The idea unfolds, so many aspects of it at once. If this is a movement, what is the movement exactly and why is it important?
The Latitude Movement centers on creating a new kind of global community, one that connects local folks around the world sharing the same minute of latitude (that’s about a mile wide stripe of earth going east and west, experiencing the exact amount of sunlight each and every day so something very much in common!). This new global community builds its connection via cultural appreciation and conversation centering on food art and culture (history, communities, story, perspectives, relationships, worldview, traditions, beliefs among others). With the cultural connections, bridges are built, and those bridges become infrastructure for dealing with large global issues and challenges of our time.
So the latitude movement concentrates on culture, but can foster the kinds of community to address climate change for instance, not to the exclusion of other efforts of nations and international cooperation, but in the way that local folks can impact change. Rings of local folks along latitudes can combine localized efforts in ways that bring something new to the table.
But that is down the road.
Here I know I am on to something big, and the question becomes how to move it forward.
A basic blog tracing the idea as it develops is one way. Researching and writing and contemplating all help shape the idea, and new sparks arrive on a daily basis.
Today I began thinking that the Latitude Movement should concentrate on gatherings as a momentum builder. Latitude Summits as it were. If each year a latitude summit took place, the gatherings could become organizing forces for latitude delegations.
A latitude delegation, my idea today, would consist of a minimum of 12 representatives of a minute of latitude no closer than 100 miles to each other. There can be more than 12 representatives, but at least 12 different home locations 100 miles apart. That would go a long way to building an international latitude family.
So a delegation would cover a minimum of 1200 miles of a latitude line, and most likely much more. The latitude summit would then bring together delegations from different latitudes. If latitudes had their own gatherings, that could be a latitude gathering, or symposium.
This would be down the road, say a few years from now, the international Latitude Summit. I am thinking the Hawaii Convention Center in Honolulu would be perfect. I could imagine some several hundred participants the first one- let’s say January 2017.
Perhaps the first Latitude Summit takes place in Ogunquit, Maine, this fall. A one day meeting in a simple room at the Birchmere. That’s kind of where this whole thing kicked off, in a certain sense. Arriving to Ogunquit at sunset, purely because it shared the exact same latitude as Dorset. The first meeting would not consist of delegations in that it would more be an assembly of whoever I can engage for the first meeting. The next summer 2016 might feature the first Latitude Summit with mini-delegations, groups of three from the same latitude, no matter where on that minute of latitude, groups of three. And then we get the Hawaii gathering going.
yes this IS a brainstorm. My thought is to simply get these ideas right onto a blog format. Why not.
Two gatherings a year. It would be great for the June solstice to be a gathering time for latitudes- the one minute summits. Then the Latitude Summit in January as it would not be smart to have it in December.
OK so we kind of have a plan.
2015- Fall Gathering- Gatherings are to discuss the Latitude Movement and plan the development of the movement.
2016- Summer Solstice One Minute Summit- A latitude specific summit bringing together folks on the same latitude (a minimum of 3 people the first year)
2017- First Latitude Summit in Hawaii- with small delegations 3 people from a minute of latitude- probably one room at the convention center for two three days, with lots of other activities planned around Honolulu, and of course the music of Mike Love and Sam Ites.
