Tory McCagg's Blog

I’m looking forward to my speaking event at the Jaffrey Civic Center Friday (October 1). I hope you’ll check it out in person or by zoom!Everyone has a story! The Monadnock region is full of remarkable people with unique stories and experiences. The Jaffrey Civic Center is excited to announce that, starting this fall, it will be hosting a monthly speaker series on the first Friday of each month, October to May, titled “Stories to Share.” Each program will begin at 5:00 PM, with a reception starting at around 6:15, with light refreshments. The series, which begins on Friday, October 1, is made possible through generous support from our Exclusive Platinum Sponsor Belletete’s, Inc.Our first speaker will be Jaffrey resident Tory McCagg. Her talk is titled Growing Chaos, Healing Soil, Sowing Hope: Life at Darwin’s View. Tory will discuss her memoir and the path she took which led her to her unique lifestyle. She will share how things are going these days at Darwin’s View and what she envisions for the future. The talk will also focus on her life choices and their parallels to the world at large while emphasizing the themes of change, adaptability, and hope.Tory McCagg holds an M.F.A. degree from Emerson College, where her thesis and novel, Shards, won the Graduate Dean’s Award. In 1999, “Roots”—an early chapter from her novel Bittersweet Manor—was a semifinalist in the New Millennium awards VIII contest. In 2015, Bittersweet Manor was awarded a silver medal for Contemporary Fiction by Independent Publishers. In June 2020, she published her memoir, At Crossroads with Chickens: A “What If It Works?” Adventure in Off-Grid Living and Quest for Home.Tory is also an accomplished flutist. She and her husband Carl live at Darwin’s View where they practice an experimental life off-grid and on the land.In the upcoming months, our speakers will be Bob King on November 5, who will speak of the wonders of waterpower, the burgeoning renewable energy sector, related policy, and how all of this won’t solve the ecological crisis by itself.”On December 3, by Heather Ames will discuss connecting adoptees with their heritage as a way to strengthen their identity.Joe Steinfield, who writes monthly columns for the Keene Sentinel and the Monadnock Ledger-Transcript, will be the moderator. These programs are free of charge, however, to help support this event and others like it, donations are appreciated. Advance registration is strongly encouraged.To register for the in-person event go to: https://www.eventbrite.com/…/share-your-story-with-tory….If you prefer to participate via Zoom, please register here: https://www.eventbrite.com/…/virtual-story-to-share….

This is the press release from the Jaffrey Civic Center. I will be speaking there on Oct. 1 at 5PM. See details below. You can join in person or by zoom.

The Jaffrey Civic Center is excited to announce that, starting this fall, it will be hosting a monthly speaker series, October to May, titled “Stories to Share.” Each program will begin at 5:00 PM, with a reception starting at around 6:15, with light refreshments. The series begins on Friday, October 1.  

Our first speaker will be Jaffrey resident Tory McCagg. Her talk is titled Growing Chaos, Healing Soil, Sowing Hope: Life at Darwin’s View. Tory will discuss her memoir and the path she took which led her to her unique lifestyle. She will share how things are going these days at Darwin’s View and what she envisions for the future. The talk will also focus on her life choices and their parallels to the world at large while emphasizing the themes of change, adaptability, and hope.   

Tory McCagg holds an M.F.A. degree from Emerson College, where her thesis and novel, Shards, won the Graduate Dean’s Award. In 1999, “Roots”—an early chapter from her novel Bittersweet Manor—was a semifinalist in the New Millennium awards VIII contest. In 2015, Bittersweet Manor was awarded a silver medal for Contemporary Fiction by Independent Publishers. In June 2020, she published her memoir, At Crossroads with Chickens: A “What If It Works?” Adventure in Off-Grid Living and Quest for Home. 

 Tory is also an accomplished flutist. She and her husband Carl live at Darwin’s View where they practice an experimental life off-grid and on the land. 

In the upcoming months, our speakers will be Bob King on November 5, followed by Heather Ames on December 3.  

Joe Steinfield, who writes monthly columns for the Keene Sentinel and the Monadnock Ledger-Transcript, will be the moderator. These programs are free of charge, however, to help support this event and others like it, donations are appreciated. Advance registration is strongly encouraged. To register for the in-person event go to: https://www.eventbrite.com/e/share-your-story-with-tory-mccagg-tickets-167453561109. 

If you prefer to participate via Zoom, please register here: https://www.eventbrite.com/e/share-your-story-with-tory-mccagg-tickets-167456188969. 

The Jaffrey Civic Center is a 501(c)3 non-profit cultural facility founded in 1966. The mission of the Jaffrey Civic Center is to provide and sustain a public venue where citizens, residents, and visitors of the Monadnock region can pursue artistic, educational, and civic activities. The Center’s goal is to contribute to the cultural enrichment and enlightenment of the community. There is no admission fee to the Civic Center and all art shows and receptions are FREE and open to the public. The Center also hosts fee-based educational and other programs, as well as serving as the home to the Jaffrey Historical Society. 

 

 

For more information about the Jaffrey Civic Center: www.jaffreyciviccenter.com 

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Here’s a concerning article around organic milk.

Danone, owner of Horizon Organic, to terminate contracts with Vermont farmers

 

A very interesting video (13 minutes) about farmland and the mega wealthy.

 

 

The reason? It started with MailChimp not sending out my newsletters. That was frustrating. Then this website won’t accept or upload photos which, frankly, are far more interesting and beautiful than anything I might write. And quicker to do. Unless the website won’t accept or upload photos. Then came the implementation of Carl’s and my over-a-year long planning with Ecological Designer Dave Jacke. I had intended to post pictures as things developed. Show the before and after shots. Wouldn’t that have been cool? Unfortunately, this website won’t accept or upload photos. And I don’t have the brain space to sit and deal with it. Ditto MailChimp.

Funny how hiccups around technology (a.k.a. MailChimp and websites) can completely dam up activities like blogging. And I’d put so much effort into selling my book last year. Covid aside, the All Cooped Up Book Tour’s reading from the Chicken Coop was kind of fun, and the articles written allowed for connections that wouldn’t have happened otherwise.

All for naught? I think not! Because somewhere, simmering beneath the surface is a new idea, one that doesn’t have to do with the play I am working on but with chickens who, believe it or not, do not feature in that play. Because life is about balance and my last book was so much about chickens.

More when I can get back to pictures! Maybe sooner. But really. What is the world coming to if I can’t even show you the hundreds of photos of our grown up kittens, and eighteen chickens!

Is Gates doing good, or merely continuing the legacy of white domination and knowing best?

https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2021/apr/05/bill-gates-climate-crisis-farmland?utm_term=4b09a95d693105de8f2c021208592970&utm_campaign=GreenLight&utm_source=esp&utm_medium=Email&CMP=greenlight_email

Here is the link to the Monadnock Conservancy event that I participated in. My piece starts around 48 minutes 30 seconds. It starts out a black screen but eventually gets that good old pixilated Zoom picture.

I’m working on what I’m going to say next Friday at 6PM for the Monadnock Conservancy’s Zoom event “Stories About This Place.” Perhaps I’ll “see” you there.

You can sign up to attend at this link.

https://www.monadnockconservancy.org/news/event/stories-about-this-place-2021

I just hope we have a consistent connection!

Sun. Wind. Water. It’s all so old-fashioned and natural. But, as ever, in our 21st century, Anthropocene age, things don’t happen unless they are economic and convenient. The good news is that renewables are now entirely economic. In fact, this past April, renewables surpassed coal in supplying America’s electricity. How so? First, more wind and solar farms went on line. Second, some coal plants were idled for routine inspections. We needed more power and there they were, those renewables. What used to be fantasy has become a reality. And as the renewable sector grows, there will be more real jobs that put real money into our communities that gain robustness from that interaction. Because renewables happen close to home. Local power, local food, local connections.

But don’t get overly excited. First off, however retro and groovy renewables might be, have you already forgotten our creaky, aging infrastructure known as the grid? Renewables dumping all that power into it wrecks havoc because the grid isn’t adaptable (a.k.a. flexible) enough to take in and store all that fancy power. And then there’s the health and environmental costs of mining quartz (the foundation of the silica that is used in solar panels) and the energy used to make the solar panels, and the fuel of shipping those panels hither and yon. (As with everything, it’s complicated.⁠1 And⁠2 then consider the birds that go clunk into the wind mills. And the hydro-dams’ ruination of fish migration. And some of those biomass companies that promote wood pellets as “sustainable” aren’t using slash/waste wood but are cutting down lots and lots of old trees that had stored carbon but now, as they are processed and burned, create more carbon.

Then compare any of that to the effects and costs of one mountain taken out for coal or tar sands, one oil spill, one nuclear meltdown.

No regrets?

In 2009, G20 members signed on to phase out fossil fuels but every year they still spend $452 billion dollars to subsidize those companies,⁠3 and the USA is the top offender. No wonder Greta Thunberg is so sad and angry. Billions go to aid fossil fuel companies without consideration of the enormous cost to our earth. As E.M. Schumacher wrote in his book Small is Beautiful, we use nature as income, not capital. We are using her up. And then what? Now what?

Transitions. From winter to spring, directly to summer. Polywogs to toads and then the newts. Buds into flowers. Eggs into chicks. Bambis and thumpers bound about, pitching forward into life. These transformations happen. If you don’t pay attention, you miss the most heartbreaking beauty of life.

And death. That’s there, too. Sickness, and the pain of disease and dis-ease. Rising waters or drought. Extreme heat. The human population growing out of control and anti-abortion protests against a woman’s right to control her body.

Here we are. Scientists recently affirmed that we are in the above mentioned Anthropocene age. Human created. Depending on your perspective it is terribly ugly or spectacularly fabulous. No matter your perspective, it might soon be over. I’m not quite sure what to do with that information.

The below article by Dahr Jamail suggests a way forward. Fair warning: if you read it, prepare your heart. Be ready to breathe deeply and sit still with the information. Be ready to look into your soul, and ask, “What am I going to do?”

On every level—moral, ethical, sympathetic and parasympathetic—we must choose. To do nothing or to act. Either way, we make a choice.

We are in the midst of a transition, a massive, mind-boggling change. We have the ability and the tools and the knowledge to transform this horror into something that aligns with our potential. Think what we as a country have done: World War II. A trip to the moon. . . .

It matters how we act as individuals. Imagine if we come together, again, as a nation. There is no doubt, we can do it again. Every day. Every action.  And you can start by making daily phone calls to your representatives on a local, state and national level.

Do I get repetitive? I’m a bit at a loss. I don’t have enough knowledge on things energy. I only know what I am doing, we are doing here at Darwin’s View. Of that I will write more as we go forward.

https://truthout.org/articles/arctic-is-thawing-so-fast-scientists-are-losing-their-measuring-tools/

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1 https://understandsolar.com/solar-use...

2 https://spectrum.ieee.org/green-tech/...

3 http://priceofoil.org/fossil-fuel-sub...