Breaking news is that Ernest Callenbach, a local author and visionary creator of the 1975 utopian novel Ecotopia, will be with us on Sunday to talk about his current vision of a sustainable future. We will end the afternoon with an opportunity to suggest, find support for, and/or hook into practical projects that will move us further towards community resilience in Albany.

After seeing and talking with several Transition communities in the UK on a recent visit to my new granddaughter (yes, I flew, and I’m prepared for that to be the last time for the foreseeable future. Mother Nature delayed my return by sending volcanic ash into the air, and it looks like she hasn’t finished that game yet!), my impression is that there is a huge wave of grassroots energy moving inexorably towards more local self-reliance, and Transition towns are popping up like mushrooms. Projects that I’ve seen include local food production, creating alternatives to individual motorized transport, encouragement to reduce energy consumption at home, relearning skills that were taken for granted in a pre-oil-rich civilization (“reskilling”), or putting more emphasis on individual production rather than simply consuming more store-bought stuff. It doesn’t have to have the name Transition to be an essential part of our transition away from centralized, energy-intense living to a more local, energy-lean and community-based lifestyle.

Dated City Codes
Here in the East Bay there are already many backyards dedicated to growing food. My own tiny space produces more at times than I can keep up with. But it’s coming to my attention, thanks to an article in Terrain magazine, that city ordinances are written to dissuade people from engaging in urban farming within city borders. They probably date back to a time when it was seen as chic to be moving away from the drudgery of countryside living.

For instance, in Albany’s code (under Animals) it seems at first glance that keeping bee hives is not permitted. However the city did assure me that, as long as you ask them for and receive express written permission and pay a fee of $160, you can legally keep bees here (within limitations designed to maintain good neighborly relations). This makes the situation similar to that with chickens (up to six hens are allowed, no roosters). However, goats, sheep and horses are still listed as forbidden, and these are animals that do play a part in the low-energy Albany that some of us envision 20 years from now, along with super efficient motorized transport and high tech solutions. We are looking at major changes in the next couple of decades – let’s be foresightful and prepare the way.

So, come and watch the film and listen to one of the first people to express a utopian vision in writing on Sunday May 23rd and we’ll have a chance to share specific visions for Albany afterwards. In 20 years this community could look, sound and feel very different from Albany today. What do you envision?

HomeGrown: The Film

HOMEGROWN follows the Dervaes family who run a small organic farm in the heart of urban Pasadena, California. While “living off the grid”, they harvest over 6,000 pounds of produce on less than a quarter of an acre, make their own bio diesel, power their computers with the help of solar panels, and maintain a website that gets 4,000 hits a day. The film is an intimate human portrait of what it’s like to live like “Little House on the Prairie” in the 21st Century.  - Excerpt from the film’s website.

Visit the film’s website to learn more.

Discussion with Novella Carpenter

I’ve been cultivating the city for over ten years now, and my neighbors still think I’m crazy. It all started with a few chickens, then some bees, until I had a full-blown farm near downtown Oakland. - Excerpt from Novella’s log at www.novellacarpenter.com. Farm City is her account of her experiences. She will have copies of the book available for sale at the event!

Seed and Plant Exchange

Simply bring your extra seeds and plants, and some envelopes or containers to hopefully take home others in exchange. Best to label all items properly to prevent surprise crops (but would that be so bad anyway?).

Writing in Britain’s The Guardian, George Monbiot called The Age of Stupid “a captivating and constantly surprising film: the first successful dramatization of climate change to reach the big screen.” Grounding the film is a fictional character who looks back upon our time with full knowledge of the environmental and social upheavals of the first half of the twenty-first century. This device distinguishes the film from more conventional documentaries and arguably provides a drawing card for the film.

In the film, Academy Award-nominated actor Pete Postlethwaite stars as the Archivist, the lone caretaker to the collected knowledge of humanity.  In the year 2055, the Archivist looks back upon video clips of the early years of the climate crisis from within his tower in the now-melted Arctic, his refuge from a world devastated by storms, starved by droughts, and consumed by violence.  As he views the videos, he seeks answers to the question that haunts him: Why did humanity fail to save itself?

Postlethwaite, whom Steven Spielberg named “probably the best actor in the world today,” delivers a strong performance, but it is the lives of real people from our time whom he observes in videos in his archives that make the film so compelling.  Through these videos, director Franny Armstrong follows the struggles and aspirations of several intriguing people in often uncomfortable relationships to oil and global warming.  From Iraqi refugees to a British wind farm developer, from an Indian airline founder to a French mountaineer, we see the emerging possibilities of humanity’s future with all their complications and contradictions.

Amidst resistance to change in countries such as the U.S. and U.K. and growing aspirations elsewhere to “live like Americans,” can we avoid the fate that the film depicts? Or is our time destined to be remembered as the “Age of Stupid” for our failure to heed repeated warnings?

It’s been said that the best way to predict the future is to create it.  Consider this showing an invitation from Transition Albany to begin doing just that.

Age of Stupid: Trailers: Original Theatrical Trailer from Age of Stupid on Vimeo.

This theatrical showing of The Age of Stupid is expected to be the only one of its kind in the San Francisco Bay Area in the coming months.  Tickets will be available for purchase at the box office of the Albany Twin both in advance and on the morning of the 11:30 a.m. showing on Sunday, March 7, 2010.