Fog City Living

 In this lesson, Daniel talked about the reality of believing that the category of non-human person encompasses plants and fungi. His voice is so soft and manner so gentle that it cushions the impact of his words which are: to live is to kill. We eat the bodies of other beings in order to power our life. So, in a way, it does not matter if you are eating cousin Rabbit or cousin Kale - they are both people and both give their lives for your sustenance. To presume to create hierarchies of worthiness (eating animals is killing but eating plants is not) is a mental dodge to escape the uncomfortable truth that we live because others die. He also invited us to understand that our relationship with our food is not a one way street and the fact that the plant and animal others die for us to consume is a fact without moral judgement inherent in it. It is human-centered thinking to assume that humans are always the ones choosing the relationship and that the relationship is always us exploit...

This week’s lesson was a fairly low key entry into the new practice I’m hoping to build. Basically, the instruction was to start talking out loud more regularly to the non human people in our lives. So, as I’ve been going around my house taking care of my house plants, I’ve been trying to more consciously greet them. This is something that I think a lot of people do, at least some of the time, especially if they have plants in their home so it wasn’t so difficult to begin. I started something like this a couple of months ago when I resolved to try and connect with a tree in the park. That experience inspired a poem; my houseplants don’t seem to be quite that communicative but it certainly makes me more mindful of their health if I think of them as tiny beings who work with me to provide beauty and clean air in exchange for a kind word and some water.  In trying to more regularly talk to the plants in my home, I realized that I have a lot of resistance to the idea of talking to my p...