by Eliana Alcivar

One of the privileges of living in most cities is the higher than average access for people of all ages to opportunities for arts and cultural enrichment.  Greensboro is no different in that respect.

For most of my life I’ve enjoyed the visual arts – art was my favorite grade school class, second only to reading – but it was not until I was in my 30s that I took my first “grown up” art class, a course in 2007 through the Art Alliance of Greensboro.  I saw a flyer one day replete with tantalizing course descriptions.  Truly, I wanted to take them all.  I settled on a drawing course.

On occasion I had drawn little things and portraits over the years, even as an adult, working mostly from photographs.  But during that eight week course, for the first time my eyes were opened to techniques which had long escaped me, having seemed for all the world like magic.  For example; I learned the secret of how to select a piece of the 3-D world and repackage it in some recognizable fashion onto a 2-D page.  Wielding wands of charcoal, I felt like a sorceress of art.

After the 8 week course, I continued to practice my learned techniques.

Here is an example of a sketch I made over the course of a couple days in 2008: felled trees over a lake along a trail in the Piedmont Environmental Center, one of my favorite spots in town:

Continued…

by Adam Arney

Harvard anthropologist Richard Wrangham has recently released a book exploring the close relationship between human evolution and fire. In Catching Fire Wrangman calls humans the “cooking apes.” There is a great review in the NY Times here.

Wrangham delved into the benefits early humans gained from controlling fire and found them so important as to be essential to the development processes that created modern humans. Cooking food makes it safer, increases the absorption of nutrients and calories, and fire–quite literally–keeps bears out of one’s cave.

It’s not all biological anthropology in Catching Fire. Wrangham offers us some practical advice as well. Avoid raw-food diets. Wrangham points to research proving it impossible for us to gain enough nutrients and calories from uncooked food.

I don’t know about you but thanks to Wrangman, when I am grilling steak this weekend, I’ll be comforted with this knowledge–I’m only human.

by Kathleen Forbes

I’ve been inspired by a book I’m reading to consider the notion of “real wealth.” Discussed in David Korten’s Agenda for a New Economy, real wealth encompasses the things that money cannot buy. Examples include happy healthy children, loving families, caring communities, and a beautiful healthy environment. Also included are supportive relationships, education, health, fulfilling opportunities for service, and time for meditation and spiritual reflection. At a time when many people seem focused on how much money they have “lost” from the recent economic downturn, I’ve decided to focus on celebrating and investing in the real wealth I have. Over the course of my next several blog entries, I’m planning to share my experiences with you as a “real wealthy” person.

Growing My Own Food
I live in a historic neighborhood replete with old majestic trees. The abundant shade these trees produce has always made gardening a challenging task. However, a tree in our neighbor’s yard recently met its demise, leaving a small area in our backyard with full sun. Seeing that little patch of sun awakened my inner gardener and led me to thoughts of an organic vegetable garden.

Digging the sweet potato bed

I’ve always wanted to grow vegetables, but didn’t know the first thing about it. So I contacted Charlie Headington and he put me in touch with a professional urban garden designer. She helped me prepare the soil and drew a plan with the best plants for a novice gardener. She schooled me on organic gardening techniques and where to buy organic plants. A promised follow-up visit and availability by phone or e-mail for questions gave me the confidence to start digging. I’ve planted the usual: peppers, tomatoes, beans, cucumbers, and squash.

I’m also planning to grow sweet potatoes when the slips become available in June.

Inspecting the garden with Izzy

So far it has been gratifying to see the garden grow. Each night after work my cat Izzy and I go out and inspect the garden. Imagine our delight when we see that another bean seed has sprouted, pushing its little green tendril through the soil, or when we realize the tomato plants are getting tall enough for staking. I’m looking forward to nurturing these plants to maturity. Besides the obvious effects of eating healthy food and slightly offsetting my carbon footprint, I’m hoping that I will gain a better understanding of the growing cycle of the foods I eat and a deeper connection to our precious and bountiful earth. I don’t think that’s anything money can buy.