Nature Makes Us All Kin

I know I'm not alone when I look around and think the entire world is going insane. Times are crazy, and volatile, and scary, and ... does any of it really matter if we don't have a livable Earth? In yesterday's political hubbub, I didn't realize until the evening that it was World Oceans Day. I LOVE the Ocean. It really is the only thing sometimes that keeps me sane. Indeed, yesterday I had to shout out to the Pacific Ocean and Radiohead's A Moon Shaped Pool for keeping me from either self-destructing or getting into an actual fist fight with all of the mainstream media. Instead, I breathed in deeply and thanked my lucky stars that I had all of this beautiful water to calm me down and appreciate all of the beauty in the world.

And then I saw the dead bird. Just about every morning I see something dead as I walk along the shore, from bees and butterflies to a big, fat seal bloating in the sun. It's awful, and I don't know why it's happening, but it is. I pay close attention to the Heal The Bay water scorecards, and though it might say "A" for our water, they can't test the whole ocean, and something is killing things on a regular basis. The Oceans sustain most of the planet for food. It's all connected, and if human life becomes impossible on Earth, it really won't matter at all what political party you're a member of or what candidate you support (it doesn't feel like it matters anyway, with all of the corporate calculation going on, but that's another story for another non-World Oceans Day).

As I was thinking about all of this, I walked over to check out the brand new mural by my lovely friend, Diana Garcia, in the back patio of the Tom's Shoes store on Abbot Kinney Boulevard. The gorgeous deer/peacock spreads its tail and reminds us that "One touch of nature makes the whole world  kin" - from Shakespeare's Ulysses. In that moment as I read those words, I felt that profound truth, and decided it far better to focus on what we can do TOGETHER to help the world, not fight it. To lift each other up, and hold ourselves to better standards of respect for our Earth and all its Peoples.

Truly, none of the rest of it matters if we don't have that.

Thank you, Diana! #Bewhatyoudream

Love Your Oceans - Be The Solution

Maybe it's because of all the horror of the Gulf Oil Spill down South, but it seems to me that people here in California are getting a lot more riled up lately about saving our own waters from the same fate. Because we MUST.

In that vein, I recently went out with the Santa Monica Baykeeper folks to observe National Oceans Day, and also to take a look at what shape our beloved Bay is in. Started in 1993, the Baykeeper's mission is to protect and restore our waters through enforcement, field work, and community action. As we've seen down in the Gulf, if people are allowed to do whatever they want to our environment, they will - and with disastrous results.

So it was that I woke up early on a Sunday morning and pedaled over to the Marina to meet up with Brian Meux, Baykeeper's Marine Programs Manager, and Kristy Pyke, their lovely P.R. Lady. The idea was to take the boat up to Point Dume and meet up with reps from Heal The Bay, The Surfrider Foundation, and Below The Surface, who were paddling out on stand up paddleboards to highlight our most diverse and productive ocean area, and check out the health of the kelp forests that keep our entire oceanic eco-system thriving (hopefully) while we were at it.


It was a misty morning, with waves just big enough to make us happy that we'd behaved ourselves (somewhat) the night before. It was, in all honesty, a joy just to look down and see blue water, after all the black globby images we've seen coming out of the Gulf Of Mexico. It was not a joy, however, to see a giant cluster of mylar balloons floating by, way out at sea. I've said it before and I'll say it again ... LEAVE YOUR DANG BALLOONS OFF THE BEACH!


Your kids will still have a happy birthday, I promise. They kill marine life, period. That is not a good lesson to teach the birthday party kids, now, is it? We scooped up that bunch of balloons, and just wished we'd had a chance to wring the necks of those who thought it best to leave them in the sea. Grrr.


Cruising along, we spotted the Paddlers up ahead, and we all met up to discuss what they were doing, and what we can ALL do to make sure that we continue to have beautiful beaches and waters to enjoy for generations to come. It's all about involvement, after all. Each of the organizations mentioned above has events or clean-ups you can volunteer for pretty much every week. And you should.


It's good for the soul to participate in things that are bigger than you,and that make the world better in one instant. I pick up after some of you fools every morning as I walk along the beach, and you have the instant gratification of it being more lovely than you met it each morning, just by bending down and grabbing that broken bottle (REALLY?!) or picnic remnant or stupid balloon scrap.


We were all encouraged (and one surfer a little spooked) when a gigantic purple striped jellyfish wafted by right under the guy's board who was next to the boat. If that big jelly was happy where he or she was, things may be looking up for our Bay. The stories these guys can tell you, from their paddle-outs, their aerial surveys, and kelp forest dives are full of both dismay, and hope.


Dismay that people actually still have the mental capacity to think it fine to dump old toilets and tires IN the sea, 3 miles out from the coast! What in the world is WRONG with these brains that could do that? Dismay at the "Plastic to Plankton ratio" that some say is like 6 bits of plastic to each one of plankton. I just almost puked as I typed that, but it's true.


But there is hope for us yet. I felt it as we raced across the waves and watched about 30 dolphins race alongside us and in our wake, jumping out into the sunshine and gracing us with their sleek beauty and natural smiles. Hope that we were all out there early in the morning, because there are these organizations and people who care so much, and actually get out to DO SOMETHING about it.

Hope was evident again this past weekend as Baykeeper, Surfrider, Heal The Bay, and a whole bunch of concerned citizens met up for "Hands Across The Sand" down by the Venice and Santa Monica Piers, and at over 650 other coastal beaches around the world at noon our time.


We all gathered by the Venice Pier, and talk was less what you did last night, and mainly all how much we love our beaches, and how badly we all want to preserve and IMPROVE them, and especially save them from any oil related fate. On that note, Venice friends and neighbors laid down on the sand to spell out "Go Green" and "End Oil" out of humans. Then all of us who were not being used in a letter, held hands all across the beach to demonstrate to the world that we mean business about our beaches. We have to.


As the motto of Below the Surface states, "Be The Solution". That can mean many things, but it HAS to mean doing SOMETHING. Bring your own bags to the market. BAN Plastic bags. Use a stainless steel water bottle every time, and phase out those plastic ones. Participate in beach clean-ups. Throw your beach trash away in the first place - duh. Get rid of your cigarette butts in an ashtray, not out your car window, jerks. (I will make a citizen's arrest on that one. Every time.) Reduce your filthy oil habit, as best you can. Reuse and Recycle. Ride your bike. Take a WALK, L.A.! Hold hands across the sand with your friends to bring attention to it all. Walk the talk.

As Summer takes over Venice, get to know your H2o. Our health depends upon its health. Imagine our Summer months down at the beach, looking out at black tar islands and choking sea creatures, instead of shimmering blue waters full of life. That would wreck your buzz for sure ... and we really don't want that.



- CJ Gronner


*Photos by Paul Gronner (Baykeeper) and Sean James (Hands Across The Sand).

Bin Your Butts!

I love smokers. I do. There are many smokers among the most beloved people in my life. But it has driven me crazy for years when I see people throw their cigarettes on the ground. Or out their car windows. I've been in verbal altercations with people in cars because I can't let it go by without a scolding. Those cigarettes wash into the ocean, from all the way downtown, not just near the beach. I walk every morning along the beach and it breaks my heart every day to see that people don't seem to care that they are poisoning our whole eco-system. Murdering it. (You can check out Heal The Bay to get more informed.)

I was happy to see these informative signs go up recently on Abbot Kinney from the Venice Neighborhood Council, so I know that I'm not the only one annoyed by this bad habit. ONE cigarette in a liter of water will kill a fish in 96 hours?! So what's it doing to the smokers inside themselves? Eek. I've been watching the past seasons of Mad Men, and it's Smoker Central - even the gynecologist telling a woman that she's pregnant does so while smoking - and it just seems so out of date and strange. I remember a conversation I had where we were discussing Woody Harrelson or Sting or someone withholding having sex to preserve their chi or something, and a friend of mine saying, "I think it's hilarious that people still do that." It's kind of the same thing with smoking. I think with all we know about how terrible it is for you, that people - whom I love - still signing up to slowly kill themselves every day is kinda crazy. Like in the early 60's, people were advertised to that it was cool; now it just seems like every time you see someone light up, they've just been HAD.

But this isn't a lecture about smoking - it's just me being selfish because there are people that I want to grow old knowing, and oceans I want to grow old swimming in, and fish I want to eat along the way* ... so if you could please pass along that if you must smoke, at LEAST think of that choking fish in the liter of water and BIN YOUR BUTTS! Thank you. I'll appreciate you on each morning constitutional.





*But this is just if the world makes it past 2012. Until then, smoke 'em if you got 'em!


(Just kidding.)