M: Writings ’67–’72

Diary: How to Improve the World (You Will Only Make Matters Worse) Continued 1971–72

195 DIARY: HOW TO IMPROVE THE WORLD (YOU WILL ONLY MAKE MATTERS WORSE) CONTINUED 1971-72 CLXXIX. Edwin Schlossberg: "Raising animals so peoplewill have daily protein intake doesn't make sense; thinkof all the land that's necessary for pasture." Solution of world food problem will involve sourcesof protein that stay in position, terrarium-like places. Fuller domes, self-supporting, weather-controlled environments: organic reproduction of plant foods. Education and Ecstasy (George Leonard). It would be better to have no school at all than the schools we now have. Encouraged, instead of frightened, children could learn several languages before reaching age of four, at that age engaging in the invention of their own languages. Play'd be play instead of being, as now, release of repressed anger. CLXXX. On the plane I gatnext to a psychologist employed at the Galesburg mental hospital. I said I was glad students had succeeded in changing the institution. He said, "What are you talking about?" I said, I understand patients leave the hospital and enter enliveningly into community life. He said, "That isn't true." Use the same opening until you know all its pitfalls. Walking toward Greenwich and Bank Streets, I noticed an open 196 manhole with temporary toolshed. Con Edison was at work. Two tall, heavyset workmen, facing one another in the shed, were concentrating on something placed between them. It looked as though they were playing chess. I walked past, stopped, went back, came close to them. They were playing chess. CLXXXI. She'd spent two weeks in southwest Colorado working on Soleri's building that'll house three thousand people. All apartments are cubes and identical. Those that're finished are used by the workers. "If you think about it," she said, "it's awful, but if you live in it you find it's delightful." Mushrooms. Teaching-machines. Therapy-machines aiding people to form their brain waves, shifting waves' shape from that of anxiety to that of poise, invention. He said he'd rather have half a pint of the wild ones than a gallon of the tame (speaking of wild strawberries). Sam Moon, poet, met me at the Galesburg airport. Asked him whether he'd heard of changesin the mental hospital brought about bystudents. He hadn't. Doris Moon told me hospital uses dope. Doped up madmen, formerly given jobs as salesmen,seemed listless, not really interested in what they were doing. Their eyes were strange. Galesburg customers demanded doctors stop letting their patientsout. CLXXXII. "Soil is as precious as pearls and water as precious ag oil." 197 (A slogan coined by the Valley of Stones Brigade of Yueh Kechuang Commune.) In 1959 we developed the program of "splitting the mountain, creating the soil" so as to alter its face into fertile land. Doesn't matter whether you're in first clan or coach. You see the same movie. Many people are allergic to the commercial mushroom. Donald M. Simons tells of an acquaintance who suffers vomiting, diarrhoeaand loss of consciousness from eating any restaurant sauce that has even a trace of a mushroom in it. Moved to the country for city reasons: to start summer theatre; to set up electronic music studio. Instead took to walking in the woods. GLXXXIII. Just after ten o'clock I cashed a check for one hundred dollars. Atnoon I lost my billfold. I spent the afternoon cancelling credit cards. I also called the police. I tried to remember what there was in my wallet besides passport, bankbook, vaccination certificate, and social security card. At five o'clock I began drinking. (I was invited to speak to staff-members of a Connecticut asylum. After leaving the reception room, I walkeddown the hall among the madmen towardthe room where I was to speak. When I got there I knew what had to be said. "You're sitting," I told the doctors, "on top of a gold mine: share your wealth with the rest of us!") CLXXXIV. Left college end of sophomore year. Refused honorary degrees. Reinforcement, positive or negative, is beside the point. I'd been 198 smoking like a furnace for nearly a week. As I was leaving, university secretary said, "You've given us a breath of fresh air." TAao •. Our point of departure is to serve the people whole-heartedly, to proceed in all cases from the interests of the people and not from one's self-interest...