff Denham, R-Merced; former Fresno Mayor Jim Patterson; and Fresno City Councilman Larry Westerlund, have similar positions on the issues. They all have angled for lower taxes, an overturn of President Barack Obama’s health care law, and new rules to waive the Endangered Species Act to allow more water to be pumped to farmers from the Sacramento-San Joaquin River Delta. Can’t evolution of flora and fauna be stifled by the law? What good is lawmaking anyway if it can’t put limitations on everything, even nature?

The Stetson-donning Pombo, has stated that if elected, he’d not only start with 14 years seniority, but with insight into how Congress works, particularly when it comes to water and wildlife laws.

Here’s something to chew on: If the GOP wins back the House in November, Pombo has said that by January he could be chairman again of the powerful House Natural Resources Committee. Perfect!

“This is a tight race,” he said. “The state, the Central Valley, doesn’t have a lot of time. We’re in trouble. We need somebody who is going to be effective immediately. That’s what I bring to the table.”

What are greenies doing about this? Not much, I’m afraid. (Really, with this kind of threat to the environment, how can anyone not be afraid?) The Defenders of Wildlife Action Fund has spent around $65,000 on radio ads calling Pombo “another corrupt politician.” (Been there, done that, guys.) The Humane Society Legislative Fund has distributed thousands of mailers – which is kind of counter-intuitive if the mailers are not printed on recycled paper, which you just know Pombo and his ilk will call out. And the League of Conservation Voters put Pombo on its “Dirty Dozen List,” normally reserved for sitting members of Congress – do they not realize that The Dirty Dozen is the title of a movie starring Lee Marvin, Ernest Borgnine, Charles Bronson, Jim Brown, John Cassavetes, Telly Savalas and Donald Sutherland – precisely the kind of “man’s men” that deems the classification a compliment?

“Having Pombo represent a district that includes Yosemite National Park is like electing Godzilla as mayor of Tokyo,” said Warner Chabor, CEO of the California League of Conservation Voters. No, Warner, it’s not. Godzilla was a stranger in a strange land. Richard Pombo is a danger in endangered land.

During the campaign, he has caught controversy for once taking money from disgraced lobbyist Jack Abramoff and also for billing taxpayers $5,000 after taking his family in 2003 on an RV trip of national parks. I mean, come on. Californians, when you vote in this election next week, take a look outside your window and hum the “This Land is Your Land” tune. When you do that, remember that those lyrics are little more than Communist what’s-mine-is-yours propaganda. Do you like the view from your den? Enjoy it now, because it’s about to become Marlboro country.

The post The ‘Marlboro Man’ Returns to Ruffle Green Feathers appeared first on EcoSalon.

Feral Childe is the bi-coastal collaboration of designers Alice Wu and Moriah Carlson (respectively of Oakland, California and New York City). Based in Brooklyn with the collection produced in New York City, Feral Childe is a fresh take on the symbiosis of comfortable and forward-thinking styling mixed with almost poetic graphics and lots of color.

Their spring 09′ Collection, called Yosemite, is inspired by the natural world there: from the 3,000 foot, towering El Capitan in the heart of the park to crackling campfires and Alice’s first visit to Yosemite after moving to the Bay Area in 2006.

Easy-to-wear shapes are patterned out of organic cotton chambray, hemp cotton, tencel and silk modal jersey while oversized textile prints are designed by Feral Childe and hand-printed in Brooklyn. Each step of production is done locally with the dye house, printers and the cutting and sewing done in the historic Garment District in Manhattan.

The designers claim that their collections are in line with the philosophy of making do with what is at hand, and true to the label’s name – “Feral,” meaning wild and untamed, and embodying the spirit of survival in the big city; and “Childe” for the playful, narrative references that make the theme for each collection a story or a place.

I just love the fact I can wear a collection named after a place out west.

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