#OneMinnesota, One Earth, One Human Race

Today is the day we celebrate the birthday of Martin Luther King, Jr. His actual birthday is on January 15th. Since we celebrate that, and his accomplishments, today, it seems like an opportune time to explore and learn about the Walz-Flanagan administration's One Minnesota theme.

OneMinnesota needs dairy farms and wind farms

Photo by J. Harrington

According to the Star Tribune newspaper, at his inauguration, Governor Walz noted

“We find ourselves at a time when economic, social, racial, and geographic division feels rampant. I will not normalize behavior that seeks to deepen or exploit these divides,” said Walz, a Democrat from Mankato. “I will not normalize policies that are not normal — ones that undermine our decency and respect. If Washington won’t lead, Minnesota will.”

As we picked our way through the dust bins of the internet, looking for more insights into what Walz and Flanagan have in mind, we made an interesting discovery. Apparently, for some years now, there's been an organization named OneMN.org. Until today, we don't believe we've encountered OneMN.org, despite our having worked for the City of Minneapolis and in the affordable housing/green building sector. We would have expected to have at least heard about this organization:

Over the years this multi ethnic coalition has created a space within Minnesota for a nonpartisan engagement around policy issues. This space has been effectively utilized to achieve significant benefits to Minnesota, as can be seen below, both to aggregate ALANA communities’ voices over issues that impact one or more communities (example, Hmong hunters, racial profiling or undocumented workers) as well as collective issues such as business contracts. It also provided a nonpartisan space for policy dialogue and engagement with different political institutions in Minnesota.  OneMN.org has evolved over the years to its present identity.

As it stands today, OneMn.org is slated to sunset on December 31, 2022. We think it would be unfortunate for Minnesota if the sunset provision occurs without a capable successor to pick up and carry the torch. Perhaps the Governor and Lieutenant Governor can work on the merger of their particular theme with the work accomplished by OneMn.org (perhaps they already have and we're just coming late to this party).

"green" affordable housing on Minnesota's Iron Range

Photo by J. Harrington

We believe, as much as we believe anything, that a sustainable future for humans must be based on reduced inequalities as well as better care for our natural environment. We think that Doctor King would agree. We look forward to seeing how Minnesota will lead over the next year and posting a report of exemplary progress on MLK Day next year.

Let America Be America Again

By Langston Hughes

Let America be America again.

Let it be the dream it used to be.

Let it be the pioneer on the plain

Seeking a home where he himself is free.

(America never was America to me.)

Let America be the dream the dreamers dreamed—

Let it be that great strong land of love

Where never kings connive nor tyrants scheme

That any man be crushed by one above.

(It never was America to me.)

O, let my land be a land where Liberty

Is crowned with no false patriotic wreath,

But opportunity is real, and life is free,

Equality is in the air we breathe.

(There's never been equality for me,

Nor freedom in this "homeland of the free.")

Say, who are you that mumbles in the dark?

And who are you that draws your veil across the stars?

I am the poor white, fooled and pushed apart,

I am the Negro bearing slavery's scars.

I am the red man driven from the land,

I am the immigrant clutching the hope I seek—

And finding only the same old stupid plan

Of dog eat dog, of mighty crush the weak.

I am the young man, full of strength and hope,

Tangled in that ancient endless chain

Of profit, power, gain, of grab the land!

Of grab the gold! Of grab the ways of satisfying need!

Of work the men! Of take the pay!

Of owning everything for one's own greed!

I am the farmer, bondsman to the soil.

I am the worker sold to the machine.

I am the Negro, servant to you all.

I am the people, humble, hungry, mean—

Hungry yet today despite the dream.

Beaten yet today—O, Pioneers!

I am the man who never got ahead,

The poorest worker bartered through the years.

Yet I'm the one who dreamt our basic dream

In the Old World while still a serf of kings,

Who dreamt a dream so strong, so brave, so true,

That even yet its mighty daring sings

In every brick and stone, in every furrow turned

That's made America the land it has become.

O, I'm the man who sailed those early seas

In search of what I meant to be my home—

For I'm the one who left dark Ireland's shore,

And Poland's plain, and England's grassy lea,

And torn from Black Africa's strand I came

To build a "homeland of the free."

The free?

Who said the free?  Not me?

Surely not me?  The millions on relief today?

The millions shot down when we strike?

The millions who have nothing for our pay?

For all the dreams we've dreamed

And all the songs we've sung

And all the hopes we've held

And all the flags we've hung,

The millions who have nothing for our pay—

Except the dream that's almost dead today.

O, let America be America again—

The land that never has been yet—

And yet must be—the land where everyman is free.

The land that's mine—the poor man's, Indian's, Negro's, ME—

Who made America,

Whose sweat and blood, whose faith and pain,

Whose hand at the foundry, whose plow in the rain,

Must bring back our mighty dream again.

Sure, call me any ugly name you choose—

The steel of freedom does not stain.

From those who live like leeches on the people's lives,

We must take back our land again,

America!

O, yes,

I say it plain,

America never was America to me,

And yet I swear this oath—

America will be!

Out of the rack and ruin of our gangster death,

The rape and rot of graft, and stealth, and lies,

We, the people, must redeem

The land, the mines, the plants, the rivers.

The mountains and the endless plain—

All, all the stretch of these great green states—

And make America again!

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Please be kind to each other while you can.

Winter adaptations

We're struggling to stay warm and comfortable in the living room (too many large windows). It's not that it's cold in that room, just cool and a little drafty. But then the outside temperature dropped to ten below last night and early this morning. We noticed that as we walked one of the dogs this morning. That's when we saw the super moon, whose eclipse comes tonight, and what we think were Venus and Jupiter stacked low in the Eastern sky. (Astronomy is far from our forte.)

downy woodpecker at suet feeder

Photo by J. Harrington

We've read about the adaptations to the North COuntry's bitter cold that many local birds have made: fluffing feathers, restricting blood flow in their feet, etc. Never-the-less, we are mightily impressed that creatures as small and light as goldfinches, red-breasted nuthatches, and chickadees manage, at least many of them anyhow, to make it through Minnesota Winters. At the moment, a pileated woodpecker (female) has landed on the deck railing and hopped onto the suet feeder. One we refilled half an hour or so ago. When she departs, we expect to see downey, hairy, and red-bellied woodpeckers at one or both suet feeders. We've noticed that, when there's no suet in the feeders, some woodpeckers feed on the ground under the suet holder. It is a bit disconcerting to see a woodpecker hammering on (into?) frozen ground.

ground-feeding pileated woodpecker

Photo by J. Harrington

As we're typing this up, a loaf of artisan sourdough bread is baking, filling the house with wonderful aromas and, with the oven set at 500℉, adding more than a little to the ambient heat level in the kitchen, dining and living rooms. We're discovering that's one of many side benefits of learning to be a baker, especially in the Winter. We just realized that, if we had a wood fired oven, located outside, we'd end up missing both the aromas and the extra heat in Winter. We should have thought of that some time ago, since our last abode in Massachusetts was an apartment converted from an old "Summer kitchen" in one of the original farm houses of the area. Those long ago farmers didn't want extra heat from cooking and baking in the house during the warmer months, but it fit right in during the cold season. We suppose that could be considered a Winter adaptation that some humans evolved to survive more comfortably.

How Is It That the Snow

By Robert Haight

How is it that the snow  

amplifies the silence,  

slathers the black bark on limbs,  

heaps along the brush rows?  

Some deer have stood on their hind legs  

to pull the berries down.  

Now they are ghosts along the path,  

snow flecked with red wine stains.  

This silence in the timbers.  

A woodpecker on one of the trees  

taps out its story,  

stopping now and then in the lapse  

of one white moment into another.

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Thanks for visiting. Come again when you can.
Please be kind to each other while you can.