Alder Stone : A Transition

I've decided to transition to a different name
both for this blog & for me: Alder Stone.

Why? Three reasons.

First, Stone is my given middle name, a family name on my father's side. Why not use it more, at least informally?

Don't get me wrong. I'm not going to legally change my name. Fuller will remain on the books as my "official" last name for the business as usual crowd, for book titles, etc.

No, this is a more informal change,
perhaps known more among my friends.

I think of this informal name transition as a ritual to recognize & honor the substantive personal & professional transition that I'm undergoing, that began in spring, 2009 & will continue through 2010. It's a phase transition into a new attractor state that is substantively & qualitatively different from the states I've manifested for the last decade.

Part of that transition - by design - involves travels next summer, beginning in June, mostly on the east coast, much of it in Maine, some of it - hopefully - in Massachusetts & the British Isles. It's not quite clear yet when I may return to Eugene, though I will return ... for at least a while - I still have work to do here. (More about all this in a future post.)

I switched from Ollar (old English for alder) to Alder in 2000 (when I learned the meaning of "Ollar") to signify substantive changes in my life : the transition from Albuquerque to the Pacific NW; my first Burning Man experience; entry into rave culture; my move to Eugene...

I recognized then that alders are great trees with an important niche: they're nitrogen fixers that colonize damaged areas like burns or blow downs. In addition, with their roots often near stream banks, they seek water - the symbol of soul, which I was seeking at the time; still do.

I already knew that the surname Fuller referred to craftspeople
who used a type of clay - Fuller's earth - in processing wool.

So, when I learned that my first name translated into modern English as "Alder", I came to understand that all of my names are "of the Earth". How fitting for a biologist who teaches Gaia theory, right? It helped me - an Earth kid who grew up walking in woods & fields beside rivers & creeks - understand that I was named after a life form.

So why not give stone it's due in 2010?

As a fringe benefit, Alder Stone rolls
off the tongue more easily than Alder Fuller.

Second, I have a great fondness for stones. Yesterday, I spent part of the afternoon on the west bank of the Willamette near a rocky rapid with exposed dry stones. On them I stood, stretched, stepped, hopped - from stone to stone - & balanced. Doing so reminded me how much I love to walk on their uneven topography.

I've always - since early childhood - been attracted to stones. I was a "rock hound" early on; earned a ribbon in a middle school county science fair for a rock display.

I also like to climb stones. Sometimes as whole mountains, but often just large boulders. In recent months, I've come to understand that I'm not really attracted to mountains per se so much as much as the stones that they are made of.

That is, for me, it's not so much the height as the stones. A large rocky outcrop in a moderately jagged terrain is as attractive to me as a 10,000' peak, especially when the latter is made of basalt that is crumbly, like here in western Oregon. Basalt will be even harder to walk on as the glaciers on western mountains recede further & faster.

When I lived in Albuquerque, where there exists world-class granite walls, I spent a lot of time bouldering. I miss that in Oregon; there's basalt everywhere, but it's crumbly, not usually very good for bouldering. I'm seeking harder rocks now. Granite. (As it turns out, I have a lead about where I can find a large amount of that to climb on next summer, but that's a tale for another day.)

And third, as James Lovelock would say, stones are the bones of Gaia. I like that metaphor.

So, yeah. I think I'll just go informally by Alder Stone for a while & see how that feels.