Message to Elders - April BJP

My Bead Journal Project for April concerns a topic not everyone wants to discuss. Please stick with me on this one, and feel free to post your comments, even if you disagree with my thoughts on the subject.

If you've been following my BJP pieces this year, you know I've been greatly concerned for the future of the world and the children who are yet to be born. Countdown, a book by Alan Weisman (a well-researched, yet readable, book about the recent history of the growing human population in all areas of the world, and the effects this growth is having on us and on our habitat) greatly influenced my piece for April. Although I began working on it before getting the book, you can see the like-mindedness between my divided piece (in progress) and the art on the cover of the book (which I think is fabulous).

Message to Elders of the World (in progress)

Cover Art by San Chung for the Book, Countdown, by Alan Weisman

Watching environmental documentary films on many topics over the past few years, a foreboding sense of the damage our ever increasing growth and demands place on the earth has brought me to a voluntary, world-wide, one child point of view, as the only thing the citizens of the world can do to save it. I call it 1+1=1, and it is the theme of my BJP pieces this year.

For April's BJP, I direct my hopes toward the elders, the grey and white haired folks, like myself.

Message to Elders of the World

Above is the finished piece. And here is a poem I wrote while beading on it and the message I hope it conveys to others who are grey now, like me:

I Am Grey Now

I am grey now –

no longer so self-absorbed

as in the greener phase of my life,

looking beyond my pile of beads,

considering the colors of the whole world,

wondering how long before

there are no more red or green apples,

how long before the abundant waters

under the earth's crust are gone,

how long before order turns to chaos,

and most of all wondering what I can do,

in my grey years, to help.

        Robin Atkins

Message to Elders of the World

For the sake of your grandchildren and great grandchildren,

wake up to the possibility of massive hunger and thirst,

the depletion of resources and environmental destruction

caused by the demands of an ever increasing human population.

We, the elders, must help our granddaughters and grandnieces

to understand it is on their shoulders to save the world,

with only one way to do it: world-wide, voluntary, one child.

No government can make this happen. Only they can do it.

        Robin Atkins

If you are like me, worried about the world, concerned for the future of all the babies being born every second, and especially for our own children, it follows that we must take on the responsibility of coaching them in stewardship, which includes green living as well as voluntary one-child. My other three bead embroideries on this theme are:

Message to Young Brides of the World

Message to Women of the World

Message to Citizens of the World

My available tools of change are art and words. Thus, I am making these bead embroidery pieces (2.5 x 3.5 inches each), which can be displayed on small easels, and writing poems for whoever will see or read them, in the hopes of helping others to envision and question the future, to ask what they can do for the world.

Thank you for staying with me to the end of this post, and for considering the questions it raises.

Save the World Bead Embroidery

I'm definitely NOT a political person, not especially well-informed about current affairs, never a protest marcher or letter-to-the-editor writer.

But, in recent years, I've been watching a lot of documentary movies, many of which address the film maker's concerns about the well-being of the world, films about water shortages, about problems with fracking, about the polar ice cap and glaciers melting, about famine and poverty, about disappearing wildlife habitat, about oil spills and coal dust, about tsunami and hurricane damages, to name a few.

An ever-thickening cloak of despair settles over me, as I become convinced that we are slowly destroying our world, and worse, that I am powerless to stop any of it. At some point, looking at all of the things going wrong, I knew, beyond doubt, that the core issue, the root of all of it, is the demand we humans place on the earth. Nothing can stop the demand, short of decreasing the population; not just curbing population growth, but actually dramatically decreasing population.

There is only one way to decrease world population: to do so, every person must voluntarily embrace this world-saving motto:

Message to Citizens of the World

1 + 1 = 1

One + One = One

When every couple has only one child, the population will decrease significantly in just one generation. Demand for power, for water, for fish, for just about everything will decrease dramatically. Life will seem more precious. We will, in a single generation, improve all of the concerns we now have.

For 5 years I've been thinking about making a 1+1=1 bead embroidery. Finally, here it is. This is my Bead Journal Project piece for January, 2014. I'm starting the year by doing something, doing the one thing I know how to do that might help our beautiful world survive. I may do more of them, trying different ways to show this concept. In this one, there is a message to all citizens of the world:

Message to Citizens of the World

Our home is crumbling, burning, blowing away, and melting,

as we take and trample, and continue to take what we want

from it. In our clear heart and mind, we know the truth,

and we fear the future even as we continue to consume.

What can we do? When we sit up, pay attention, and learn,

we realize there is only one way to repair and restore our home.

For the sake of our child’s child, we must voluntarily decrease

our numbers by embracing world-wide, voluntary, one child.

Robin Atkins

January, 2014

 

I even have a fantasy that maybe others from around the world would join me, illustrating their concern and this solution in their own style and materials. I have started a 1+1=1 Facebook group , and encourage artists, quilters, beaders to join me. Maybe we'll have an exhibition one day, maybe it will become a quiet, yet powerful, movement. If you agree with me, I'd love to see your version of 1+1=1!

This piece is only 2.5 x 3.5 inches, and is entirely made with size 15 seed beads. My next post will be a technical one... how to bead nice, even circles. Yes, the circular pattern of blues and greens represents the world. I've learned a lot making "the world" (trial and error) that I want to share with you.