Defending the important things...

My backyard view, December 28, 2017

There is a story about the karate master, Matsumura Sokon, who was challenged once and won a match simply by looking at his opponent.  It wasn't that the opponent had no skill;  Matsumura himself acknowledged that he might easily have lost the match to the skilled engraver, who continued to argue that Matsumura was the greater.  Matsumura explained it this way to his opponent:  “But I know this: you were determined to win and I was just as determined to die if I lost. That was the difference between us.”  (Karate-do, My way of Life by Gichin Funakoshi)

Those words come back to me now as I face another challenge in my life.  "You were determined to win and I was just as determined to die if I lost."  I recall the words one of my sensei used in class one night, the saying of the samurai, who each day would say, "Today is a good day to die."  It wasn't that they were suicidal, as our society assumes immediately.  It meant that if they should go into battle they would fight as if each battle was to the death.  In other words, one was fighting to win, the other was fighting for his life.

Today is a good day to die.  

Gas War 2018 has begun.  It isn't my old friends across the road this time, but the one that blew up 3 miles south of us 4 years ago along the Vector Pipeline (just to mention one incident.)  It hit our house hard, from 3 miles away.  It cracked plaster next door (we don't have plaster).  Now this company wants to build a compressor station 1/2 mile south of my house.  Already the downplaying begins:  "oh, it only blew up because of the pipeline getting hit a few days before..."  "oh, it was only compressed air, not gas...."  It is funny to me how a bunch of people, who have never done a FOIA request on an incident involving natural gas, know so much about the safety of gas.  

Fear has that effect on people.  When we are afraid, we downplay the seriousness of whatever it is so that we feel like we are in control of the fear.  We all do it at times.  I'm guilty of it myself, and I've done it with some pretty stupid and silly things (yoko geri -- side kick -- still gets me.) However, after almost 19 years of living in the shadow of the natural gas industry, and after the night of August 10, 2016, downplaying the fear is no longer an option.  Either I leave and get far away, or I stay and fight.  If I stay and remain silent, then I lose all rights to redress when something happens.  (Not "if" something happens, "when.")  

Leaving is an option we have looked at, but forces outside of our control have pretty well taken that away from us.  (Insert rant about the housing market being destroyed, Macomb Twp and their warped politics, and side rant about agribusiness vs agriculture and who is turning Macomb County into Wayne County Junior.)  Yes, the option of leaving has been taken away when it will mean between $70,000 and $100,000 mortgage, with selling a house without a mortgage on it, for one not any better than what we have.

The fight has already begun on my end.  I will be honest.  I do not know if it is possible to stop another compressor station from going in.  (Kelo v. City of New London, perhaps?)  However, I do know this:  Said company is fighting for money; I am fighting for my home.  

Today is a good day to die.