Hey. I’m merging event announcements back into my main blog. I’m excited to be hosting these public events in the upcoming weeks, and I’d love to see you there. Saturday, April 5th: Clay Paint Workshop at the Cambridge Foundry The last one was a hit, so I’m stoked to be offering it again (and even… Continue reading My April & May Events
Author: Emily
Painting Without Plastic
My exploration into natural clay paints has been unexpectedly inspiring. I used to use acrylic paints. My last acrylic painting was in 2019, a large replica of a de Chirico oil painting I really love. Oil paints have been used for centuries, and are made of pigments suspended in a hardening oil, like linseed oil.… Continue reading Painting Without Plastic
Year Three of No Flying
My last flight was in the fall of 2021, so it’s really been about three and a half years, but this has become an annual holiday post and I like that (see Year Two and Year One for some throwbacks and more context). Speaking of holidays, I’m on vacation right now. Staycation. I finally decided… Continue reading Year Three of No Flying
What Have I Been Doing? (Life Update)
Over the past half year, I’ve started writing this blog post at least five times. I mean to update my friends on how my life is going: what my days look like lately. It’s changed so many times this year, and I don’t mean that negatively at all. But every time, I run out of… Continue reading What Have I Been Doing? (Life Update)
Save America’s Ecovillage
This time last year, I was biking through Western North Carolina and Eastern Tennessee, regions that have now been devastated by Hurricane Helene. It’s shocking to see pictures of charming mountain towns I recall riding through, now torn-up and buried by the flooding. One of those places is Earthaven Ecovillage, one of America’s longest-running (30… Continue reading Save America’s Ecovillage
Foliage
Fall has arrived, the season that calls us to look to the trees. Yesterday I went on a tree walk led by local herbalist (and former arborist) Alex Klein, our area’s “tree walker.” We meandered through a small stretch of the Jamaica Pond shore over the course of two hours. It’s not really a tree… Continue reading Foliage
Biking 1000 Miles Through Michigan
This June I completed my longest bike trip yet—one thousand and seven miles over thirteen days, starting near Detroit, looping around Michigan’s lower peninsula and ending in Cleveland, Ohio. The idea began way back in early spring when some new friends (also Community Rebuilds alumni) invited me to their straw-clay work party in Boyne City,… Continue reading Biking 1000 Miles Through Michigan
My Time In Moab with Community Rebuilds
I spent March and April as a volunteer/intern/work-trader at Community Rebuilds, a small nonprofit Moab, Utah, that builds energy-efficient houses to alleviate the housing crisis there. Some background: last year, as I prepared to embark, full-steam, on my journey into natural building, I came across Community Rebuilds (CR) online. They started in the early 2000s… Continue reading My Time In Moab with Community Rebuilds
Some Thoughts on Meditation
This morning I biked to Grandstaff Canyon to hike. At the soaring natural sandstone bridge that marked the end of the trail, I found myself alone for a short while, and sat on a flat rock to meditate. It makes for an idyllic picture, but the truth is that meditating under “America’s sixth longest natural… Continue reading Some Thoughts on Meditation
Stop Asking if It Scales
Point: “Big, global problems need big, global solutions. Big solutions spread fast, to lots of people: that is scalability. So scalability is a requirement for any solution that seeks to solve big problems.” Counterpoint: “Big, global solutions proposed are often ineffective, unfeasible, or counterproductive, because people and places are different. Any long-term solution is adapted… Continue reading Stop Asking if It Scales
