As many people know, the state of California has burned with some 7,600 fires this year. Many of these were large and leveled entire towns, leaving thousands of people homeless. California’s recent largest recorded fire ever was the Mendocino Fire. The fires have cost about 2.975 billion dollars in rebuilding and fire suppression costs. I live in California. Yesterday morning, I woke up to a blanket of smoke covering the landscape outside my window. Later, when I went outside, I could hardly breathe through the fumes, which made my throat burn. I was supposed to have a soccer game at noon. It was canceled due to the air quality. My school was scheduled to have a volleyball game against a school in Paradise, a town razed by flames just a week ago. That was canceled. I began to wonder why there were so many fires. I didn’t have to look far for the answer. Climate change, or global warming, has become a growing concern for the world these past couple of decades. Severe weather patterns, large fires, flooding, erosion, and droughts are only some of the disasters that are becoming more and more common. The question is, what causes climate change? Global warming is the effect of an imbalance of where carbon is stored on the Earth. When too much of that carbon is put up in the atmosphere, it creates a barrier that prevents heat radiated by the sun from escaping Earth. When this happens, our planet slowly begins to heat up, changing the weather and leading to a great increase of the natural disasters we have been experiencing. An increase that, for example, leaves hundreds of thousands of people homeless within a matter of weeks. However, carbon is not our enemy. In fact, carbon is what makes up every living thing on Earth! The problem is the imbalance. Around 500 million years ago, plants began to creep out of the ocean and onto dry land. There, they started to pull carbon out of the air and turn it into sugar through photosynthesis. This created a shift of carbon into the soil and out of the atmosphere, so Earth became more inhabitable. Soon though, humans came along and figured out how to burn carbon for energy. This began to transfer more and more carbon from the ground back into the air, which started this imbalance that is the root cause of climate change. The plants that once were able to pull enough carbon from the atmosphere can no longer do so to the extent needed. This is because our agricultural system is disrupting the balance. Through photosynthesis, the plants turn the carbon into sugar and pump it into the soil, feeding millions of tiny microorganisms. In turn, the microorganisms make nutrients and minerals more available to the plants, which make the plants healthier. When we put chemicals such as weed killer and pesticides on the plants, it kills those microorganisms. Tilling the soil also disrupts the microorganisms as they work, which makes it harder for them to help the plants flourish. Not only this, but deforestation greatly decreases the amount of plants pulling carbon out of the air. The effect of this system of agriculture is the imbalance of carbon on Earth. And the effect of the imbalance is climate change. In addition to this, the ocean has absorbed a lot of the carbon in the air, which is resulting in a slow acidification of ocean waters. This is greatly accelerating a mass extinction of ocean life. The solution to global warming, therefore, is closer than most of us may realize. In fact, the solution is right under our feet. Literally. In order to reverse climate change, humanity has to strongly reconsider their agricultural system and stop relying so much on carbon or fossil fuels to create energy. In other words, we would start using regenerative practices in agriculture, instead of sustainable practices. If we stopped using chemicals to protect our crops from bugs and weeds, and didn’t till the soil, we would be helping the microorganisms make the plants healthier, as they wouldn’t be disrupted in their work. Another aspect of regenerative agriculture is to plan the regular grazing of cattle. Their dung would apply a constant layer of compost, with more microorganisms in it. Planting trees and crops to cover unplanted areas would greatly increase the amount of plants pulling carbon from the air. The soil would be able to hold a lot more water, preventing major droughts and soaking up much water that might cause a flood. Damp plants and soil also would help prevent the large-scale fires we have been experiencing. All of these regenerative practices combined would make the soil healthier. The healthier the soil, the healthier the plants. The healthier the plants, the more carbon they can pull from the atmosphere to reverse climate change. Not only that, but humans eat the plants, and the healthier the food, the healthier the human! It all contributes to an amazing cycle, returning the balance that will keep the planet healthy. The smoke yesterday morning was still here today. And it will be tomorrow. Climate change, for me, is no longer something I just read about in a book. It is something I am living every day. But the truth is, we can reverse it. The solution is right underneath us. We just have to grasp it and put it into motion. Please comment on what you think. If you would like to learn more about climate change, visit http://www.thesoilstory.com
Stone Soup Magazine for young readers, writers, and artists
Stargirl, Reviewed by Keira Olson, 11
Stargirl is a beautifully written book by Jerry Spinelli. It tells about being different, and the problems and joy of a first love. Stargirl is written for seventh to ninth graders, but adults will love it too! Stargirl is one of my favorite books because of the way Jerry Spinelli describes the characters emotions, and the setting. He uses phrases like, “She laughed, and the desert sang,” and, “The ground does have a sandy color to it, or gray, but your feet won’t sink in.” I can relate to Stargirl because she is different, and isn’t everyone? This book made me realize that being different doesn’t mean that everyone necessarily wants to fit in, like in most books. When Stargirl is asked by her friend, Leo, to become normal, she tries once to be like everyone else, and goes back to being herself, which I find very inspiring. The story takes place at Mica High, in the town of Mica, where everyone acts, and dresses the same. On Stargirl’s first day, she showed up dressed in a long white gown, with a ukulele strapped to her back. Her classmates were in awe, and out of shock, and admiration, she instantly became very popular. Classmates dressed like her, and acted like her, but nothing lasts forever… Leo Borlock fell in love with her almost immediately. They went on adventures together, and had a great time, until he realized that no one was talking to either of them, but Stargirl didn’t seem to notice or care. When classmates turned on Stargirl, and Leo pleaded that she become normal, will Stargirl stay different, and be herself? I hope that the first chance you get, you will read Stargirl. You will never look at a rat, a cactus, or a billboard the same again. So now that you’ve read my book review, go read Stargirl! Stargirl by Jerry Spinelli. Ember Books, Reprint 2002. Buy the book here and support Stone Soup in the process! Have you read this book? Or do you plan on reading it? Let us know in the comments below!
Saturday Newsletter: November 10, 2018
A note from William Rubel These are the first four volumes of the revised Stone Soup anthologies! The next four are being printed this upcoming week. What can I say? Jane Levi, who has been responsible for this project has done a spectacular job. Revised content, completely new look, every volume expanded (the poetry volume alone has 50 additional poems), and every book is now over 200 pages. They are all available right now as forthcoming titles at our online store. The official publication date is November 15, though, as you can see from the picture, half of them have already arrived, so we can start shipping those ones earlier in the week. We love libraries! This weekend Jane, my daughter Stella, and I are presenting Stone Soup at the California Library Association conference in Santa Clara, CA. We have a booth. We’re very excited! Getting back in print lets us get back to selling print subscriptions to libraries once again, and a library is one of the absolutely best places for Stone Soup. And, of course, we will be selling anthologies and copies of the Stone Soup Annual. We hope to see them in every library soon! William’s Weekend Project I want to call attention today to the poem posted on our blog this week. It is called “Searching for Han Solo” and was written by Isabella Posel. This poem speaks to me as a parent, and it speaks to who I was as a child. This poem asks questions about today’s world—where it’s headed and how can it be saved from the direction it’s going in. So, yes, this poem is about global warming, and it’s about leaders who lie. It is always disconcerting for me to go into my daughter’s middle school to see all the banners hanging in the hallways about integrity, honesty, and acting toward others as you would want others to act towards you. Every time I go to my daughter’s school and read these banners or listen to the principal speaking at the assembly about the school’s values, I wonder what is it like to be a child today when so many of our leaders offer such a profoundly bad example. I’m so happy that Isabella has contributed this poem to Stone Soup. It is really an important one, and I hope you all will read it. To make it easier, it’s included below in the former ‘Story from the Archives’ section. Isabella’s poem achieves something that is very, very difficult. And that is to turn contemporary history and politics into a work of art that transcends the moment. Note how Isabella draws on classical myths, American comics, and today’s real world as sources for her work. It’s a poem to make you think. So what I’d like you all to do today is to start poem or story that explores the big world and national issues of today in a literary way. In other words, you are not writing an essay. You are not writing an opinion piece. You are using the techniques of poetry and storytelling to draw out what you feel about the big global and national issues of your childhood, right now. I can say that when I was a child my fears were about nuclear war. That was a huge concern. But when I see all of the issues that are on the scale of nuclear war that you are having to deal with today, I just can’t imagine what is going through your heads.This is a project where you can use your literary skills to talk to your peers and to talk to us adults about how you are feeling. Isabella proposes the idea that you children are all getting ready to fix all this mess. I can say to you that I sincerely hope you will. And thank you, Isabella, for contributing your poem. So, thinking about this poem, you know the drill. If you write something that you want Emma to consider printing in Stone Soup, then go to our online submissions form and submit it under the category of poem or story. If you would like your entry to be considered as a blog post, then please submit it to the blog category, where Sarah will contact you. Blog posts are published fairly quickly upon acceptance, whereas it takes longer to publish something in the magazine because we work many months in advance. In every case, I look forward to reading what you produce. Until next week, Partnership news Secret Kids contest This is our regular reminder to young, long-form authors that we are running a contest in partnership with Mackenzie Press: the Secret Kids Contest. All of the details are on our website–suffice to say, that if you are under the age of 18 and working on a book-length piece of writing, you should be thinking about getting it ready to submit by the end of the year to be in with a chance of winning one of the amazing prizes–a publishing contract. Miacademy We have an exciting partnership in place with Miacademy, the interactive learning site for K-8th grade. Writing from Stone Soup is being featured on their site, and Miacademy subscribers have the opportunity to submit their work to us. As part of this partnership, our friends at Miacademy are offering generous discounts to Stone Soup subscribers: 20 to 40 percent off, depending on which type of subscription you purchase. To find out more about Miacademy and explore the various services on offer, visit their website and read the information for parents. If you choose to join, simply enter the code STONESOUP2018at the checkout to receive your discount. From the Stone Soup blog, November 6, 2018 Searching for Han Solo: A Poem By Isabella Posel Riddle me this And Make My Day Who has taken all the heroes away? They are not in the papers Or on TV Not anywhere, sadly, that I can see Maybe King Arthur got lost And James
