Celebrate the Spirit of
Interdependence on July 4!

This year marks Living Earth's fifth annual Interdependence Day Celebration. Celebrate the spirit of InterDependence, cooperation, community, and peace at this potluck picnic in Laurelhurst Park, and spend some time sharing the summer's early bounty with potluck dishes, home-made music, summer games, and friendship.

No “bombs bursting in air” at this celebration, but do bring guitars, banjos, kazoos, tubas, or whatever kind of musical instrument you can. We’ll also have materials so children and adults can create Peace Flags for the Harmos Project on Aug. 4-5-6, which Living Earth is supporting.

Mutual dependence and support

American mythology makes a great ruckus about the notion of "independence" but on closer scrutiny, the whole idea is called into question.

Our history texts glorify the valiant break from England's tyranny, forgetting that a driving force behind the revolution was colonial tea traders' demands for high profits and unrestricted markets. The iconic American cowboy is one of the most independent, rugged-individualist characters ever concocted, and we seldom challenge that fiction with recognition of the miserable wages and dehumanizing working conditions endured, the common violence and short life spans of our erstwhile national role models.

Given our history, it's no surprise that those who stand to gain the most have managed to sell the rest of us on the idea that our very fundamental mutual dependence is unnatural, undesirable and probably an un-patriotic and dangerous idea.

Yet, to depend simply means to rely upon, and the idea of interdependence suggests a mutually supportive condition that is at the heart of relationship, family, friendship, and community.

In contemporary use, interdependence has its roots in ecological models, where the symbiotic relationships of species and ecosystems offer elegant, efficient models where mutual support and enhanced opportunity are freely exchanged. Interdependence is basic to all constructive interactions between diverse, individually discrete yet actively cooperating systems. In this image we find the natural strength, beauty, stability, and possibility that are available when we are open to rich, diverse, complex and mutually-supportive communities and relationships.

So join us on July 4 to celebrate that radical, scary notion: Interdependence, with Cooperation, Generosity, and Goodness for All!