MCSEA anniversary/some old nicknames

Sometimes you just know it’s going to be a good day.

I was in a meeting all day today. Governance Committee reports. Usually that’s not exactly a good sign. But today is special. Today is different. Today is an anniversary.

Ten years ago today, I was in another meeting. Ten years ago today, around 15 high school students gathered at my parents’ place. Ten years ago today was the first meeting of Montgomery County Student Environmental Activists.

There are two things I’ve done in my life that I am really, truly proud of. MCSEA was the first. Neither of them could have been accomplished alone, and the community of incredible friends I encountered is part of what I take pride in. During the year and a half that I headed MCSEA, we protected wild places, killed highways, made the air in Maryland substantially cleaner, and generally demonstrated that political power belongs to those who TAKE it. Along the way, all of our lives were changed, at least I know mine was.

Incidentally, the other accomplishment I’m proud of is developing the SSC’s training department, which relied on lessons learned through MCSEA and stories told about MCSEA to teach and inspire other young people to start their own MCSEAs (my favorite was always the group Emily Cikanek wanted to start in Chicago, which would have been named “Chick-see-ah.” Awesome.). In a very real way, I am a Board member of the most influential environmental group in the country as a direct result of that meeting ten years ago.

So my point is, it’s a good day to be alive. I’ve been slipping out of the meeting now and then to call old friends and wish them a happy anniversary. That’s been fun too. Next weekend will be the 10-year reunion. That will be a ridiculous-good time.

To mark the occasion, I’m starting a new blog where I’ll record the story of MCSEA: mcseastory.blogspot.com. It ought to be of interest to Sierra Student Coalition-types, and it will be a good repository of the teaching-stories I’ve used over the years. I’ve written an outline at this point, but it will probably take six months to actually get it all written down. There’s a LOT to say.

And because this is a day of celebration, I thought it might be entertaining to list some of the nicknames I’ve earned during my ten years in the environmental movement:

1.Davo: this is the correct spelling. Dave-o is incorrect and a punishable offense. I don’t know how this started, but it’s been by far the most endearing. The funny thing is that it’s role-specific. MCSEAns and SSCers always call me Davo when we’re talking about environmental or organizational matters. But if we’re just shooting the shit, somehow I revert back to just Dave. I’ve always thought there was something particularly cool about that.

2.Mugwump: The best, the crowning achievement-nickname. When we started MCSEA, I was the “chair.” We also had an executive committee, and after a little less than a year, we agreed that the excom should have its own chair. So what should we call my position? Briony looked up “leader” in the thesaurus and, along with all the usual suspects, there was “primate” and “mugwump.” Now, understand, back in high school I had long hair and a shaggy beard. People regularly mistook me for a certain lord-and-savior. So I immediately made it clear that they were NOT calling me primate. Everyone got grins on their faces and I knew what they were thinking. “Here’s the thing, guys: when we go lobby our state senator, I’m not gonna say, ‘I’m Dave Karpf, and I’m the mugwump of MCSEA.’” So I became Executive Director and everyone started calling me mugwump.

On a related note, 6 months later a bunch of us were watching “Naked Lunch” after one of our meetings. The group included me and my high school girlfriend. If you haven’t seen this movie, I don’t recommend it. It’s about as twisted and confusing as a film can get, and it doesn’t have any of the redeeming qualities of the book, as far as I know. Anyway, you’re introduced early in the film to a weird typewriter/alien creature called a mugwump. Weird. And when you type on it, a weird liquid oozes out of its antennae, and this liquid is a strong hallucinogen. Weirder. This leads up to the moment, late in the film, where one character says to another, “yeah, nothing beats mugwump jism.” Everyone fell silent, slowly turned around, and stared at me and my girlfriend. I didn’t know either of us could turn that shade of red. The end.

3.The Tool: This is a short story. At the 1997 Vermont summer training program, Sage Rockermann and I were in charge of giving the “intro to the SSC” talk. This was on Thursday night and everyone was exhausted. In retrospect, not the best time to go over an org chart. Anyway, Sage has explained most of it, and I’m noticing this glazed look in peoples’ eyes, so I break in and say, “look, you all came here because you want to make a difference for the planet. And everything you’re learning this week, the campaigning and media and all… it’s like you’re developing a toolbox you can use back home. And all of this structure, the whole SSC, are just more tools for your toolbox.” Sage was standing a little behind me and, like it was planned, added in, “I don’t know about you, Dave, but I’m nobody’s tool.” A bunch of punkass MCSEAns were in the audience. That nickname followed me around at conferences for two years. Jerks.

4.Oldcore: The point of this story is that SSCers are mean. It was the 1999 Virginia summer training, I was director at this point, and all of 20 years old. These are high school trainings, so that’s still ancient you know. All week, people keep using the word “hardcore.” “That’s hardcore man, right on,” all over the place. And just once, I use the term. One of the MCSEAns, can’t remember who, pipes in, “Dave, man, you can’t say hardcore… you’re oldcore.” I was 20. By the time I was 22, this had become “ancientcore.” And when I graduated college, Tom Hale said that I was “pre-school.” As in, there’s new school, old school, and Dave. Dave is from before there WAS school.

5. Dave Karpfffffff: I’ve never understood this, and I’ll send a check to anyone who can explain why it’s so funny. My last name has a silent “f” at the end of it. It’s pronounced “carp,” like the fish. The folks at envirocitizen always loved to call me “Dave Karpffffff” and got a huge kick out of it. More disturbing is I was later told that they even did it while I wasn’t around. Why is this funny? Better, I’ve always thought, was the time both I and John Kamp attended a conference (Kamp took over as SSC Trainings Director after me) and, knowing that the SSC trainings guy had a silent f at the end of his name, our nametags read “Dave Karp” and “John Kampf.”