For me, the start of a new year is as good a time as any to reflect on the importance of staying grounded in the present, in the now.

Here’s a line by Emerson, taken from his Essays and Lectures, that captures this point in a vivid and poetic way:

These roses under my window make no reference to former roses or to better ones; they are for what they are; they exist with God today. There is no time for them. There is simply the rose; it is perfect in every moment of its existence. But man postpones or remembers; he does not live in the present, but with reverted eye laments the past, or heedless of the riches that surround him, stands on tiptoe to forsee the future. He cannot be happy and strong until he too lives with nature in the present, above time.

I’m getting into the holiday spirit by making glögg, one of my favorite holiday traditions. Here I’ve brought together cinnamon, cloves, cardemon, ginger, orange peel, and other spices and let them soak in vodka for a couple of days. Next the booze will be sifted, mixed with red wine and a little sugar, heated and served with raisins and slivered almonds. Wonderful stuff, especially on a cold winter night.

Update: There was a story on NPR’s All Things Considered yesterday with a recipe based on port instead of vodka. I’ve never tried that, but it sounds good to me. Here’s the story: Get Into The Holiday Spirit With Scandinavian Glögg

I’ve been using Apple computers for most of my professional life and rarely has a day gone by that I haven’t felt a sense of gratitude for the technologies he brought into being. I’ve produced radio programs, written books, edited films, retouched photos, and created graphic designs on the Mac. And that’s just the beginning. My story is hardly unique. Countless people will tell you the same thing.

Though I never met Jobs, I photographed him some years ago in Oslo. He was there to attend the Nobel Peace Prize ceremony for his friend Al Gore. My photo made the rounds. Apparently people were shocked to see Jobs in a suit and tie. They imagined that his closets were full of nothing but black turtlenecks and blue jeans, and I had proved them wrong.

People will be discussing his legacy for years to come. But right now, all I can say is that feels like the sudden end of an era.

“Remembering that I’ll be dead soon is the most important tool I’ve ever encountered to help me make the big choices in life. Almost everything — all external expectations, all pride, all fear of embarrassment or failure — fall away in the face of death, leaving only what is truly important. Remembering that you’re going to die is the best way I know to avoid the trap of thinking you have something to lose. You’re already naked. There’s no reason not to follow your heart…. Stay hungry. Stay foolish.” — Steve Jobs, Stanford University commencement address, June 2005.

Irwin Abrams passed away a few days before Christmas. He was a longtime professor of history at Antioch College, a pioneer in the field of peace research, and a global authority on the Nobel Peace Prize. He was also my grandfather.

We worked together on many projects over the years, including a couple of books, and I learned much of what I know about scholarly research and historical analysis from him. But his influence goes far deeper.

When I was a kid, he instilled in me a great love of knowledge — first through stories, and later through ideas. He was always presenting me with books and newspaper clippings, introducing me to his favorite students (and there were many), and sending me off on unexpected research assignments.

Growing up as I did in Sweden, he used to enlist my help translating articles from Swedish and Norwegian. I eventually became his far-flung research assistant. Before I was out of my teens, he had me running off to do interviews for his various projects.

I remember one occasion when he had me travel to meet the late daughter of Carl Von Ossietzky, winner of the Nobel Peace Prize for 1935. She spoke Swedish but little or no English, so I was perfect for the job, he said. The interview carried on late into the day. She made me soup, served me cookies and tea, and later, as I was readying to leave, took out an old shoebox and showed me an item wrapped in terry cloth. I opened it to find her father’s gleaming Nobel Peace Prize medal. It was an impressive 23-carat gold piece weighing almost half a pound, with Gustav Vigeland’s beautiful engraving of three men locked in an embrace. It was assignments like these that nurtured my passion for journalism.

My grandfather loved to travel, to eat, to sing, and to tell jokes. He used to dance with his arms raised above his head, like Zorba the Greek. He spoke several languages, most of them quite badly, but always with a carefree exuberance. He was never a showman, but he loved a celebration and was happiest when in the midst of family and friends.

There was nothing in the world he cherished more than my grandmother, Freda. They were married 60 years. I used to love watching them beam at each other across a room, or across a big dinner table. He often told the story of how they met at a new year’s party on a train from Chicago to San Francisco in the months leading up to World War II. By the time they heard the stationmaster’s “bells and whistles” in Cheyenne, Wyoming, heralding the arrival of the new year, they were hearing bells and whistles of their own.

After she died in 1999, it was like a light in him had been extinguished. He spoke of her everyday, kept her artwork on his walls and her photos on the bedside table. Almost every time her name would come up, his voice would break.

He was always a special presence in my life, but perhaps especially after my grandmother died. During the last ten years, we were in touch almost every day, took on joint projects, and made trips together. Our conversations grew deeper, more rich and nuanced.

He came into his final years as I entered mid-life. There was a curious symmetry there, and I had much to learn from him about the transitions of life. His role shifted from grandfather to mentor, and finally to confidant.

When I saw him for the last time in mid-November, he still displayed his sparkling sense of humor. As usual, he seemed more interested in hearing about me than in talking about himself. Several times he would reach over and take my hand while we were talking, always very sweet and attentive.

Although he worked with a physical therapist several times a week, he was mostly confined to a wheelchair toward the end. He was quite frail and hunched over and though he wasn’t ill I sensed that time was running out. He died peacefully on December 16, a couple of months shy of his 97th birthday.

In the course of drafting an obituary, and also planning for the upcoming memorial service, I’ve been going back to his writings and correspondence. To my amazement, I discovered a letter addressed to me, written just days after I was born. “May I be the first to send you a letter welcoming you to this planet,” it begins. “There may be moments when you will regret your decision to dwell among us, but may I wish you a long residence here with few occasions for such regrets.”

My grandfather not only welcomed me into this world, he was always there to guide me along, especially during times of sorrow and regret (there have been more than a few). He had a long residence here on the planet, and he enriched many people’s lives. But few as deeply as mine.

With Irwin in Ohio, 1966

With Freda and Irwin in Maine, 1976

With Irwin in Oslo, 2002

With Irwin in Ohio, 2010

My Norwegian friend had invited me over for dinner. He lives in a quiet hamlet on a peninsula a half-hour’s boat ride from downtown Oslo. As we came up to his house, his wife had put out candles to light our way. They were protected from the freezing winds by lanterns made entirely of ice.

A few years ago, British author and philanthropist William Murtha invited me (and about 200 others) to do just that for a book he was writing. He also asked us to name five books that have profoundly influenced our thinking.

I reflected on it for several days. It seemed to me that our world is sorely in need of visionaries, yet most of us don’t know how to be one. We’re confused by appearances. We traffic in intellectual constructs and abstract formulations, but we forget to look within, to our own source of truth. We neglect the authority of our deepest knowing.

To be a visionary meant nothing, I felt, unless it involved looking beyond appearances to the essence of things. To be a visionary means perceiving with the heart — taking our cues from within and holding fast to that truth even, and perhaps especially, when the culture seems to contradict it at every turn.

This certainly seemed to be one of the common characteristics of the visionaries I have known and worked with as a journalist.

I remembered a line from the great British scientist Jacob Bronowski: “In every age there is a turning-point, a new way of seeing and asserting the coherence of the world,” he wrote. “Each culture tries to fix its visionary moment, when it is transformed by a new conception either of nature or of man.” It was my sense, then as now, that for those of us living in the West, this is our unique and visionary moment as a culture.

In the end, I sent Murtha 100 words on the subject of discovering our unique genius.

Now his book is out. It’s called 100 Words: Two Hundred Visionaries Share Their Hope For the Future and includes contributions from a host of remarkable people. They include Jane Goodall, Alice Walker, Angeles Arrien, Bill Drayton, Lynne Twist, Frances Moore Lappe, Julia Butterfly Hill, Ben Okri, Barbara Marx Hubbard, and many others.

Murtha calls them creative souls, passionate activists, way-showers, and doers who are paving the way for all of us.

He says the book represents “a testament to the hopes, resilience, courage, and life-message of the visionaries. This is their story. And best of all, their uplifting and courageous stories clearly demonstrate much of what is going right in the world.”

If you happen to be in Santa Barbara on August 15, 2010, please consider coming to a special book signing at Chaucer’s Bookstore from 3:00-5:00 p.m. I’ll be joined by fellow contributors Noah benShea, Barbara Fields, Barbara Marx Hubbard, and C. Jean Wiedemann. Chaucer’s is generously donating 10 percent of the proceeds to the nonprofits of the contributors.

Five of the people featured in William Murtha's "100 Words: Two Hundred Visionaries Share Their Hope for the Future" appeared at a book signing at Chaucer's Bookstore in Santa Barbara, California, on August 15, 2010. From left to right: Scott London, Barbara Fields, Noah benShea, Barbara Marx Hubbard, and Jean Wiedemann. (Photo by Alka Arora.)

Links and further information

• “Sharing Their Hope” by Karna Hughes, Santa Barbara News-Press, August 15, 2010
• Additional photos from the book signing at Chaucer’s Books in Santa Barbara
• Five Books I Love — A blog entry about the 5 titles I selected for 100 Words
• Order 100 Words from Amazon.com

I didn’t see the caterpillar transform into a chrysalis, but the following morning I found it hanging on the vine. The bright green pupa was cleverly disguised and hard to spot among the green leaves.

Three and a half weeks went by without any activity. Finally, I noticed that the chrysalis began to shift from a bright green to a dark brown color. I could make out the faint pattern of monarch wings through the skin.

In a matter of a few hours, the pupa became transparent as the insect began to separate itself from the skin.

The wings were now clearly visible through the delicate husk.

In less than two hours, the chrysalis had become virtually transparent.

Suddenly it cracked open.

In a matter of seconds, the creature began to ease out of the enclosure.

The butterfly unfurled as it descended out of the chrysalis.

The camera data on these photos shows that the exposures were taken mere seconds apart. The emergence took less than a minute.

Here the butterfly reaches it’s legs out of the pupa, grabs on, and in one swift movement eases itself completely into the open.

The wings were soft, wet and rumpled. It took a few minutes for them fully straighten out.

Here the newborn butterfly spent several minutes testing its equipment: moving its wings and curling and uncurling its proboscis, or antannae.

As the wings slowly straightened out, the butterfly made its way up to the branch of the vine.

Here the full splendor of the new female monarch was on display. It stayed in the same position, motionless, overnight. Later the next morning it finally took its first flight, fluttering off to a nearby rose bush.

The transformation from caterpillar to butterfly took 28 days.

I had my first espresso in a backstreet café in Venice. It must have been 1985 or ’86. I had arrived on the night train from Zagreb, Croatia, achy from a long and sleepless night. I stumbled out of the train station and into a café and ordered a coffee. What I didn’t know was that “coffee” in Italian is synonymous with espresso.

It came in a white ceramic demitasse cup, gave off a strong and slightly sweet aroma, and was topped by a curious brown foam. It wasn’t what I expected, or wanted. What I thought I ordered was a cup of brewed coffee, black and unsweetened. But this was something else.

Not knowing any Italian and in any case too weary from a long night of travel, I decided to simply take the poison and let the caffeine do its work. I held the cup to my lips, took in the curious aroma, and had a sip. Then another. And then a third. The fourth sip finished it off.

It was a new and altogether unforgettable taste sensation — like taking in the essence of coffee in its purest form. This wasn’t just a coffee, it was an elixir. I was intoxicated.

It wound up being the first of countless espressos I had during my weeklong stay in Italy, and each one worked its magic like a kind of secret potion.

After leaving Italy and returning to Sweden, where I lived at the time, I started ordering espressos everywhere I could. It became a virtual obsession. But it was hard to find the kind of espresso I’d had in Italy. Even the fancy coffee houses outfitted with gleaming new espresso machines and serving Italian roasts seemed to come up short.

When I eventually moved to the States, getting a good espresso became almost impossible. Sometimes I would order a double shot, and the kid behind the counter would hand it to me with a frown on his face, as if to say, “Are you really going to drink that straight, without any whipped cream or syrup added?”

Sometimes I would happen upon a café that served a decent espresso, but it was so hit-or-miss that the same café, the same machine, the same roast, even the same barista often served me a good cup followed by a foul and poisonous one.

Starbucks prided itself on serving consistently good espressos, but the experience was never quite right: the shots were too small, the cup too large, and the flavor, well, mediocre and generally unsatisfying. Plus, I hated the pretense of it all — asking for a double espresso and having a barista correct me with “doppio,” as if I had committed some sort of ordering faux-pas.

Besides, the smell inside those Starbucks stores is off-putting to me, like a combination of burnt coffee and cough medicine.

At Starbucks, baristas still occasionally hand me a double espresso with one of those unforgiving looks: “Wouldn’t you like me to add some steamed milk to that?”

Then I found Espresso Roma café in Berkeley. It was like being back in Venice 25 years ago. Espresso at its best. When I first found the place, I went three mornings in a row. Every espresso was exquisite. Perfection in a cup.

Now I go there every time I’m in the Bay Area. I can hardly wait to get up in the morning and head down for the first cup of the day. The guys working the machines are a delight to watch. They’re like clockwork — fast, efficient, flawless.

The place is on the corner of College and Ashby. If you love espresso, go there. The Yelp reviews are mixed, but that’s not on account of the coffee. The place is loud and sometimes has dirty tables, single women complain about guys hitting on them, that sort of thing. Also, people are finicky about their addictions, and coffee is no exception. So it’s no surprise perhaps that reviews vary.

I still drink my espressos straight, unsweetened. A piece of dark chocolate goes nicely with it, but is hardly necessary.

It’s not an addiction exactly, but a weakness to be sure. And short of returning to Italy, I can’t think of a better place to indulge it than at Espresso Roma Café.

What have I been working on? One project was a year-long study I led for the Harwood Institute that looks at what we call “public innovators” — who they are and why they’re one of the keys to bringing about the change we need in America’s communities. That report should be out very soon.

Another big project was the completion of a book I co-edited with Irwin Abrams for the Nobel Foundation. The foundation is in Stockholm, the publisher is in Singapore, Irwin Abrams is in Ohio, and I’m here in California. Getting us all into alignment was what you might call a global effort. This was a very interesting and rewarding, if time-consuming, project. The book should be out later this year.

Another reason why it’s been so quiet here lately — and I know you’ve heard this before — is because I’ve been needing to make some changes to the site. It’s cumbersome work. But I’m making behind the scenes improvements as time permits. Meanwhile, there’s much new stuff to add to the site in coming weeks, so please stay tuned.

Another factor is the growth of Google Scholar which has generated a lot of traffic from college and university campuses. Professors who used to hand out “readers” — bound collections of photocopied articles and book chapters — now just point their students to a page full of links. Google Scholar makes the professor’s job that much easier by tracking down quality information on practically any subject under the sun. Gone are the days when academic research actually involved a trip to the library.

And then there is Wikipedia, the world’s favorite encyclopedia, which is growing by leaps and bounds and now has quite a few links to pages on this site.

For the record, Burning Man is not a rock concert, a gathering of techies or punk-rockers, or even a drug fest. That said, Bede Moore, the writer of the ABC story, got much of it right. I’m quoted at one point in the article saying that Larry Harvey and the other founders based the event on a very enlightened set of values. Even though the festival has grown exponentially over the past 20 years, they have stayed true to those values. For many of us, it’s the thing that keeps us coming back year after year.

I’ve also introduced a guestbook — a much-requested feature that allows visitors a chance to drop me a line and, more importantly, respond to the material on the site. (Some of the guestbook entries were originally sent to me as e-mails, but I’m making them public here — hopefully without offending anyone — to encourage open discussion and constructive criticism.)

In addition, I’ve revamped the site index, posted a list of the ten most popular pages, and added an overview of material related to civic renewal.

Finally, I’ve introduced a news page. Many people encouraged me to add a blog to the site, but I had mixed feelings about it. First of all, I thought, does the world really need one more blog? And secondly, isn’t there more to life than sitting at the computer writing up a blow-by-blow? So, the news page tries to strike a balance between a blog and a periodic update. It offers a place for commentary, ideas, recommendations and news. (It also replaces my electronic newsletter “London Calling.”)

This marks the first major overhaul of the site in five years. If you’re interested in how it has evolved over the years, read about this site.

Please do send me your thoughts about the new changes — what works, what doesn’t, dead links, etc. Are there elements that are confusing, redundant, pointless, infuriating? Any and all feedback is much appreciated.

I remember a conversation seven or eight years ago with the late economist Robert Theobald. He and I were commiserating about the latest reports on the state of the environment. Our future as a civilization hinges on whether we can find a more ecologically sustainable model, he told me. And we only have a few years to turn things around.

“The problem is that we’re now living in a global culture and there is no one to take up a new model,” he said. “The Chinese are the logical ones to take up a new model, but they have bought into exactly what we’re doing, which is fatal because of the environmental question. If the Chinese decide that they are going to have the American standard of living, the environmental ballgame is over.”

The full interview, one of many I had with Theobald before he died, is available here. See also my review of his book The Rapids of Change.

What can foundations and nonprofits do to address the problem? This was the focus of three day-long dialogues, held over a twelve-month period, in Washington D.C. The conversations were rich, thought-provoking, perhaps even ground-breaking. Crafting more effective strategies, the participants believed, has to begin by paying greater attention to how communities come together to name and frame their problems, finding entry points for working with a diversity of people in the community, fostering integrative and sustainable partnerships, and developing more enlightened evaluation practices that reflect both qualitative and quantitative measures of community development.

The dialogues served as the basis for a report, Investing in Public Life, which was published last month. In it, I outline a range of strategies for accomplishing these goals. I also set forth some practical ideas for foundations and nonprofit organizations committed to building and strengthening local communities.