cynical vs. concerned or skeptical

Another post in this forum got me thinking.

For those of you that are familiar with my rants here, you probably would not be surprised to learn that I've borne the label "cynical" more than once.

To me, the word "cynical" seems to suggest a certain ignorant negativity.  And while that might be sometimes true, I remember something Ralph Nader once said (I think) on this topic.  That it is not cynicism at all - but rather concern combined with healthy, experience based skepticism that some folks mistake for cynicism.

I've also been told that I like to debate.  I know that is not true.  Absolute fact.  And I am the only person that truly knows what I like.  I do know that I will protest when asked to eat a bucket of horse potatoes.    And this protesting will appear to the ignorant boob holding the bucket as a desire to debate.

there have been times that I believe people have considered me cynical as well..i just know it all ..is all..tee he..well I know I know more than some of them do anyway.

I don't see you as cynical..more like well educated..and letting people know the truth..nothing wrong with that.

not sure what a horse potato is..maybe what my husband calls road apples..

you know it takes educated peope with a keen eye to what is going on to help keep the world informed and on the right track..look at all those big green lawns out there and not a food plant in site?? duh..what do they know?

(horse potatoes is the same as road apples)

Well ... if you wanna talk about lawns ...  for me I think I had my own evolution that goes like this:  when I first gave a damn about lawns, I wanted it to look good by the standards of my neighbors.  Weed free - all the grasses even ...  then later I wanted to replace all of the grass with gardens - i thought it would be best to have no grass.  I ended up not liking that either.  Grass does have it's place and its appeal.  Playing with toddlers in the grass is great stuff.  So then I went back to embracing grass.  And then I got it into my head that a lawn can be so much more than grass.  And a great incubator for potlucks, overnight tenting, yard sales, eating on a picnic table, club meeting spots (everybody sit in a circle!) and all sorts of other things that are an incubator for community.  So now I'm in a space where I like to embrace lawns even though so many eco people are now against lawns.  A lawn loaded with more than a dozen species of things, especially dandelions.  A tall grass has less weeds, but it also feels more like an inviting meadow.

oh don't get me wrong I'm not anti-lawn.....I'm anti NOTHING BUT LAWN ...I have a small lawn area in the front of my house surrounded by gobs of vegetation...and a small driveway/lawn on the east of my house to get from the front to the back without mud..I have a small lawn surrounded by beds on top of my rear drainfield..basically cause nothing else will grow in that spot but a tired lawn..and lawn paths..as mowing a lawn path is easier than weeding another kind..but i have other paths as well..also we have some open field areas..that get mown a couple times a year ..and so often they are lawns..and then they are not.

my concern I guess is that that is all there is..in many urban areas is lawn..and nothing else..no trees..no bushes..no tomato plants..nuthin else..WHY??...i've always loved walking barefoot or lying down on a nice lush lawn..

sorry if i sounded a bit lawn-cynical ..tee hee

There is one nice thing about a nice, big organic nothing-but-lawn:  what the owner calls 'waste'.  When I lived in Las Vegas, I had a neighbor four doors away like that.  Organic fertilizer, annual de-thatching, weekly mowing.

Do you REALIZE how much clippings and mulch you're talking about?  The de-thatching was FORTY BAGS ALONE!  The mowing was 5-7 bags every week.

I would pull into the driveway on Thursday (trash pickup was Friday), glance down the street, wait until the sun was low, then got my trusty (and rusty) hand truck and tootled down the street.  It was unfortunate that the slight slope was uphill in the loaded direction and downhill in the empty direction.  Oh, well.

I tilled the green stuff into the sand.  I dried more on the driveway (one whole day in the Las Vegas 115F summer day) and used it as mulch.

The neighbors would just shake their heads.

Sue

yeah true, I used to go into town and "steal" bags of leaves and clippins left out by the road..until I saw some diseases in the leaves that were coming from town..they looked like little cigarette burns in the leaves..holes brown..so then i stopped stealing the leaves..i was afraid that I would be bringing home a diesease from town..a couple years later we noticed the neighbor's maple tree had those burns in it and i thought..OMG did i do that??

i doubt it was you brenda. those things have a way of getting around even without human help and the natural disease cycles can make it seem like it appears where it wasn't before just because it wasnt' their within a human memory cycle.

I'm no longer afraid or ashamed to be cynical. when someone tells me I'm not open minded I just explain that it keeps my brain in my head. show me why you think the way you do and I will determine for myself whether the idea has any merit or at least deserves consideration. throw out there a bunch of mumbo jumbo quack science and you bet my mind is closed.