Island Press Field Notes

As a mediator, I am always interested in unlikely bedfellows snuggling up to solve a problem, particularly in cases where there is no mediator, no third party to make the bed and tuck them in. These bold hookups, generated by the parties themselves, can result in creative solutions that one side or the other would have never considered but that end up meeting the needs of both.

Back in April 2001—a time in-between the contested 2000 election and the 9/11 attacks when the Bush Administration seemed just like a bad joke and not yet a flag-draped war machine—Vice President Dick Cheney quipped, “Conservation may be a sign of personal virtue, but it is not a sufficient basis for a sound, comprehensive energy policy.” A friend of mine was so incensed by this that he immediately disconnected his bathroom sink from its drain and threw a bucket underneath—the beginnings of what would become a fairly ambitious (and not badly designed) home greywater reclamation project.

Photo by Rob Lee, used under Creative Commons licensing.  

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