May-June 2007
Earth Friendly Friday -
June 8 - "Summer Solstice Celebration" to feature live music, pot-luck
supper
This month's Earth Friendly Friday (June 8,
6:30 PM) will be a celebration of the coming of summer, including a
pot-luck supper and old-time acoustic music by The Wild Turkeys.
Bring a covered dish, and enjoy fellowship, food, fun and fantastic
music!
Our guest artists, The Wild Turkeys, play a
style of music called "old-time", which is the foundation for bluegrass
music. It's a traditional, rural sound that used to be heard throughout
the mountains at community dances, on the porches and in the parlors of
their homes. Today, it's more likely to be heard at fiddlers conventions
and gatherings.
The band got together about eight years ago to
play a gig with the Hoorah Cloggers, a Blacksburg dance group. They had so
much fun, they decided to stick together for that summer to compete at
fiddle festivals and conventions in Virginia, North Carolina, and West
Virginia. As the band's sound developed, so did their friendships, and
they've been together ever since.
All the members of the band can play several
instruments, but in their performances, Cindy Cook takes the lead on
fiddle, Greg Galbreath plays banjo claw-hammer style, Jim Barnhill plays a
drivin' guitar and Frances West holds down the bottom on standup
bass.
Besides festivals, The Wild Turkeys play
concert performances and private events, but they especially enjoy playing
for dancers, and they love it when their music gets people on their feet.
If anyone has ever been to the Floyd Country Store for the Friday Night
Jamboree you'll know what we're talking about!
"The Wild Turkeys" CD will be available for
purchase at this event. It features 20 cuts of irresistible old-time music
and ballads.
Everyone is welcome, and admission is
free! The only requirement is you bring a covered dish, baked goods,
or something to add to the feast (please arrive by 6:30 with your covered
dish). Some beverages will be provided, or you can bring your own,
including beer/wine.
Earth Friendly Friday (EFF) is a monthly program series to celebrate
the natural wonders of the earth and to mobilize our community for needed
action to protect our environment. This series is sponsored by the
Roanoke Sierra Club and the Environmental Concerns Committee of the
Unitarian Universalist Church of Roanoke.
LOCATION: At the UU Church, 2015 Grandin Rd., Roanoke (at Brandon Ave.,
across from PHHS).
DATE/TIME: June 8, 2007 6:30 PM, Bring covered dish; music
will start approximately 7:00 PM.
Earth Friendly Friday - July 13 "The Power of the Sun"
"And now for something completely different . .
. " Those immortal words, and many other catch-phrases and comic routines,
catapulted John Cleese and his Monty Python cohorts to international
stardom in the early 1970's. So naturally, we expected that “The
Power of the Sun” would be replete with chuckles while illuminating us
about this important source of energy. Well, to our mild
disappointment, it is not.
But to our absolute delight, we found that this
56-minute film is perhaps the best available on this subject, telling the
story of solar energy from the perspective of the science, the history,
the implementation, and the future potential.
The film is a scientific morality tale: how,
starting from the most pure and basic science, through stages of brilliant
applied science and engineering, there emerges one of the most promising
multi-billion dollar technologies to help deal with one of the great
challenges of our time: energy. That is, finding economically viable,
clean, renewable energy sources that do not contribute to global warming
pollution.
We are happy to offer a free screening of this
2005 production at July's Earth Friendly Friday. What better time
than mid-summer to contemplate the possibilities of the power of the sun
for our energy future?
Date: July 13, 2007. Doors open at 6:30, program starts promptly
at 7:00 PM. Everyone is invited to bring a snack dish for sharing,
and to enjoy socializing, music and refreshments before and after the
program.
LOCATION: At the UU Church, 2015 Grandin Rd.,
Roanoke (at Brandon Ave., across from PHHS).
"Greening the Grassroots: Community
Organizing for Environmental Protection"
On Saturday, June 9, 2007, the Virginia Chapter
of the Sierra Club will offer a four-hour workshop on the basics of
community organizing for environmental protection. Bob Egbert,
Chapter Membership Chair and former Roanoke Sierra Club Group Chair,
will be the facilitator for this workshop.
There are many huge environmental issues of
concern in the U.S. and around the world, such as global warming,
endangered species, air & water pollution, and suburban sprawl.
They often appear overwhelming to people at the community level.
However, just as America is composed of thousands of smaller communities,
our big environmental problems are composed of thousands of smaller
parts. A forest is made of many trees. It’s not just one big
block of wood.
“Greening the Grassroots” is intended to help you get
started in “greening” the community where you live. You are on the
front lines and know your local environmental issues. All
environmental activism is local and, the Sierra Club can help.
Date: June 9, 10:00 to 2:30
Location:
Roanoke Higher Education Center, 108 N. Jefferson St. (for map,
directions, see web site: www.education.edu).
Cost:
Free to Sierra Club members, all others $15. Lunch
provided.
Registration deadline June 4
"Greening the Grassroots" Registration
Form
Complete and send to Bob Egbert, 3571 Bradshaw Rd.,
Salem VA 24153. For information 540-384-7448 (after 6:30 on
week nights) or rsegbert@comcast.net
Name:
__________________________________
Address:
________________________________
City/Town/ZIP:
____________________________
Telephone:
______________________________
E-Mail:
__________________________________
Sierra Club member? Yes ___
No ___
Membership #
__________________.
• Non-member registration fee
$15.00
• Non-members please include a check payable
to the Virginia Chapter of the Sierra Club. |
View from the Chair - The case for "standing
on the big rock"
by Roanoke Group Chair Mark McClain
The world view of the Sierra Club is not perfectly aligned with that of
any elected governing body, nor even many individual elected
leaders.
Of course, nearly everyone believes that they are an environmentalist,
and government officials are no exception.
So we have this dissonance, this disconnect between the self-perception
of the "greenness" of our leaders and the assessment of them by those who
carry the banner of the "environmental movement".
Unfortunately, many environmental activists and leaders see this
dissonance as a call to an Environmental Jihad, and they spare no effort
to excoriate these eco-infidels. Their criticisms run the gamut from
the benign ("they just don't get it") to the vicious ("they've been
bought!").
Regrettably, these critics miss the point and thus miss an opportunity
to have an impact. The fact of the matter is that elected leaders
have a much broader mission than that of the Sierra Club's inspiringly
simple "Explore, Enjoy, and Protect the Earth." They must also
Defend, Fix, Administer, Pay For, Incarcerate, Clean Up, Regulate and
perform sundry other functions in the discharge of their duties.
Because of this reality, their judgments on many issues are often tempered
by conflicting considerations that lead them to a less than
perfectly green solution.
Given this landscape, we must first recognize that there is little to
be gained by impugning those who may not agree with us on every
point. Nor is there much benefit in stamping our collective feet and
insisting on the most perfect solution (as defined by us) on every
question. Rather we should explore the opportunities to make
incremental progress toward our ideals through collaboration, negotiation,
influence, and persuasion.
We need not compromise our beliefs to do this. But we do have to
be willing to assess the range of possibilities and make a rational case
for an outcome that most closely resembles our vision. This involves
the ability to understand the point of view of those who don't agree with
us. It also requires a willingness to engage policy makers, not in
an adversarial manner, but in the spirit of mutual respect and
openness.
Sierra Club founder John Muir, set this example for us, famously
illustrated through his appearance with President Theodore Roosevelt
in 1903 picture in Yellowstone Valley. While widely
acknowledged to be our first and perhaps only great "environmental"
president, Roosevelt largely disagreed with Muir's philosophy of the
sanctity of nature and wilderness. Despite that difference, Muir's
ability to influence the president led to many great environmental
victories.
If we are to succeed in our quest to bring about
change for the good of the earth, our chances are much better if we,
like John Muir, are standing on the big rock with those whom we seek to
influence, rather than sitting behind the camera throwing small rocks at
them.
