Life With Iron Giants: The Mouse That Roared

I want to admit something: Until recently I was a bit of a city rodent.  I went about my business but kept to the shadows, coming out only to take care of my personal needs, blending in as necessary.  Raised to fear sticking my neck out when it came to public activism that might make me vulnerable to squashing, broomsticking, or just being spat upon, I preferred the anonymity of a well-tended nest sequestered somewhere out of kicking range.  You see, for most of my adult life, I've lived in a major metropolis complete with a wide and complex array of pressing neighborhood, city, and yes state-wide issues that I read about in the newspapers but did absolutely nothing about.

Nada.

I knew the air was dirty, the roads crowded, the schools inadequate, development over-reaching and poorly planned. There were social justice issues too, poverty and racism.  And although I had a loud enough opinion in private, my voice ended there.  I lived far from the maddening crowd and liked it that way.   

Then we moved.  To a little town in the shadows of a very, very big bully.

Hello Ports of Los Angeles and Long Beach.  The single largest polluter of Southern California Basin, affecting 20 million lives give or take with a whopping 30% of all the pollutants we breathe.  Functioning for a century with impunity, maintaining the worst kind of back-room politicking and self-serving financial interests that have spawned major state and federal laws that have as yet still failed to adequately protect the lives of a state population in size close to that of an entire nation (like Canada, for instance).

How a tiny town like San Pedro (along with other neighboring communities) got the privilege of trying to take on an entity with a financial stake as large as the GNP of some of the world's smaller nations is a long story and can be an exhausting prospect for anyone willing to listen.  It is a community full of cynics and burned out protesters who mingle with the workaday folks whose lives have been shaped, defined and nurtured for generations by the bounty and politics of the sea. Despite our different paths, San Pedrans have one thing in common.  They love this town and generations never leave, a rarity in this transient region.  What defines them is a wild, turbulent, and passionate connection to the coastal industries that fuel the Southern California economy and the knowledge that it comes with a price.

It's been an overwhelming responsibility, and since we were annexed early last century by the City of Los Angeles, we aren't even masters of our own fate because, well, it's tough to take on City Hall, especially when it lies thirty miles to the north, tethered by a slim corridor that cuts through other cities with the express purpose of ruling from afar.

But what can you do?  It is impossible to live in this place and not step out of the shadows. The ever-present sea surrounds us, as blue as the Adriatic on some clear afternoons, the freshened, aromatic ocean breeze brings with it a constant reminder of the life-sustaining gifts it holds; we gaze on it daily as a touch point, to the southern night sky unhindered by city lights, and when it's solace we seek all roads lead to quiet shores and hidden coves we can explore in relative peace.   

The problems we face may be larger than pretty much any small town in the nation has to face, but the rewards are similarly over-arching.  What we do here affects not just our neighborhood but millions of others to the north, south, east and west who may not have seen the heavy diesel fog dispersing out from the mega-tonne container ships, the thousands of polluting and dangerously worn trucks coming in and out every day, or the acres and acres of fire-belching refineries in neighboring Wilmington, or Long Beach, but they breathe it just the same, they risk injury on the highways just the same, they, like us, live with the consequences of nature out of balance.

I started small, and to date I am still learning what it means to really understand the concept of 'government for and by the people'.  It's not just about who we elect for President, or mayor, or our City Council for that matter.  I can't settle for trickle-down anymore.  I've come to realize that there are guardians out there and these dedicated people have been working tirelessly and intelligently to protect all of us.  We owe them an incredible debt of gratitude, for they stand between us and a lot of very canny, self-serving survivalists who will do pretty much anything to steal our cheese.

There's a quality of life war out there, folks.  And I say, choose your side, live your convictions, and join the ranks.   If you notice a shiny mouse whose been well fed and groomed sticking her nose out into the daylight of scrutiny, that would be me.  

Don't mess with my nest.

Next: A short primer on CEQA, Neighborhood Councils, and my journey into activism.