By Kimberly Mayer
San Juan Island
Sometimes you have to get away. And there it is, waiting as always with open arms: O Canada!
We went to Toronto to attend the Rotary International Convention (June 21-27), as well as the Rotary Peacebuilding Summit that preceded it. First Nation blessings were bestowed on Rotarians from around the world as we gathered on ancestral land. Red Sky performances filled the stage with feathers and color, hoop dancing and drumming.
Toronto, we were told, translates to “where the trees are standing in water.”
Full disclosure: I went as an outsider. I am not a Rotary member, but I am married to one. When growing up, my father was also a Rotarian. He didn’t get up early and slip out to breakfast meetings, nor did he come home late at night after dinner meetings. Rotary met for lunch in the city in which he worked, and the meetings were folded into his day each week. We were not a part of that world.
Times have changed.
If I were to sum up the subject matter of both the summit and convention, I’d say it was an emphasis on educating and empowering women in the world, the global immigrant and refugee crisis and an overarching concern for the environment. All this on the plate of the organization that has nearly rid the world of the poliovirus — only 11 cases remaining — a mission that practically consumed Rotary in my father’s day.
Regarding the environment, you might say Rotary is returning to its roots in that Paul Harris, the founder of Rotary, was a naturalist. Traveling extensively with Rotary International, by the end of his life Harris could say he had planted trees “… on all continents of the Earth and on islands of the seas.” Indeed Harris thought the planting of trees the finest symbol for the idea of Rotary.
Last year Rotary International President Ian Risley proposed that every Rotary Club in the world plant one tree for every member. That’s 1.2 million trees. Living lungs in the face of deforestation and development.
Islands have the greatest stake in sustainability; as islanders, we understand this. On San Juan Island, 54 more trees will stand for 54 Rotarians. A living legacy as well as a commitment to the future.
Here too, Rotary can make a difference. We all can, by planting a tree. I’m going to make mine a Madrone tree.
Read more on Mayer’s blog at www.alittleelbowroom.com.
