we absorb wonder

big universe. big people. big love. 

(Source: beautifulconsciousness, via fuckyeahyoga)

(Source: theohpioneer, via awelltraveledwoman)

from a cheerleader fanboi site. 

(Source: ninety9)

as seen on tout-bon.

Probably not the kind of messaging oil companies energy providers would go for today. culture CAN change. 

Humble became Standard Oil of NJ, which became Exxon. Ad taken from Life Magazine, 1962.

melancholia takeaways:

1. even the rich get eaten during the rapture and in fact, their assumption that everything is going to be fine and their self-importance makes them less prepped for destruction. 2. men take the easy way out. except for the little ones who are very cute and small! 3. i need to sit on it still but this shot of the magic cave and the aerial shots of horse-riding through the woods were the most magical to me. 

i forgot about how super this song is. thanks bud. 

iamnotananomaly:

Your Rocky Spine | Great Lake Swimmers

(Source: vrac-musique, via thecountryfucker)

(via mydarling)

a new adventure in science writing…

So, I have been a shoddy blogger multiple times.  And yes, I can be really good at starting things, getting stoked about them, doing a great job at them, and then walking away.  My Brasilian adventures blog was pretty good. Absorb Wonder has had its moments too and I will certainly continue to write and post here. But neither of these have quite stuck. And I think I know why: I haven’t ever written consistently about something I think about on a daily basis, that has withstood my test of time, the good ole, I’m-actually-dedicated-to-this metrix which is tough for a lucky girl like me. 

i digress. the point is: there are a few things, that my levels of interest and commitment to have grown, as I have, regardless of how many more items I add to my never-ending list of curiosities. These include my love of guilty pleasure pop (think Robyn), my unrelenting dedication to culinary adventures (do you know how good home made bo saam is?), and my extreme anxiety over the state of climate change and our lack of effectively mitigating carbon dioxide emissions. 

this issue occupies my thoughts more than most things. i lose sleep over it. i think about impacts on poor women in bangladesh and farmers in kenya—and the Hudson Valley—and polar bears in the arctic, and of course, of my own city—New York—inundated by a crazy storm and rising sea levels. i literally have moments of panic when i think of what may come. so clearly, i spend a lot of time thinking about how we can build the movement better. that is actually where the idea for the City Atlas came up. No joke—lying in bed, not able to sleep, putting together lots of seemingly disconnected discussions I had at the 2009 Tipping Point Conference and the readings I had been doing on why climate change communication was failing. 

Aaaaaaand, here we are in 2011. We have moved backwards once again and in fact, our unfortunate, disturbingly short-sighted, inept leadership has done nothing to move the issue forward. The Obama administration is currently fighting to get U.S. airlines exempt from a charge on CO2 emissions when they land in Europe. you may wonder why that is. i do too. As bill Clinton, ineloquently said recently, “I mean, it makes us—we look like a joke, right?” he was referring to the fact that middle income countries are now in the works to regulate their emissions including a coal tax in India and a basic cap and trade policy in China. And even more shameful, while 70% of people in China, India, and South Korea said they were willing to pay more for energy if they could prevent climate change, only 39% of Americans said they would. This is unreal. All of these stats by the way are from a great article in the Times last week: “Whatever Happened to Global Warming?” 

I have a hard time with how much Americans hate science and also, how bad we are at geography, and languages. it makes me cringe and I feel like no matter how bad things might be about to implode in Europe, at least they know, generally speaking where Iraq is. I feel out of sorts when I reflect on how everything is so god damn excessive here. The AC levels, the house sizes, the car sizes, etc. But this, the continual manipulation of the public by an opportunistic lobby—and a leadership that is willing to be lobbied—by people who would very much like to keep us in a high carbon economy, rather than a low carbon one, and their successful derailing of any political will on this issue is just beyond my comprehension. 

So, a new blog that will focus on interesting new climate change communication projects, research on how to do this best, what i think scientists can do better, what corrupt loopholes are where and how you can help fight the man—or join him—last week, a group of some of the world’s highest net worth individuals and their investors wrote a memo urging the importance of investment-grade action on climate change, will now be found on “It’s the Science Stupid.”  Even though I actually think that the science is sound—and there will be some basic factual discussions of it on here—its more of the arts we need to focus on. the art of communication and branding, the art of mediation and message crafting. it makes sense. Americans don’t like science. They don’t trust it. So, we need to figure out how to break it down, in a much easier way, that someone, anyone, insert name _____ or stupid for that matter, could comprehend. And there ya have it. First entry will be up tomorrow.  

thinknorth:

(via prAna blog)

i need some of this.

(via thecountryfucker)

this is pretty super. “because the people who are crazy enough to think they can change the world, are the ones who do.”

(Source: allieesslinger)