On the eve of Earth Day, I have spent many hours in two different attempts to write something. Even though I have completed both, I feel that there was even something more pressing that ought to be said.

It is true that our valley is part of the rest of the world, and that the destruction that continues to accelerate here is a shadow of a larger crisis. An honest progress report about the earth shows that humans are remarkable beings who have intelligence and yet can continue patterns of destruction beside mounting evidence that we are dooming ourselves with every action where we fail to radically change course. In our beautiful valley, the damage is still happening--it would be untrue to say otherwise--though it is happening much less quickly perhaps than elsewhere.

Something else is happening though, here, and events of the last two days have led me to try once more to articulate what that might be. Perhaps just a quick mention of the course of my own experience might be a way to tell the story.

On Saturday morning, twenty-five individuals met at the Community Farm to learn about composting at home. Each face was a study of Sonoma, people who care and are trying to make changes at home to make some contribution to our lives here and around the world. Behind them, patiently working, was Simon Lang, an intern and budding farmer, putting in his sixtieth hour or so of work for that week, guiding new seeds and starts into an innovative project called a mandala garden where soil is improved, water is conserved, and plants are positioned in special arrangements that allow them to assist each other's growth. I picked up a load of compost later from Mitch Mulas, a long time resident and dairyman who once again made a donation in his easy style of giving things to those that need them here.

At a celebration for our Ukrainian Sister City later that day, other people were hard at work and celebration, creating a flow of cultural exchange and understanding that only comes from contact and commitment. Without such investment in learning how others live, we are quick to loose our understanding of the pricelessness of diversity, a lesson that nature is shouting at us to learn for our very survival.

I will not be the first or last to mention the power of words, and the commitment to culture and ideas and human beauty that Bill Moyers brought to tens of hundreds of us that evening. Sonomans had worked together to make a festival of poetry that was unparalleled in the country, and Moyers came to visit in return. In his style of being any one of us in a conversation with the great minds of our era, he let many of us feel the possibility of being great for who we are, that our thoughts and concerns are more than validÑthey are when we share them the very essence of the miracle that is life. His words, for their precision and eloquence are not wasted on Sonoma. As I looked around the sea of faces, all so familiar, I saw in them that we who choose to live here feel that possibility, and, despite our falls in public, we are doing what is necessary to make the world a better place. We have learned that key--faith in ourselves, in our neighbor, and in the community we make together.

I ran through dogwoods in bloom this morning, returned to town to see Dan Ruggles receive on his 85th birthday the warmth of hundreds of people, including myself, who have been inalterably touched by the constant gifts he gives us, and saw one more time the miracle at work here.

We live at a crossroads of nature and human affection. Together, these forces have the chance to save the world. Nature is crying for people to learn to live in community with it. We can be a place that once again leads the way. As Bill Moyers might remind us when we ask who are we to make such a contribution, we are part of a community who have learned that we are a miracle. Maybe we can do this.

I, for one, am counting on it.

Happy Earth Day.