Reading [listening to] Terry Tempest Williams’s essay collection Erosion: Essays of Undoing while building my retaining wall [and maybe doubling down on irony]. It is a transcript of a conversation between herself and Tim deChristopher before his 2011 sentencing after being found guilty of violations of the Federal Onshore Oil and Gas Leasing Reform Act.Continue reading “Impermanence, OR how to act when the future isn’t coming”
Author Archives: theoracleofz
On Freedom, OR: ‘Murica!
This is a post I wanted to write, or was mentally writing, on US Independence Day, but was not at liberty to sit down and actually write, which continues to strike me as ironic [kind of like everything about the American concept of “freedom”]. I don’t know what “freedom” is, or rather that is misdirectionContinue reading “On Freedom, OR: ‘Murica!”
Shoulder Seasons: lessons in non-attachment
I had been saving up lots of images and pearls of wisdom about gardening and permaculture in the inter-mountain west to write something about the Farm. Things had been going very well for over a month. Temperatures had been unseasonably warm, annuals were germinating on the their own from last year, the rhubarb was outContinue reading “Shoulder Seasons: lessons in non-attachment”
OMG Mother’s Day, again
A childhood friend of mine lost her mother to covid this year. I used to spend many weekend nights over at their house when I was in middle school. Her mother was always gracious and supportive of this odd, heathen child who said strange things at her dinner table. All day yesterday my idle mindContinue reading “OMG Mother’s Day, again”
#ActuallyAutistic Part 2: Masking, OR “you don’t seem autistic”
Y’all, my exhaustion is exhausted. The internet wants me to think that this is the brain fog of the late pandemic, and it isn’t not that, but it is actually a whole other thing for me personally. And that thing is called “masking.” Masking is the process of learning and implementing the behaviors required byContinue reading “#ActuallyAutistic Part 2: Masking, OR “you don’t seem autistic””
Animal Husbandry, OR Yes, I think we are going to eat these
On our urban farm we already have chickens, but these chickens are for eggs. Yesterday, we got chickens for meat. In some ways, thinking of the adorable balls of fluff cheeping under their heat light in our boiler room, it seems unthinkable that in September we are intending to turn them into chicken, the meat.Continue reading “Animal Husbandry, OR Yes, I think we are going to eat these”
#ActuallyAutistic Part 1: Autism Awareness/Acceptance Month
So…it’s April and that is Autism Awareness month. Perhaps you are aware that autism exists? Success! But actually no, not success because there are a lot of things about being autistic that still suck and very few of them are autism itself, they are mostly trying to exist as autistic in a neurotypical world. ForContinue reading “#ActuallyAutistic Part 1: Autism Awareness/Acceptance Month”
Retrospective
My new year begins on my birthday and not so much New Year’s Day the federal holiday. Part of this is because my birthday is very close to the spring equinox [in the Northern Hemisphere] and spring feels more “new” than two weeks after the winter solstice when we’re all exhausted and it’s too darkContinue reading “Retrospective”
Against Performative Productivism
Last Saturday, it was the weekend, ostensibly the time I get to rest from the trials of the week also known as the time of wage labor when I am unable to fully own myself. It becomes 5pm on Friday and I once again own myself. All the time that stretches out before me untilContinue reading “Against Performative Productivism”
A Prayer for Natives of the Internet in a Troubled Time
O Lord,* help me to remember that everyone on the internet is a narcissist, or a hypocrite, or a liar and that we all transparently sit in judgment of the choices of others at all times [perhaps especially myself]. And so, guide my fingers to backspace through the witty and cutting retort that is nearlyContinue reading “A Prayer for Natives of the Internet in a Troubled Time”
The Oracle of Z 