STRESS LESS AT HOME THE HUFFINGTON POST MAGAZINE
APRIL 28, 2013
The Secret to De-Stressing 8 Calming Hues for Your House How the Other Half Relaxes (You Can Guess Snoop’s Strategy) Breathe Easy With These Plants Slow Down That Tasty Dinner
PLUS: When It’s Government
Policy to Measure Your Happiness
04.28.13 #46 CONTENTS
NEED TO DESTRESS? HELP IS HERE RANDY TARAN: The Good News About Stress QUOTED: Celebrity De-Stress Edition LIFESTYLE: The Most Stress-Reducing Colors HOME: Goodbye, Air Purifier. Hello, House Plants. EAT THIS: Slow Down and Make Your Own Pasta
FROM TOP: DESHAKALYAN CHOWDHURY/AFP/GETTY IMAGES;CHIP SOMODEVILLA/GETTY IMAGES
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FORGET GDP Is measuring our Gross National Happiness the way forward? BY MALLIKA RAO
POINTERS: Boston Bomber Suspect Charged ... France Says ‘Oui’ to Gay Marriage JASON LINKINS: Looking Forward in Angst DATA: The Worst States for Kids of Gay Parents Q&A: Snoop Lion Lights Up on Air HEADLINES MOVING IMAGE: The Week in Photos
Voices FRANK WARREN: We Want to Tell Our Secrets ... Anonymously
Exit TFU
HINDSIGHT IN TEXAS The hazards of a fertilizer plant eluded regulators for nearly 30 years. BY CHRIS KIRKHAM AND BEN HALLMAN
FROM THE EDITOR: The View From West ON THE COVER: Photograph for
Huffington by Marshall Troy
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LETTER FROM THE EDITOR
HUFFINGTON 04.28.13
The View From West N THIS WEEK’S issue, Chris Kirkham and Ben Hallman look at the tragic explosion of the fertilizer plant in West, Texas, that left 14 people dead and a town grasping for answers. This is a story of breakdown. The deadly explosion was the end result of a staggering string of failures on the part of the regulatory agencies that exist explicitly to prevent such accidents. “A sense emerges,” Chris and Ben write, “that no institution sounded the alarm here, even as fertilizer piled up inside the plant, creating a potentially deadly tinderbox in close proximity to the town.”
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The list of players who failed to sound those alarms is a long one. There’s the company that owned the plant, which in 2011 stated that there was no risk of fire or explosion. There’s the Occupational Safety and Health Administration, which had not visited the facility in nearly 30 years. And there’s the Department of Homeland Security, which, as Chris and Ben put it, “apparently was unaware of the plant’s existence.” Even after the explosion, with West residents reeling from substantial damage to nearby apart-
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LETTER FROM THE EDITOR
ments and a school, there is widespread sympathy for those who run the plant — longtime West residents who were pillars of the community. Ted Uptmore, who has managed the plant for half a century, also owns a livestock business. And Donald Adair, the plant’s owner, has served on the local school board. Like the schools and churches of West, the fertilizer plant was a part of the community. “It’s been there so long that you just take it for granted,” said Jeanette Karlik, a columnist for the local newspaper, the West News. But as Ben and Chris write, both the regulatory agencies and the people of West — everyone, it seems — shared a “notion that an explosion at the plant was not something to worry about.” Elsewhere in the issue, Mallika Rao looks at Santa Monica’s Local Wellbeing Index, a new way to help city leaders redefine the way they craft policy. As radical as the idea may sound, there’s precedent, and many countries around the world are way ahead of us in terms of, as Mallika puts it, “worrying about how their people feel,
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not just how much they produce.” In the 1970s, the king of Bhutan famously called for a measurement of his country’s Gross National Happiness. England’s annual government survey now asks
This is a story of breakdown. The deadly explosion was the end result of a staggering string of failures on the part of the regulatory agencies.” questions like, “How happy did you feel yesterday?” And American states and cities are slowly adopting similar programs that bring us nearer to governing, as Mallika puts it, “with a citizen’s inner life in mind.” Finally, our continuing coverage of ways to reduce stress in our lives includes houseplants as a way to purify your air, calming colors to de-stress your house, and slowing down at home by cooking from scratch.
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BOSTON BOMBING SUSPECT CHARGED
Dzhokhar Tsarnaev, the surviving suspect of the Boston Marathon bombing, has been charged with two federal counts of using a weapon of mass destruction and malicious destruction of property that resulted in death. The 19-yearold was charged while in the hospital, where he is still being treated for injuries, and could be sentenced to life in prison or face the death penalty. Amid the start of legal proceedings, Boston held a moment of silence Monday at 2:50 p.m. in remembrance of the twin bombs that went off one week ago, killing three and injuring more than 280.
CHIP SOMODEVILLA/GETTY IMAGES (BAUCUS); MARK WILSON/GETTY IMAGES (GIFFORDS)
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POWERFUL MONTANA DEMOCRAT RETIRES
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FRANCE LEGALIZES GAY MARRIAGE
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OUTRAGEOUS COMMENTS DIRECTED AT GABBY GIFFORDS
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Sen. Max Baucus (D-Mont.), who currently serves as the Senate Finance Committee chairman, announced he will not seek reelection in 2014. The 72-year-old’s retirement may give Republicans an opportunity to win a Senate seat in a state that Mitt Romney handily won in the 2012 election. Baucus is one of eight senators to have announced plans to retire before the next election cycle. “In the next year and a half, I want to spend all my hard work, shoe leather and luck working for the people of Montana instead of on campaigning,” Baucus said in a statement.
The French Assembly passed gay marriage on Tuesday, 331-225. The vote comes amid an increase in protests against gay couples, with one drawing hundreds of thousands of demonstrators. “We believe that the first weddings will be beautiful and that they’ll bring a breeze of joy, and that those who are opposed to them today will surely be confounded when they are overcome with the happiness of the newlyweds and the families,” Justice Minister Christiane Taubira said.
After the Senate failed to pass a bill last week that would have expanded background checks on gun purchases, former Rep. Gabby Giffords, who was shot in the head in January 2011, wrote a New York Times op-ed saying she was “furious” with the outcome. But conservative columnist James Taranto questioned how Giffords was able to write the piece so quickly. “So we are supposed to believe that somehow in less than five hours a woman who has severe impairments of her motor and speech functions was able to produce 900 publishable words ... I think that’s a little bit odd,” he said on an NRA talk show.
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BOSTON GLOBE GETS A SURPRISE AFTER RUSH TO COVER BOMBING
After a week of grueling coverage across the nation of the Boston bombing, the Chicago Tribune surprised the Boston Globe with dozens of pizzas. “We can only imagine what an exhausting and heartbreaking week it’s been for you and your city,” read the note that accompanied them. “We can’t buy you lost sleep, so at least let us pick up lunch.” Globe editor Brian McGrory said last week that his team’s coverage exemplified the need for metro papers. “The Globe and its website became something like a town square, where people turned for information and they got it,” he said.
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ANTHONY WEINER IS BACK
THAT’S VIRAL ‘YOU’RE MORE BEAUTIFUL THAN YOU THINK’
Disgraced former Rep. Anthony Weiner has returned to the Twitterverse. Nearly two years after tweeting a lewd photo of himself and resigning from Congress, Weiner is trying his hand again at social media under the handle @AnthonyWeiner. He resurfaced amid speculation that he plans to run for mayor of New York City, and his initial tweets contained links to his policy proposals.
A selection of the week’s most talked-about stories. HEADLINES TO VIEW FULL STORIES
ZOOEY DESCHANEL, BOSTON BOMBING SUSPECT?
ANOTHER STUPID TREND
WHAT NOT TO SAY ON AIR
NOW IS NOT THE TIME, NATE BELL
DATA
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The Worst States for Children of Same-Sex Parents Millions of children in the United States are being raised by same-sex parents. Many of them live in states that don’t legally recognize their families or make it difficult for both parents to claim legal ties to them.
Washington Montana Oregon Idaho Wyoming
New Hampshire
North Dakota South Dakota
Wisconsin Michigan Iowa
Nebraska
Nevada Utah
Colorado
California Arizona
New Mexico
Vermont Rhode Island Massachusetts New York
Minnesota
Pennsylvania Ohio Illinois
Kansas
Indiana Kentucky
Missouri
Oklahoma
North Carolina
Tennessee
South Carolina
Arkansas Louisiana
Texas
West Virginia Virginia
Alabama
Georgia
Mississippi
SOURCE: FAMILY EQUALITY COUNCIL
Florida
State lacks clear mechanisms that create legal ties to both parents for children born to same-sex couples via donor insemination
State lacks clear mechanisms that create legal ties to both parents for children born to same-sex couples via donor insemination AND no legal recognition for samesex couples
State lacks clear mechanisms that create legal ties to both parents for children born to samesex couples via donor insemination AND same-sex couples face legal restrictions when petitioning for second-parent adoption
Statefalls into ALL THREE of the aforementioned categories, making it one of the six worst states in the U.S. for kids of gay parents
Maine
Conneticut New Jersey Delaware Maryland
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JASON LINKINS
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IN DEFENSE OF MAUREEN DOWD RARELY, if ever, have the opportunity to say something kind about New York Times columnist Maureen Dowd. In fairness, this is mostly because I rarely, if ever, feel compelled to read whatever it is Dowd has written. Of all the reasons to attempt to surmount The Times’ paywall, she
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ranks fairly low, having long lapsed into schtick. And as an editor of mine once cautioned, taking the time to critique Dowd comes at the cost of doing hundreds of more relevant things. I see his point. But today, I must give credit where credit is due. Dowd, perhaps without intending to, may have managed to do something wonderful, for America. See, over the weekend, Dowd penned a column titled “No Bully
Dowd speaks during a taping of Meet the Press at the NBC studios in 2008.
Enter in the Pulpit,” responding to the defeated effort to pass a bill that would enhance the current system of background checks for gun purchases. In it, she wrote: How is it that the president won the argument on gun safety with the public and lost the vote in the Senate? It’s because he doesn’t know how to work the system. And it’s clear now that he doesn’t want to learn, or to even hire some clever people who can tell him how to do it or do it for him. It’s unbelievable that with 90 percent of Americans on his side, he could get only 54 votes in the Senate. It was a glaring example of his weakness in using leverage to get what he wants. No one on Capitol Hill is scared of him. Okay, so I never said that Dowd’s column wasn’t completely, howlingly stupid. It is that, and much more. She goes on to imagine a scenario in which Pres. Barack Obama strongarms North Dakota Sen. Heidi Heitkamp (D) by making a veiled threat about not helping her to re-election (in 2018!), couched in an appeal to her maternal instincts. She’s totally obsessed with an Aaron Sorkin movie from the 1990s.
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She imagines that Obama could have leveraged his friendship with Sen. Tom Coburn (R-Okla.) to help him “do something big,” despite the fact that previously, Coburn’s never let his friendship with Obama get in the way of thwarting the president’s agenda. She ignores the fact that siding with the NRA is a no-brainer scenario for an Oklahoma Republican, and the fact that the offer on the table — expanding background
If Obama would only find the right combination of magic words, the leadership surrealists argue, he would melt the hard hearts of the intransigent GOP.” checks in the wake of the Newtown tragedy — is not, strictly speaking, doing something “big.” Dowd asks: “Couldn’t the president have given his Rose Garden speech about the ‘shameful’ actions in Washington before the vote rather than after?” Uhm, sure ... but that would have been strange. “Those mangy Republicans and cowardly blue dog Democrats could never have resisted that nuclear weapon of American politics, a well
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timed Rose Garden speech,” writes Walter Russell Mead, who spares a few thousand words to pillory Dowd for her Panglossian take on presidential power. Others have piled on. “[Dowd’s] still stuck in the gauzy past when presidents really did have at least a bit of arm-twisting power,” writes Kevin Drum. Here’s Doug Mataconis: The only explanation I can come up with is that Dowd has become enamored with the idealized New York-Washington corridor vision of politics epitomized by the movie she references in her column ... You can’t
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just solve problems by being a “strong leader” and giving nice speeches. If the political winds are blowing against you, then you’re not going to win. All of which makes a lot of sense. So, what, then, is the good thing that Dowd has done, potentially, for America? Well, thanks to Dowd weighing in over the weekend, there’s the very real possibility that she’s single-handedly made one of the dumber strains in contemporary political punditry — “leadership surrealism” — unfashionable. To the leadership surrealists, the president’s main failing is that he hasn’t figured out a way to use the “bully pulpit” to deliver a speech of magical, sentimental wallop. If Dowd has sinned by penning
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Dowd on stage with Alec Baldwin (left), Ovation Chairman Ken Solomon, and the CEO of Americans for the Arts, Bob Lynch, at the Americans for the Arts 25th Annual Nancy Hanks Lecture on Arts and Public Policy in 2012.
Enter this column, then these are some really unoriginal sins. Her fellow Times columnists, David Brooks and Thomas Friedman, have made a cottage industry for themselves making the same arguments — that Obama’s major failing is that he has not managed to find the right rhetorical flourish to weaken the opposition. (Of Brooks’ similar argument, Mataconis opines that he has “a point.”) If Obama would only find the right combination of magic words, the leadership surrealists argue, he would melt the hard hearts of the intransigent GOP, and turn recalcitrant Democrats away from the incentives they follow to retain their seats. (At least Dowd cited The American President as her cinematic inspiration. Friedman cited Tin Cup, for some reason.) For spouting the same bilge as Dowd, people like Brooks and Friedman are treated as influential thinkers, and they’ve amassed many followers. David Ignatius has lamented the fact that Obama hasn’t made enough “clear, firm presidential statement[s] that speaks to everyone onboard.” Ron Fournier advised the president to give a speech similar to an op-ed he read in the Green Bay Press-Gazette, because it was crazy-magical.
LOOKING FORWARD IN ANGST
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And when it comes to strong-arm tactics, you can’t beat Bob Woodward’s contention that Obama should just ignore the Constitution. Look, you can’t blame Dowd for getting into the spirit of “everyone else is doing it, so why shouldn’t I?” She’s watched her colleagues grow in esteem making the same arguments, paying little consequence for them. Chances are, the “x-factor” here is a simple matter
Chances are, the ‘x-factor’ here is a simple matter of institutional sexism — once the same arguments are flowing forth from her keyboard, they suddenly look rancid.” of institutional sexism — once the same arguments are flowing forth from her keyboard, they suddenly look rancid. The point though, is that this was an always dumb set of contentions to make. I trust that going forward, we won’t tolerate it from anyone, and whoever attempts a similar feat of whimsy will have all of the critiques that have been laid at Dowd’s doorstep read back to them, verbatim. I hope, anyway!
Q&A
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Snoop Smokes a Joint, Freestyles on HP Live
“I won’t smoke it, I promise, I know the people watching at home/they gettin’ excited cause they know I might hit it/but if I hit it I’m gonna get you in trouble, I can’t do it, but I did it.”
Above: Snoop speaks at a press conference for his documentary, Reincarnated, during the 2012 Toronto International Film Festival. Below: Snoop in concert at The Wiltern in L.A.
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The Week That Was TAP IMAGE TO ENLARGE, TAP EACH DATE FOR FULL ARTICLE ON THE HUFFINGTON POST
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The coffin of former British Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher is carried by the Bearer Party following her funeral service at St Paul’s Cathedral.
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Beijing, China 04.13.2013 Beijing Ditan Hospital Vice President Cheng Jun speaks to the media about the seven-year-old girl infected with the H7N9 strain of bird flu, Beijing’s first case. PHOTO OR ILLUSTRATION CREDIT TK
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Melbourne, Australia 04.16.2013 Fire fighters put on a demonstration at the Opening of Airservices Hot Fire Training Ground. The mock-up aircraft fuselage is the centerpiece of a state-of-the-art fire training center to be used at Melbourne Airport. PHOTO OR ILLUSTRATION CREDIT TK
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Washington, D.C. 04.16.2013 Rep. Gabrielle Giffords, in pink, and her husband Mark Kelly ride the subway to the Capitol building with members of Congress, including Sen. Joe Manchin (center) and Sen. Pat Toomey (right), who had sponsored the legislation to expand the background check system for gun sales. PHOTO OR ILLUSTRATION CREDIT TK
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Seville, Spain 04.17.2013 Girls traditionally wear costumes associated with “sevillanas” — a type of folk music and dance — at the Feria de Abril, Seville’s April Fair. PHOTO OR ILLUSTRATION CREDIT TK
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London, England 04.18.2013 A skater runs with his board in South Bank skatepark, hailed as the birthplace of British skateboarding. The park is to be moved to nearby Hungerford bridge, which has stirred anger in the skateboarding and bmxing community. PHOTO OR ILLUSTRATION CREDIT TK
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Toronto, Canada 04.18.2013 Toronto Blue Jays’ Rajai Davis spins through the air after being brushed back by Chicago White Sox pitcher Chris Sale during the fifth inning of a baseball game.
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Quito, Ecuador 04.20.2013 Protesters at the Marcha de las Putas (March of the Sluts, or “Slutwalk”) call out for respect for women. The Marcha de las Putas movement was born in Canada and is now present in the UK, U.S., Mexico, Colombia, Australia and India. PHOTO OR ILLUSTRATION CREDIT TK
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Jammu, India 04.16.2013 Hindu devotees offer prayers at the historical Kali Temple during the Navratri festival, or the festival of nine nights, dedicated to the worship of various goddesses. PHOTO OR ILLUSTRATION CREDIT TK
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Cairo, Egypt 04.16.2013 A shirtless Egyptian man dances with fire during a bachelor party. PHOTO OR ILLUSTRATION CREDIT TK
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Caracas, Venezuela 04.19.2013 Venezuela’s Presidentelect Nicolas Maduro waves to supporters as he arrives at the National Assembly for his inaugural ceremony. PHOTO OR ILLUSTRATION CREDIT TK
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Sakhir, Bahrain 04.21.2013 Hostesses stand before the Formula One Grand Prix at the Formula One Bahrain International Circuit, a motorsport venue in Sakhir.
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RANDY TARAN
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The Good News About Stress
“IF YOU’RE NOT STRESSED, you’re not working hard enough.” More and more this mantra seems to be woven into our cultural dialogue. Stress may be considered the new “normal,” but it doesn’t have to be that way. Simple shifts in attitude and practices can yield big benefits. April is National Stress
Awareness Month, which gives us the opportunity to look at both negative trends and some signs of hope. Here’s the bad news, the good news and how you can make some positive changes now.
THE BAD NEWS
The reality is that stress is a factor in most people’s lives. It is not just something that shows up during traumatic life events, like a death
Voices of a loved one, job loss or divorce. Nowadays, it is palpable in the air at almost all times. Previous generations could leave stress at the office, and wind down at home. Today, with smartphones and social media, there are fewer boundaries, and less downtime. The American Psychological Association’s (APA) most recent statistics show: • 69 percent of U.S. adults surveyed reported experiencing physical symptoms of stress during the previous year. • Of those Americans reporting extreme stress, 20 percent reported extreme stress levels of eight, nine or 10. • Young people are more stressed — 39 percent of Millennials say their stress has increased in the last year, compared to 36 percent of Gen Xers, 33 percent of Boomers and 29 percent of Matures.
THE GOOD NEWS
Though stress is a constant companion, there are signs of improvement in how people are dealing with stress. In managing their stress, more people appear to be making choices that help rather than hurt them. Unhealthy behaviors like eating and drinking alcohol to manage stress are on a steady decline.
RANDY TARAN
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• More people are turning to exercise to manage their stress (52 percent compared with 47 percent in 2011). • 25 percent of Americans report eating to manage stress compared to 34 percent in 2008. • 13 percent report drinking alcohol to manage their stress compared with 18 percent in 2008. • Overall stress declined from 5.2 on a 10-point scale in 2011 to 4.9 in 2012.
Stress may be considered the new ‘normal,’ but it doesn’t have to be that way.” OK, so stress is here — what can we do? Let’s look at how to alleviate stress on four levels: PHYSICAL: It’s common knowledge that exercise is key, but having an exercise buddy can make the difference to stick to it when motivation lags. MENTAL: Just as the food we take in affects the health of our bodies, what we take into our minds affects the health and resilience of our minds. Are the thoughts you
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RANDY TARAN
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are thinking making you feel better (appreciation) or worse (blame)? Consider reframing your thoughts and asking, “What am I learning from the challenge at hand?” EMOTIONAL: Emotions are contagious. Make a point of spending time with people that care about your well-being, happiness and success. Life is too short for “frenemies.” SPIRITUAL: Find your own way to connect with something greater. That can be through spiritual practice, spending time in community with like-minded people or even being in nature.
TIPS FROM SCIENCE
GETTY IMAGES/OJO IMAGES RM
There has been much research in neuroscience that indicates we can actually rewire the neural pathways in our brains to reduce stress and be happier. Here are five ways that can help: EXPRESS GRATITUDE Instead of focusing on all the things you are worried about, think of what you are grateful for in your life. By jotting down even small things (good cup of coffee, sunny day, great conversation)
Just as the food we take in affects the health of our bodies, what we take into our minds affects the health and resilience of our minds.” daily, you will train your brain to be on the lookout for the good stuff, and hence notice more of it. Try this for 21 days, the time it takes to create a habit. COMPLIMENT OTHERS Consider starting each day giving a compliment or recognition to one of your friends or colleagues. Not only will you enjoy their positive response, but according to Richard Davidson, you will “train your brain to see the good
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RANDY TARAN
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in people, in life and in your self.” Sounds like stress-reduction to me! HEART MATTERS Return your heart to a relaxed state the HeartMath Institute defines as “coherence.” Neuroscientist Rick Hanson adapts it into three steps: 1. Breath in and out to the same number of beats (say four beats). 2. At the same time, imagine you are breathing in and out through the area of your heart. 3. Keep in mind a happy moment in your life and the feelings that elicits. You may even feel this good feeling moving through your heart as part of the breath. The GPS for the Soul App makes this available on your phone. 4. Practice patience. How many people are primed to want results and want them now? Unfortunately the world doesn’t work quite like that. People are complex and have their own wants and needs. Under pressure, many say things that are perceived as hurtful, often not knowing the effect of their words. It’s not personal! Take a few breaths and come into the present moment. Remember that you are basically all right now. There are some things you cannot control, and how you respond is a choice.
GET MINDFUL Mindfulness Based Stress Reduction lets you take charge of your life by learning new mindful ways to relate to whatever you are dealing with. Using meditation, benefits include reduced stress and anxiety, better sleep, pain management and greater energy and enthusiasm for life. Worth a shot?
In managing their stress, more people appear to be making choices that help rather than hurt them. Unhealthy behaviors like eating and drinking alcohol to manage stress are on a steady decline.” Make the choice to do some stress-reducing practices, especially when looming deadlines, non-stop emails or the harsh “inner critic” voice appear. You will discover that not only will your productivity increase, your happiness levels will, too. Randy Taran is the founder of Project Happiness.
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FRANK WARREN
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TECHNOLOGY
COURTESY OF TED
We Want to Tell Our Secrets ... Anonymously THERE ARE TWO KINDS of secrets, the ones we hide from others, and those we keep from ourselves. As I write this introduction to my 2012 TED Talk, I am overseas on a speaking tour in Australia and New Zealand sharing secrets. The
PostSecret website has received more than 600,000,000 hits. There have been five PostSecret books, the last one reaching #1 on The New York Times bestseller list. Why are we so fascinated by these secrets? Sometimes when we think we are keeping a secret, that secret is actually keeping us.
Frank Warren discusses the Post Secret Project in his March 2012 TEDTalk.
Voices I began collecting and sharing secrets in 2004. I printed 3,000 self-addressed postcards with simple instructions about sharing an artful secret. I passed them out to strangers on the streets of Washington, D.C., not knowing what to expect. But soon secrets began to find their way to my mailbox. The idea began to spread virally and I began receiving shocking, silly and soulful secrets from around the world. Today, I have received over a half-million secrets and they continue to come. One in my TEDTalk was a surprise marriage proposal. I ended my talk with a poignant secret that was a final song from a grandmother to her granddaughter. Secrets can be transformative: Sharing a secret with another person, or just with ourselves, can change who we are. Two questions I often hear are: Do you think these anonymous secrets are true? And what happens if you get a secret about a serious crime? I think of each postcard as a work of art, and as self-revelatory art. Secrets can have different layers of truth. Some can be both true and false; others can become true over time depending on our choices.
FRANK WARREN
Sometimes a secret we keep from ourselves only becomes true after we read it on a stranger’s postcard. Early in the project I received this email: “Dear Frank, Do you know that I left my boyfriend of a year and a half because of the postcard that read, ‘His temper is so scary, I’ve lost all my opinions.’ It hadn’t even occurred to me what was happening, and it took a total stranger writing it down to make me realize what the hell was going on in my life.” I get very few secrets about crimes, but I have been contacted by the FBI about one particular postcard mailed to me. That story ended positively, but I need to keep the details secret. Secrets are the currency
TED and The Huffington Post are excited to bring you TEDWeekends, a curated weekend program that introduces a powerful “idea worth spreading” every Friday, anchored in an exceptional TEDTalk. This week’s TEDTalk is accompanied by an original blog post from the featured speaker, along with new op-eds, thoughts and responses from the HuffPost community. Watch the talk above, read the blog post and tell us your thoughts below. Become part of the conversation!
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of intimacy. The most gratifying part of the project has been the community of support that over the life of the project has contributed more than a million dollars to suicide prevention and developed the most complete and comprehensive database of suicide prevention hotlines in the world. Lately we have been working on a PostSecret play called PostSecret: Unheard Voices to bring to life more of the secrets and stories. So much of this still feels like a mystery to me. The secrets keep coming year after year. I may not have a choice; this could be something that I can’t turn off. My wife has this fear that years from now we may be retired somewhere by the beach and secrets will continue to track us down, but part of me hopes the secrets never stop coming. Because so many people have shared their secrets with me, I
MORE ON TED WEEKENDS 10 POIGNANT SECRETS REVEALED
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FRANK WARREN
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THE STRESS OF SECRET-KEEPING
will share one of mine with you. It’s a secret I never told anyone until I pulled a postcard from my mailbox that described an experience very similar to the childhood humiliation I had kept buried inside for decades. “When I was in the Fourth Grade, a new kid moved into our neighborhood. He was a charismatic leader who quickly became popular. Soon after, he convinced two of my friends to pin me to the ground and hold open my eyelids. They took turns spitting into my eyes.” Secrets can feel like walls when we hide them inside, but if we can find the courage to share them, we discover we are not alone at all. Our secrets become bridges. Frank Warren is the founder of the PostSecret Project.
A selection of the week’s related blogs HEADLINES TO VIEW BLOGS ABOUT THIS WEEK’S THEME
THE SECRETS WE KEEP FROM OUR PARTNERS
THE WEB’S IMMORTAL EFFECT
TELLING A SECRET IS ONLY HALF THE STORY
CLOCKWISE FROM TOP LEFT: VINCENT DEWITT-POOL/GETTY IMAGES; VICTORIA WILL/INVISION/AP; DONNA SVENNEVIK/DISNEY-ABC VIA GETTY IMAGES; JOHN SHEARER/INVISION FOR DAVID LYNCH FOUNDATION/AP
Voices
QUOTED
“ If I’m ever feeling tense or stressed or like I’m about to have a meltdown, I’ll put on my iPod and head to the gym or out on a bike ride along Lake Michigan with the girls.” —Michelle Obama
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“ If I have something that I’m dealing with that’s causing me a lot of stress, my mind goes to architecture. I walk around the yard and start thinking about what I need to do to the house structurally.”
— Brad Pitt
to Parade in 2009
to Marie Claire in 2008
“ The things in life that used to almost kill you, stress you, depress you, make you sad, make you afraid — they have less and less power. It’s like you’re building up a flak jacket of protection.”
—David Lynch
told The New York Times about his Transcendental Meditation practice
“ Stress is something that’s created in the mind, basically. It’s how we look at things. Our greatest defense against stress is the ability to change our minds; to change our thinking.” — Goldie Hawn
told Katie Couric on a recent episode of her talk show, Katie
Voices
QUOTED
“ I meditate often. It connects you to a source of energy that’s more powerful than the material world in which we primarily dwell.”
“ I have never been very good at handling stress (though a bit of meditation helps), and I wanted some very practical ways of reducing it that I could use during the course of my day.”
— Russell Brand
told the Los Angeles Times’ Ministry of Gossip, on turning to Transcendental Meditation to cope with stress
CLOCKWISE FROM TOP LEFT: FRAZER HARRISON/GETTY IMAGES; KARWAI TANG/GETTY IMAGES; JERRITT CLARK/GETTY IMAGES; TORU YAMANAKA/AFP/GETTY IMAGES
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I find meditation in sitting on the floor with the kids coloring for an hour, or going on the trampoline.
— Gwyneth Paltrow
offered GOOP readers stressmanagement tips, including a Kabbala-inspired water ritual
—Angelina Jolie
told Stylist magazine that she has a hard time calming down with all the chaos in her home, so she finds peace in the little things that bring her joy
“ My way to de-stress is either listening to music or talking to my sister, Kourtney. She’s going to teach me how to meditate and that should help a lot.”
— Kendall Jenner
to HuffPost Teen
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04.28.13 #46 FEATURES
HOW HAPPY ARE YOU? PLAYING WITH FIRE
How happy are you
?
For Some Governments, It’s Their Policy to Know
BY MALLIKA RAO
No one understood why a Santa Monica High School student killed himself one afternoon in early 2011, leaping from the roof of a 10-story hotel as his teammates from the school baseball team watched in horror from a field across the street. He wasn’t “the kind of person you would expect to have these feelings,” the boy’s rabbi told the Los Angeles Times. “Something went horribly, horribly wrong.” ¶ City officials fixated on that something. Where in the 14-yearold-boy matrix of hormones, classes, family and friends had the seeds of such sadness been planted?
AP PHOTO/REED SAXON
Might a different external environment — a different sort of city, that is — have stopped their growth? In tackling these questions, the beachfront enclave of less than 100,000 joined a global debate just making its way to America. Countries around the world have begun worrying about how their people feel, not just how much they produce. The tiny Himalayan kingdom of Bhutan even has a measure-
ment for it: the Gross National Happiness (GNH). Coined in the 1970s by a Bhutanese king wanting to ease fears about modernization, the concept now rules that country’s politics. It’s also spreading westward, where some top economists making sense of the recession are happy to knock down the old gods — profit, loss, GDP, GNP — and replace them with a new one. A wave of teen fatalities including the hotel-top suicide made officials in Santa Monica, California, re-assess the way they run things.
A sidewalk memorial stands near the spot where a 14-yearold student athlete jumped to his death in 2011.
HOW HAPPY ARE YOU?
In response, they proposed a Local Wellbeing Index meant to help officials plan smarter policy using ready resources. The plan won Santa Monica a $1 million grant from Bloomberg Philanthropies, which this year will give out $9 million in all to five winning cities via its Mayors Challenge.
“ Wellbeing is not to be confused with wellness. [It is] a state characterized by a person’s level of fulfillment, engagement, satisfaction, positive outlook, and health.” Santa Monica joins a growing list of North American locales attempting to mimic Bhutan’s GNH, or wellbeing index, and no two Western adaptations are alike. A private index in Canada joins previously unlinked data, including work hours and crime rates, to paint a new picture of Canadian life. In Great Britain, the government survey sent out annually to households nationwide now includes such pointed inquiries as “How happy did you feel yesterday?” and “To what extent do you feel the things you do in your life are worthwhile?” The goal is to govern with a cit-
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THE HAPPIEST PEOPLE IN AMERICA
A new ranking from Gallup and Healthways researchers reveals which U.S. metro areas have the highest and lowest wellbeing, based on healthy behaviors, emotional and physical health, work environment, access to basic services and life evaluation. There were 189 metro areas included in the ranking, which was based on phone interviews with 353,563 people conducted throughout 2012. Here, find the top 10 areas with the highest wellbeing. SCROLL FOR ADDITIONAL CONTENT
ROBERT NICKELSBERG//TIME LIFE PICTURES/GETTY IMAGES
HOW HAPPY ARE YOU?
izen’s inner life in mind. If an index finds that train travel stresses people less than driving does, for instance, funds might shift from highways to public transportation. Mostly, it’s too early to gauge the worth of these efforts. Journalists in Bhutan — the origin point — note that the eco-component of the country’s GNH index hasn’t slowed the government’s push to erect dams expected to wipe out large habitats for native birds. But in the wake of the global recession, the promise of the experiment still captivates cities, states and countries who want to try their chances. In an op-ed for The Huffington Post, Santa Monica mayor Pam O’Connor named the target. “Wellbeing is not to be confused with wellness,” she wrote. It is “a state characterized by a person’s level of fulfillment, engagement, satisfaction, positive outlook, and health.” Track those levels, she asserted, and “good governance” is more possible. In the case of the 14-year-old boy, for instance, what if his distress started as early as preschool? Santa Monica’s first iteration of the index, a Youth Wellness Report Card inspired di-
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President Obama created a panel last March to routinely track “subjective wellbeing,” and no one seemed to notice. rectly by the fatalities, found that only one-third of its youngest residents were prepared to start school. Readiness was defined by a range of tests, measuring a child’s ability to hold a pencil, mix with other kids and so on. “You’d think in a community like Santa Monica, we’d have a very large number of kids ready for kindergarten,” city manager Julie Rusk told The Huffington
Former King Jigme Singye Wangchuck of Bhutan coined the concept of Gross National Happiness.
DESHAKALYAN CHOWDHURY/AFP/GETTY IMAGES
HOW HAPPY ARE YOU?
Post. “The surprising number of kids that weren’t ready is causing a discussion in our community. What does it mean? What are our preschools doing or not doing? If in third grade and eighth grade you see these gaps in achievement and disconnected youth, is this part of the reason why?” She denied any “nanny state” agenda. “We really don’t see this as government as purveyor of wellbeing. But we can provide information. Understanding how people are doing, where it is that people are doing well, and how can we share that and help people to learn from each other. That should really
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“ We really don’t see this as government as purveyor of wellbeing. But we can provide information. Understanding how people are doing, where it is that people are doing well, and how can we share that and help people to learn from each other.” be one of our core functions.” The Santa Monica index will likely run along the lines of Canada’s, remixing data to offer new insights. That’s partly for longterm efficiency, and partly to keep up with the realities of tight budgets. “The Bloomberg prize is not a continuous source of funding,” Rusk points out.
A Bhutanese man performs prayers at a Buddhist monastery in Thimph.
AP PHOTO/REED SAXON
HOW HAPPY ARE YOU?
Still, the cash infusion means access to leaders in the booming field of happiness studies. Targets for partnerships include American psychologist Martin Seligman and the New Economics Forum, a London-based think tank that helped Prime Minister David Cameron launch the British index. Joining the “movement” means leaving U.S. borders, according to Rusk. While the team’s over-
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seas contacts aren’t fazed by “the whole notion of thinking about a metrics beyond simply economic stability,” the U.S., she said “is lagging, not surprisingly.” That’s a common enough perception. But in fact, it was truer a year ago than it is today. Santa Monica’s index follows stateand city-wide ones in Vermont, Maryland, Seattle, Wash., Eau Claire, Wis., Somerville, Mass., and Nevada City, Calif. This year, the trend went national, when the U.S. government announced
Students and others look to the top of the building where a Santa Monica High School student athlete jumped to his death.
AP PHOTO/RICHARD DREW
HOW HAPPY ARE YOU?
a possible federal wellbeing index. The guiding principle is itself homegrown: GNH science largely rests on the influential Easterlin Paradox, named for American economist Richard Easterlin, who showed that rising incomes increase happiness only to a point. Easterlin’s fellow Americans seem, if not eager to confront his paradox, at least disinterested enough not to put up a fight. A year before Cameron installed the British index, the P.M. was battling critics who called the very concept “wooly” and “impractical.” Meanwhile, President Obama created a panel last March to rou-
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Some top economists making sense of the recession are happy to knock down the old gods — profit, loss, GDP, GNP — for new ones. tinely track “subjective wellbeing,” and no one seemed to notice. Whether or not the metrics take, their arrival on American soil completes a cycle that began with the financial crisis. When Time asked the Nobel-winning economist Joseph Stiglitz why he came out in support of wellbeing indices in 2009, effectively legitimizing them in the West, he blamed five familiar letters: “U.S. GDP looked good, and then we realized it was all a phantasm.”
Joseph Stiglitz, a winner of the Nobel Prize in Economics, spoke in favor of wellbeing indices in 2009.
WHY NO ONE SOUNDED THE ALARM IN TEXAS
P L AY I N G WITH FIRE AP PHOTO/JOE BERTI
Long before it captured national headlines as the scene of a lethal industrial explosion, the fertilizer plant on the edge of this central Texas town had been a community fixture, a crucial supply depot for farmers and ranchers who worked the surrounding pastures. Âś No one seemed to regard it as a threat.
By CHRIS KIRKHAM and BEN HALLMAN
PLAYING WITH FIRE
“It’s been there so long that you just take it for granted,” said Jeanette Karlik, a columnist for the local newspaper, the West News. That same attitude — the assumption that nothing of consequence could go wrong here -- appears to have shaped the actions of the seven or more state and federal regulatory agencies that collectively shared oversight responsibility for the plant, according to a Huffington Post investigation. Through interviews with former regulators and community leaders, as well as a review of hundreds of pages of documents going back to 1976, a sense emerges that no institution sounded the alarm here, even as fertilizer piled up inside the plant, creating a potentially deadly tinderbox in close proximity to the town. No one effectively prepared for the emergency that eventually materialized, leaving this community uniquely vulnerable to the tragedy that unfolded last week when the plant caught fire and exploded, killing 14 people and ripping apart an apartment building, a school and dozens of homes. In June 2011 — less than two years before the explosion — the private company that owns the
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THE LAST TIME REGULATORS PERFORMED A FULL SAFETY INSPECTION OF THE FACILITY WAS NEARLY 28 YEARS AGO. plant, the West Fertilizer Co., filed an emergency response plan with the Environmental Protection Agency stating that there was “no” risk of fire or explosion at the facility. The worst scenario that plant officials acknowledged was the possible release of a small amount of ammonia gas into the atmosphere. Fertilizer long has been recognized as a dangerous combustible material. One variety, ammonium nitrate — a pellet-shaped product typically shipped in large bags — caused the deadliest industrial accident in American history, the explosion of a ship at the port of Texas City in 1947, which took the lives of more than 500 people. In 1995, Timothy McVeigh used about two tons of ammonium nitrate to blow up the federal building in Oklahoma City, killing 168 people. As recently as 2012, the West Fertilizer plant held
AP PHOTO/TONY GUTIERREZ
An aerial photo taken on April 18 shows the aftermath of the explosion.
PHOTO OR ILLUSTRATION CREDIT TK
AP PHOTO/CHARLIE RIEDEL
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some 270 tons of that substance, according to the Texas Department of State Health Services. Yet, according to a Reuters report, the stores of ammonium nitrate here never tripped the scrutiny of the U.S. Department of Homeland Security, which apparently was unaware of the plant’s existence. Documents reviewed by The Huffington Post indicate that the last time regulators performed a full safety inspection of the facility was nearly 28 years ago. The entity with primary authority to ensure workplace safety, the Oc-
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cupational Safety and Health Administration, last visited in 1985, according to OSHA records. Since then, regulators from other agencies have been inside the plant, but they looked only at certain aspects of plant operations, such as whether the facility was abiding by labeling rules when packaging its fertilizer for sale. The most recent partial safety inspection at West Fertilizer was in 2011. That inspection, by the U.S Department of Transportation Pipeline and Hazardous Materials Safety Commission, led to a $5,200 fine for a variety of infrac-
Churchgoers of the First Baptist Church huddle in prayer in a field on Sunday, April 21. The church could not meet in their building because it was a damage zone after the explosion.
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tions, including failing to draft a safety plan for the transport of the large canisters of pressurized anhydrous ammonia stored on site. In 2006, the Texas Commission on Environmental Quality, the primary enforcer of environmental law in the state, noted that two schools were situated within 3,000 feet of the fertilizer plant. But the agency determined that “the impact potential” of an accident on the neighboring community “was low.” When assessing risks at the plant, the commission and the EPA focused solely on the potential hazards of the ammonium canisters, such as whether they were stored correctly or were leaking. The agencies did not inspect to see if other chemicals on hand might ignite and explode. “There is really no safety assessment of these facilities when there should be,” said Neil Carman, who for more than a decade inspected facilities like West Fertilizer while working for the Texas commission, before joining the Sierra Club, the national environmental advocacy organization. Neither Donald Adair, the plant’s owner, nor Ted Uptmore, its manager, could be reached for
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“IT’S LIKE YOU’RE ON THE TOP OF MT. EVEREST AND SOMEONE PULLS A GUN ON YOU. YOU CAN JUMP OR GET SHOT. THERE ARE NO GOOD CHOICES.” comment. Adair released a statement on Friday, writing: “My heart is broken with grief for the tragic losses to so many families in our community.” He added that “the tragedy will continue to hurt deeply for generations to come.” The statement said the plant’s owners would limit comments in the weeks and months ahead, “out of respect for the investigative process.” As investigators combed through the blackened rubble of the factory over the weekend, and as the citizens of West began to mourn their dead, many questions remained about the disaster. Still unclear was how the fire started, whether the plant’s materials had been properly stored and protected, and whether local firefighters had responded appropriately. Fire safety experts suspect that a fire ignited the ammonium ni-
AP PHOTO/THE DALLAS MORNING NEWS, MICHAEL AINSWORTH, POOL
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trate pellets stored on site, and that in turn may have caused the pressurized contents of cannisters of another ammonia substance to expand and explode outward with tremendous force. Investigators have not yet released a determination of the cause. But one thing had become
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painfully clear: The communitywide notion that an explosion at the plant was not something to worry about was proven tragically wrong. George Smith, an osteopathic physician who serves as West’s director of emergency medical services, told The Huffington Post that what unfolded here last Wednesday night was never contemplated as his team of volunteer
Texas Department of Public Safety Sgt. Jason Reyes walks past a damaged apartment complex.
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ambulance crews readied themselves to respond to calls for help. “No explosions like this ever fit into the drills or anything like that,” Smith said, his face marked by cuts from glass and debris that hit him during the explosion. “It never crossed our minds.” FLEE OR FIGHT Texas — a state famous for its size and stature — claims an outsize share of the country’s industrial accidents. As of May 2012, the state held 1,827 facilities deemed at risk of toxic or flammable chemical accidents, about one-tenth of all those in the nation, according to data from the EPA’s Risk Management Program as tabulated by the Right-to-Know Network, a non-profit government watchdog. Yet the state was responsible for nearly 50 percent of the evacuations and property damage costs caused by accidents at such plants over the previous five years, according to a Huffington Post review of the data. The owners of industrial facilities like West Fertilizer are required by state and federal law to notify local and state authorities when dangerous compounds
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“MY HEART IS BROKEN WITH GRIEF ...” are on site, so that emergency coordinators can incorporate the hazards into response plans. But in the case of small towns such as West -- population 2,807 -- fire and emergency medical crews are generally of the volunteer variety, and resources can be scarce. Even the best-prepared emergency response crews can face stark choices about how to approach dangerous situations. In 2009, a spark from a welder’s torch ignited a fire that quickly consumed El Dorado Chemical Co., near the city of Bryan, Texas, sending billowing clouds of toxic smoke into the atmosphere. El Dorado also stored large quantities of ammonium nitrate. Chuck Frazier, the emergency management coordinator for Brazos County, which includes Bryan, said first responders quickly made the decision to evacuate the surrounding area rather than stay and fight the fire. The risk of failing to contain the blaze was too great, they determined. Authorities ordered more than 60,000 local residents to evacuate, and dozens were admitted to
KEVORK DJANSEZIAN/GETTY IMAGES
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area hospitals for smoke inhalation and other respiratory and eye problems. Five years earlier, a fire had destroyed a branch of the same company in Greenville, Texas, prompting the evacuation of an elementary school. Stephen Cook, the chief training
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officer at a firefighter training facility at McLennan Community College in nearby Waco, said that first responders taking on scenarios like the fires in Bryan and in West confront what seem like impossible choices: With inadequate information and variables such as wind and air temperature potentially rendering their decisions wrong, they are forced to make quick determinations about whether to try
Bill Warren, a member of Veterans of Foreign Wars Post 4819, lowers a U.S. flag to half-staff in memory of victims of the West Fertilizer Company explosion, which left 14 dead.
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to extinguish the fire or to evacuate nearby residents. Both options present serious hazards, he said, and the reality may be that there is time for neither. “It’s like you’re on the top of Mt. Everest and someone pulls a gun on you,” he said. “You can jump or get shot. There are no good choices.” Smith, West’s director of emergency medical services, also oversees the West Rest Haven Nursing Home. He helped evacuate 127 patients there as the fire raged at the nearby plant. All the residents made it out before the blast, but Smith wasn’t so lucky. The explosion sent a shock wave through the building and the roof collapsed on him. The only thing that saved him was a counter at the nurse’s station, which shielded him from the beams that fell from above. “God said, ‘You have more work to do, my son,’” Smith said. Next, he sprang into action as the EMS director, frantically sending text and radio messages to any jurisdiction that would listen. Volunteer firefighters from the town, along with emergency responders and an off-duty Dallas firefighter, converged on the
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“NO EXPLOSIONS LIKE THIS EVER FIT INTO THE DRILLS.” plant. Ten of those first responders died in the explosion. “Some people think we’re crazy, because when everybody else is running from something, we’re running into it,” Smith said of his EMS colleagues. “We know in our hearts that anything we do is dangerous. We’re saving lives. We’re doing God’s work as far as I’m concerned.” Should the authorities in West have evacuated rather than battle the blaze? Experts say that question cannot be answered absent a full investigation, and even then it may never be possible to determine with authority what went wrong here. Fires at industrial facilities are inherently dangerous and can have unexpected consequences. Frazier, the emergency management coordinator in Brazos county, was unwilling to secondguess his counterparts in West. There was but one certain difference between the 2009 explosion in Bryan and the one that killed people here: “We got lucky,” he said, “and they didn’t.”
AP PHOTO/LM OTERO
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‘OUR NEIGHBOR’ The fertilizer facility in West had always been a locally owned business, ingrained in the community like the bakeries and restaurants that have graced the downtown streets for generations. Small Texas towns are known for being close-knit. But the kinship is even greater in West, where families share the bonds of Czech heritage, handed down from the some of the original Texas settlers. A local family opened the fertilizer plant in 1962 to help nearby corn, cotton and sorghum farmers who needed someone to supply
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fertilizer and other farm equipment in the area. West is located on a major north-south railway, making the location ideal as a supply base for needed chemicals and compounds for a broad area. “It was really a necessity for this community,” said Anthony Rejcek, a third-generation farmer whose family has done business with the plant since the 1960s. “There’s really nothing else like it. People come from 50 miles away to do business here.” When the plant opened, it was located far from West’s downtown area, mostly surrounded by open farmland. But over the years the town expanded north, with more and more houses popping
Firefighters search the area surrounding the fertilizer plant in the early morning hours on April 18.
AP PHOTO/LM OTERO
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up in the shadow of the plant. Town leaders built an intermediate school about a tenth of a mile across the railroad tracks from the plant. The nursing home also sits within eyesight of the plant, part of the gradual expansion of homes and businesses. Because the facility was built so long ago, local zoning regulations primarily governed what could be built near it. Ed Sykora, who owns a local Ford dealership in West and has been displaced from his home since Wednesday, was on the town school board and city council for more than a dozen years. He
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doesn’t remember any discussion of whether it made sense to build new homes and a new school so close to the fertilizer plant. “The land was available out there that way; they could get sewer and other stuff that way without building a bunch of new lines,” Sykora recalled. “There never was any thought about it. Maybe that was wrong.” Rejcek, the farmer, said he remembered some in town who worried about building a school near the plant. “There have always been questions about that,” he said, calling that decision “a mistake.” Yet even in recent reports, state regulators saw no problems for the schools and houses nearby. For
Firefighters survey the remains of the fertilizer plant after the explosion.
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most people living near the plant, the only concern through the years was the smell of ammonia, which would periodically cause a nuisance if there were leaks in containers. Records from the Commission on Environmental Quality show several odor complaints dating back to the 1970s. But most said the smell only caused problems every few years. Residents were comfortable living next to the plant because it was such a cornerstone of the community, run by locals who went to the same churches, shopped in the same stores and sent their children to the same schools. “It’s not like some corporation came in here and built a facility,” said Sykora. “It’s always been our neighbor.” Ted Uptmore, who has managed the plant since 1964, also owns the West Auction, a livestock business in town. Donald Adair, a longtime area farmer who bought the fertilizer plant in 2004, has served on the school board and is widely respected by town leaders. Some in West recalled that Adair, who was already getting older, bought the plant in 2004 because it was rumored to shut down. Adair didn’t want the town
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to be without such a crucial business, said Rejcek. “I told him, ‘Somebody your age should be selling stuff, not buying stuff,’” Rejcek recalled. “He said, ‘I’m not doing this for myself.’” Even in the wake of a disaster that touched almost everyone in West, many residents who were interviewed harbored no ill will toward the plant owners. “These are good people, and I feel so sorry for Mr. Adair,” said Jeanette Karlik, the local newspaper columnist, who grew up in West and returned to take care of her ailing mother in the late 1990s. “I know his heart is heavy because of what happened.” As investigators focus on pinpointing the cause of the accident, and whether there was any negligence, many locals stand in support of the plant owners. “I don’t question it. There is no way that there was a problem there where they knew something was going to happen,” said Sykora. “That’s not the people they are. They are good Church of Christ people. If [Adair] had an inkling, he would have shut that thing down.” ‘WILLFULLY OFF THE GRID’ Among the at least seven state and federal regulatory agencies under whose purview the West Fertilizer plant fell, none appears
AP PHOTO/CHARLIE RIEDEL
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to have exerted a sense of primary authority. Records suggest that oversight was spotty at best. Neil Carman, the clean air director at the Texas chapter of the Sierra Club, previously spent more than a decade inspecting facilities like West Fertilizer while working for the Texas Commission on Environmental Quality. Unlike large industrial plants, which the commission inspects once a year, small operators like West Fertilizer are inspected every five years or so, unless there
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is a specific complaint, he said. He described oversight of such small facilities as “minimal.” In 2006, inspectors from Carman’s former agency responded 11 days after a report of ammonia odor at West Fertilizer and discovered that the company had failed to register two giant, 12,000-gallon anhydrous ammonia tanks as required. The manager, Uptmore, said he thought the company was grandfathered into air quality regulations and didn’t need a permit to store the gas. The Environmental Protection Agency subsequently fined the plant $2,300 for failing to turn
Mayor Pro Tem Steve Vanek of West, Texas, speaks to the media in front of city hall on April 20.
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in a risk-management plan for dealing with the tanks. None of these agencies, however, regulate ammonium nitrate. The Texas Department of State Health Services was aware of the presence of large volumes of ammonium nitrate at the plant, and collected data on the hazardous substance as required. But according to a Reuters story, the plant owners never alerted the Department of Homeland Security, which tracks and inspects facilities to make sure the potentially deadly chemical is stored safely. A spokeswoman for the Texas Department of State Health Services, Carrie Williams, wrote in an email that the agency’s role is only to provide data on chemicals for more than 65,000 facilities across the state. Williams said the agency is not required to report ammonium nitrate quantities to DHS. “Our authority does not include oversight of the amounts, locations or types of chemicals that may be stored there,” she wrote. It’s unclear whether DHS, had it known about the ammonium nitrate, would have required additional safety measures and installation of protective barriers that could have prevented the explosion,
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“WE’VE DONE A LOT OF CRYING. AND WE’VE GOT A LOT OF CRYING IN THE DAYS AHEAD.” or limited the damage in West. Rep. Bennie Thompson (DMiss.), the ranking member of the House Committee on Homeland Security, said in a statement that it seemed as if the plant was “willfully off the grid.” Carman, the former staffer for the agency, said the Texas Commission on Environmental Quality and the EPA focus their attention on potential violations of the Clean Air Act; under that standard, small plants like the one in West pose much less of a threat than, say, a huge chemical factory in Houston, he said. But a smaller threat is not the same as no threat, as residents here learned last week. “We’ve done a lot of crying,” said George Smith, the West EMS director. “And we’ve got a lot of crying in the days ahead.” Caroline Fairchild contributed reporting.
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STRESS LESS
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Living Color: The Most StressReducing Hues for Your Home BY CAROLYN GREGOIRE
OLOR CAN BE a wonderful tool for making your home less stressful and more calming — and it can have a significant impact on your mood and well-being. In Feng Shui, colors are used to bring different types of energy into the home, whether it’s passionate red, energetic yellow or restorative green. And the science is there to
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back up the popular notion that room color affects stress perception: A Minnesota State University study found that red environments increase stress responses, while green and white environments do not. The most calming colors are usually in the blue family, but muted, dusty shades of other colors can also be soothing, according to Jackie Jordan, Sherwin Williams director of color marketing. Ahead, find eight shades to destress your home.
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COLOR: SW 6771 Bathe Blue
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SOFT BLUES Traditional Feng Shui wisdom says that blues can slow down heart rate and lower blood pressure. The most stress-reducing tones are soft, watery blues. “It reminds you of a beautiful blue sky or beautiful blue water, or the essence of a breeze,” says Jordan. “They’re very soothing, calming colors for any space in your home.”
GRAY BLUES A light-to-medium shade of gray-blue can have a similar effect, says Jordan. COLOR: SW 6242 Bracing Blue
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COLOR: SW 6316 Rosy Outlook
AQUA BLUES Aqua shades, which are on the bluer side of the green spectrum, can be very calming, Jordan says.
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PALE GREENS Beige greens and pale yellow-greens are the most stress-reducing shades in the green family, which can bring to mind soothing nature scenes. In order to be calming, Jordan notes, “They have to be pretty soft and less saturated.” COLOR: SW 6828 Rhapsody Lilac
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COLOR: SW 6316 Rosy Outlook
DUSTY PINKS Choose pinks that are on the paler or dustier side for a relaxing feel. “A hot pink room isn’t going to be very calming, but if you do something on the lighter end of the spectrum and somewhat on the gray side, those can be very soothing as well,” says Jordan.
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LAVENDERS Although purple can be an intense color, “purples that are on the chalky, dusty side, or more muted shades of violets and lavenders and purples on the greyer side can be calmer.” COLOR: SW 6828 Rhapsody Lilac
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COLOR: SW 6106 Kilim Beige
BEIGES “On the warmer end of the spectrum, beiges and anything in that neutral category tend to be calming, and also warm grays,” says Jordan. “When you start getting into true warm colors like oranges or yellows, those typically have more energy to them.”
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PALE GRAYS A light gray, especially when paired with blue or white elements, can create a relaxing atmosphere. “Gray is a perfect choice and can be layered with any of these colors to add to a serene space,” says Jordan. COLOR: SW 7058 Magnetic Gray
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HUFFINGTON 04.28.13
Goodbye, Air Purifier. Hello, House Plants. BY CAROLYN GREGOIRE
OUSE PLANTS are the ultimate in functional decorating. Some well-placed greenery can not only brighten a space, but also purify the air — plus, they’re helpful in creating a more relaxing, restful ambiance in any room. We know that spending time in nature is linked to reduced stress levels and relieves tension. In fact, in a 2008 study, Dutch research-
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ers found that hospital patients with indoor plants in their rooms reported lower stress levels than patients without them. That’s why we’ve rounded up 10 beautiful houseplants that are easy to take care of and effective at increasing oxygen and clearing out toxins for cleaner breathing air. (Some were even listed among the 10 best air-purifiers in a study of houseplants by NASA scientists). So try adding one to your bedroom or office space for a little dose of zen.
Golden Pothos made NASA’s list of top 10 air-purifying plants.
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ALOE PLANT
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The gel of the aloe plant has a number of healing properties, from soothing skin burns and cuts to detoxing the body, and it can also monitor the air quality in your home. The plant can help clear the air of pollutants found in chemical cleaning products, and when the amount of harmful chemicals in the air becomes excessive, the plants’ leaves will display brown spots. Grows best with lots of sun.
PEACE LILY The beautiful peace lily plant is a wonderful, low-maintenance flower to keep in the home. Peace lilies do well in shade and cooler temperatures, and they can reduce the levels of a number of toxins in the air.
SNAKE PLANT Snake plants don’t need much light or water to survive, so they’re an easy choice for any corner of your home. The plant absorbs carbon dioxide and releases oxygen during the night (most plants do so during the day), so add one to your bedroom for a clean-air boost.
ENGLISH IVY NASA scientists listed the English Ivy as the number one air-filtering houseplant, as it is the most effective plant when it comes to absorbing formaldehyde. It’s also incredibly easy to grow and adaptable — try it as a hanging or floor plant. Grows best in moderate temperatures and medium sunlight.
RUBBER TREE Rubber trees are good for cleaning the air and are one of the easiest plants to grow, as they thrive even in dim lighting and cooler climates. The lowmaintenance plant is a powerful toxin eliminator and air purifier.
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BAMBOO PALM The attractive bamboo palm also made NASA’s list of top cleanair plants with a purifying score of 8.4. It’s particularly effective at clearing out benzene and trichloroethylene. These need to be well-watered, in shade or indirect sunlight.
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RED-EDGED DRACAENA This beautiful, vibrant plant can grow to be ceiling-height (15-foot dracaenas are common), making it a great plant for decorating and filling up space. It also removes toxins including xylene, trichloroethylene and formaldehyde from the air. Grows best in sunlight.
GOLDEN POTHOS The Golden Pothos made the NASA list for its ability to clear formaldehyde from the air. Try adding it to your kitchen or living room as a hanging plant, as the leaves will grow down in cascading vines. They grow easily in cool temperatures with low levels of sunlight.
PHILODENDRON SPIDER PLANT One of the most common house plants, spider plants are decorative, easy to grow, and also made the NASA list of the best air-purifying plants. Spider plants are effective at fighting pollutants including benzene, formaldehyde, carbon monoxide and xylene.
The heart-shaped philodendron is a popular plant choice for indoor areas, as they’re easy to care for and can grow decorative vines. Like the English Ivy, they are particularly good at absorbing formaldehyde. They can also last for many years when properly cared for. Grow with moderate water and some sunlight and they’ll be fine.
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EAT THIS
Slow Down and Make Your Own Pasta
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BY JULIE R. THOMSON
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Exit E KNOW the convenience of packaged food has changed the way we live our lives, in many ways for the better. Sometimes we’re in a such a rush to get dinner on the table that we need a 10-minute meal. But at the same time, too many of us think of food as something that comes from a box or a can, unaware of what it actually takes to make some of the most basic foods. When it comes to something as simple as the ingredients in pasta (the answer being nothing more than flour and water — and sometimes eggs), many are left scratching their heads, not sure how to start. We’re advocating that you take advantage of those days where there is time to make dinner to really make a meal from scratch. It’ll remind you of how fun cooking can be. The best place to start with this slow-down cooking is to make fresh, homemade pasta. The thought of making pasta from scratch may seem like too complicated a task to broach, but it takes two ingredients and a pasta machine — it couldn’t get any simpler. And with homemade pasta, you barely need to worry about a sauce because
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Too many of us think of food as something that comes from a box or a can, unaware of what it actually takes to make some of the most basic foods.” the pasta itself is the star of the show. It takes only minutes to cook when done, and if you make a big batch you can freeze it and have 10-minute dinners ready to go for those busy nights. From start to finish, making fresh pasta won’t take longer than an hour. It takes 10 minutes to make the dough, 30 minutes to let it rest (time you can take to prepare the rest of dinner) and 20 minutes to roll it out. Once all that’s done, dinner can be on the table in less than five minutes, since it only takes four minutes to boil freshly-made pasta. Here’s how it’s done:
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1. With three and a half cups of flour in a heap on the counter, make a well in the center of the pile. Crack four eggs into that well and begin to mix the eggs into the flour with a fork, starting from the center (beating the eggs) and working your way out.
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2. Begin kneading the dough by folding it onto itself, flattening, and folding again. If the dough is sticky, add up to a half cup more flour. The dough is ready to rest once it has formed a smooth elastic ball. This whole process should take about 10 minutes.
3. Place the dough in a bowl and let it rest, covered, for 30 minutes. With this time you can prepare a sauce, or set up the pasta machine.
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[Pasta] takes only minutes to cook when done, and if you make a big batch you can freeze it and have 10-minute dinners ready to go for those busy nights.”
4. Divide the dough into manageable pieces, either in four or six sections. Starting with one piece, flatten the dough, run it through the thickest setting on your pasta machine and fold into three onto itself, like a letter.
5. Run the folded piece into the pasta machine still on the widest setting. Then run it through a couple more times before bringing the pasta machine to a thinner setting to make sure it won’t tear. Repeat this process on each thickness level until you’ve reached your desired thickness.
6. Once all the pasta sections have been rolled out, cut each long stretch of dough to the appropriate noodle length. This is usually about 12 inches. With the noodle cutter attachment on the pasta machine, run each sheet of pasta through carefully. Now, congratulate yourself because you just made pasta from scratch.
To eat your fresh pasta, bring water to a boil in a large pot and cook the pasta for no more than four minutes. Top with the sauce of your choosing — though sometimes a drizzle of good olive oil is all you need — and enjoy your delicious handy work.
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