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Julie Dermansky | September 27, 2013
By Julie Dermansky • Friday, September 27, 2013 - 05:00
It took a while for the Alabama public to understand that their state is being transformed into a tar sands Mecca. Proposals for rail and pipeline transport and tar sands storage facilities were first presented in 2010, and by 2012, most were rubber stamped with no public input.
But in 2013, a handful of concerned citizens in the Mobile Bay Sierra Club and the newly formed Tar Sands Mobile Coalition cried foul. And now their cries are being heard.
Two of four proposed projects are on hold – The Plains Southcap Pipeline, which would pass through the Big Creek Lake watershed that supplies drinking water to Mobile and the vicinity, and the American Tank & Vessel project to build tar sands storage tanks in Africatown, a historic Mobile neighborhood.
Still reeling from the BP oil spill, concerned citizens along the Gulf Coast are fighting back by educating themselves about the risks these tar sands projects present to their communities and then spreading the word to their neighbors, their elected officials and the media.
September 17th delivered a big victory when Judge Don Davis dismissed Plains Southcap's condemnation lawsuit against Mobile Area Water and Sewer System (MAWSS). This victory opens the door for landowners to fight back. At issue was whether Plains Southcap had authority to use eminent domain to condemn the land they wanted in the Big Creek Watershed in the first place. This judge ruled they did not.
There are currently four tar sands related developments in progress in Mobile, Alabama:
1. Arc Terminals and Canadian National are building a rail terminal in downtown Mobile. Canadian National is transporting heavy crude from Western Canada, known as tar sands bitumen, from Canada to Mobile via rail. The bitumen will be heated in order to get it on pressurized insulated cars that keep it warm, and then reheated to be able to get it off. The pressurized cars present worrying safety issues in the instance of derailment, and this process of transport uses a lot of energy.
2. Arc Terminals will build a pipeline to transport Canadian tar sands from the downtown rail terminal under the Mobile River to Arc's storage tanks on nearby Blakely Island, where capacity will be greatly increased. Tar sands and other petroleum products gathered there could then be transported through an aging pipe, under historic Africatown to the Ten Mile Terminal where it will meet the Plains Southcap pipeline.
3. The Plains Southcap Pipeline will go from Ten Mile Terminal, Alabama to Pascagoula, Mississippi. Although Plains Southcap claims its pipeline will transport only conventional crude, and the Chevron refinery in Pascagoula claims it will not be processing tar sands, the infrastructure will be in place for them to accept tar sands crude should they choose to. The pipeline will be a high-capacity, 24-inch line able to move 150,000 barrels of product a day according to the Alabama Public Service Commission.
4. Storage tank expansion by American Tank & Vessel in Africatown will include tanks to hold tar sands and regular crude oil.
At a recent meeting attended by more than 200 people, Mobile mayor Samuel Jones said the Sierra Club knows more about these developments than he does.
He and Mobile County Commissioner Connie Hudson claim they were unaware of the Plains Southcap pipeline. It was approved after a 15-minute presentation by Plains Southcap at a meeting in Montgomery, AL held by the Alabama Public Service Commission on November 28th, 2011.
The only public announcements made about the meeting were four advertisements in local newspapers that omitted any mention of the key points of the project, including the pipeline's route. At the hearings, Plains Southcap claimed the pipeline would lead to substantial job creation and domestic energy growth.
Factors like climate change and the resulting rising tides that will have a direct impact on the state's coastline were ignored, and questions about environmental impact and insurance liability for such high-risk projects were not raised before the permit was issued.
Africatown resident Ruth Taylor Ballard says that being left in the dark on such matters is nothing new, unfortunately. The community hears about industrial projects when it is too late to do anything to stop them.
Alabama Governor Robert Bentley, who serves as chairman of the Interstate Oil and Gas Compact Commission, defensively asserts that the Army Corps of Engineers–with input from both the Alabama Public Service Commission and the Alabama Department of Environmental Management– signed off on the project. Although he has some concerns about safety, he trusts industry to perform safely.
But Plains Southcap's parent company, Houston-based Plains All American Pipeline (NYSE: PAA) has a far from spotless safety record.
The company's spill record includes a 28,000 barrel oil spill on April 29, 2011 in Alberta, Canada, and the Bay Springs oil spill in Mississippi. The company recently agreed to a $44.25 Million settlement with the Environmental Protection Agency for violations from 10 other crude oil spills in the United States.
Plains Southcap's pipeline is 70% complete, and Arc's expansion on the riverfront has begun.
New storage tanks have already been built on Mobile's riverfront. And a multitude of Canadian National's black-painted railway cars move toxic heated bitumen though Africatown to downtown Mobile.
Trains with toxic cargo at downtown Mobile's terminal
American Tank & Vessel is planning more storage tanks for Africatown, a couple of miles from downtown Mobile in an area zoned for industry. There is concern that existing pipeline in the area could be used to transport tar sands crude, if that is what industry demands.
Africatown was included on the National Register of Historic Places by the National Park Service on December 4, 2012. A core group of local elders fought to get this citation of the community's historic importance, and hope it will help them in the fight to protect Africatown from tar sands threats.
Community activist Ariela Philip Scraig, 84, a life long resident of Africatown in Mobile, Alabama. She helped Africatown get on the National Register of Historic Places, and is now fighting against tar sands developments.
The Tar Sands Mobile Coalition's actions are slowing down these projects. The Mobile Area Water and Sewer System (MAWSS) refused to give Plains Southcap permission to use its land in the watershed area despite the Army Corps of Engineers permit. Plains Southcap is suing MAWSS to condemn the land under eminent domain laws so they can move ahead.
They successfully argued that Plains Southcap, a limited liability corporation did not have the legal right to seek condemnation and asked that the case be dismissed. Plains Southcap can appeal or reroute the pipeline. Either way, the project is facing a major and costly delay.
Judy Hale, mayor of Semmes, a Mobile suburb, issued a stop work order when she found Plains Southcap had started construction before obtaining all the permits it needed and was not following state construction standards.
Federal Judge William Stelle upheld the stop work ruling against Plains Southcap, who challenged the order. Plains Southcap has said the delay is costing the company $124,000 a day.
Plains Southcap Pipeline in Semmes, Alabama where construction is at a standstill due to a stop work order.
During a recent meeting organized by the Tar Sands Mobile Coalition at the Mobile Bay Sierra Club, word spread that American Tank & Vessel had withdrawn its proposal to build more storage tanks in Africatown.
Despite this victory, the project can be resubmitted to the commission at any time.
"It's like herpes," said Dr. Rip Pfeiffer of Mobile, who gave a presentation at the meeting. "It's not going to go away. It's too much money and it will be back."
Africatown's Omar Smith points out that American Tank & Vessel withdrew its application because of a skipped step in the permitting process. With new public scrutiny of the project, it would have been turned down, meaning the company would have had to wait six months to resubmit. They are required to make a public presentation about the proposed new work to the impacted community before presenting it to the zoning board. Smith is sure they will try again after taking the proper steps.
Watch Omar Smith and Joe Womac talk about tar sands development in Africatown:
Plans for a new terminal on the Mobile River that would allow for greater quantities of Canadian tar sands crude to be delivered by train, a new pipeline to transport tar sands under the Mobile River, and more storage tanks dangerously close to Mobile's downtown are all in the works.
The combination of toxic tar sands being stored and transported by rail and in pipelines, coupled with increased risk of mega storms due to climate change in an area already experiencing the effects of rising tides, makes these developments extremely risky.
Mobile Bay Sierra Club Conservation Chair David Underhill says,
"Imagine a hurricane storm surge 25 or 30 feet high, which is what happened with Katrina, coming up the bay and the river. This could result in the release of several times more petrochemicals into the environment than the Exxon Valdez, and even the Alabama Department of Environmental Management permit asks if the area is within a projected area of a so-called 100-year flood plain."
Despite increasing public pressure, Governor Bentley continues to support all of these tar sands projects. He and Mississippi Governor Phil Bryant have teamed up to conduct a study on Hartselle sandstone, a natural underground resource that stretches from northern Alabama into northern Mississippi.
According to AL.com, "A recent study found an estimated 7.5 billion barrels of oil located in the reserves. Canada has proven to be a leader in oil sand recovery, and we hope through this evaluation process we can collaborate and share knowledge on best practices," Bryant said.
Neither governor seems concerned with the dire environmental consequences a slew of recent tar sands and crude oil incidents are having, including the Enbridge Kalamazoo spill in Michigan that is still being cleaned up three years later at a cost of over a billion dollars; the Mayflower Pegasus pipeline spill in Arkansas where tar sands rushed down residential driveways, forcing evacuation of a housing development and contaminating nearby waterways; the ongoing tar sands leak at Canadian Natural Resources Ltd's Cold Lake project in Northern Alberta, out of control since June, or the Lac Megantic train derailment that killed 47 people when runaway crude cars exploded in the city's center.
In the meantime, local groups are making sure the word gets out. None of them wants to see Mobile become an environmental disaster zone.
Storage tanks on the banks of the Mobile River for Canadian tar sands, or other petroleum products.
Joe Walmac stands next to a historic marker for Africatown's cemetery.
Train with toxic cargo passes by just a few feet from homes in Africatown.
Plains Southcap Pipeline on Airport Road in Alabama near the Mississippi state-line where construction is ongoing.
Dr. Rip Pfeiffer holds up a sign during a presentation he gave at a meeting held by the Mobile Bay Sierra Club and the Mobile Tar Sands Coalition.
Map of tar sand development projects in Mobile, Alabama.
Map of the Plains Southcap Pipeline.
All photos (c) Julie Dermansky.
Semi related...
What is the required insurance for those rail cars? As we've learned up in Canada the Lac Megantic trains only carried $25 million in insurance.
Capped insurance amounts to industry subsidy. As a capitalist, I find that incredibly offensive. It also tends to downplay the dangerous game the rail companies are playing, and give them an excuse not to upgrade their rail cars for better safety. If there is an accident citizens have to pay out of pocket.
I need not point out that we use the same rail cars as Americans do and they are not very safe. In Canada accident after accident has pointed to needing better rail car safety for transporting dangerous goods.
The rail industry itself is also transporting more and more toxic chemicals. Here is an example of what is being carried;
Right now, shale oil is being shipped to Canada for tar sands diluent. So that toxic stuff has to go both directions.
Appearently its hard to get information about car contents for your first responders in case there is an accident. It may be the same in the US, I don't know. We've had two derailments this year in Calgary, and the rail companies are unable to provide information on what is in the rail cars. The represents a serious safety concern for your local fire departments. Your first repsonders may want to know if the car can burn or explode in order to make decisions.
Michael Berndtson replied on Permalink
Need some clarification.
I can't figure out if Mobile, Al is going to be a terminal, an upgrader and terminal or a refiner. There doesn't' seem to be a refinery in Mobile. A little help?
Looking at Canadian Association of Petroleum Producers' PowerPoint you linked - I'm truly amazed at what Illinois is becoming - the freaking tar sands pipeline capital of the world. We're already getting tar sands going to two refineries outside of Chicago. Then there's Flanagan and Patoka lines sending the stuff west and south. Illinois has the world's best farmland. It's not like it's some barren hellscape like Alberta is. Easy Canadians. I'm kidding.
Peter Moss replied on Permalink
No offence taken. Once you
No offence taken. Once you get north of Edmonton, a lot of areas look like hellscapes.
What I'm not sure of is why they would need to heat the bitumen up to load and unload onto railcars. Wouldn't it be easier to dilute the bitumen like they do for pipelines? Or just leave it semi-solid. In the winter, when it's cold, bitumen hardens and poses much less of a hazard if spilled. You can just scoop it up in pieces.
Michael Berndtson replied on Permalink
Maybe you're onto something.
Maybe you're onto something. Process tar sands just enough to remove inorganic matter up in Alberta. Ooze it into giant ice cube tray like totes and stack onto rail cars. Transport to the US or ship overseas. Off load using enormous articulating two handed robotic cranes that twist the totes so cubes of solid bitumen drop into giant open top tanks. Sending the solid bitumen trays empty may be a problem. What does Alberta need in return?
That was probably Option X of the engineering feasibility study and got screened out as being silly.
Don't be so sure...
Oil and gas has tried all kinds of silly. It is a very old industry.
1) One problem with coil drilling is that its hard to steer. So one company built an entire rig that could rotate on the spot. (Millions spent… Never worked..)
2) Rig hands die all the time from falling pipe or flying chains. One company has decided to solve that with Iron Derrickman! Able to lift huge tonnage and store pipes faster than any crew could. (Also cheaper than having 4 guys who charge $120k a year.)
I'm sure this will work just fine until the day the robot forgets where zero is, or decides to drop a pipe on the BOP.
3) There was a DOE\Sandia report saying you could use layered pipe to build a communications link downhole. They were recommending that companies take $2 million in pipe, throw that in the garbage, then buy $10 million in fancy pipe. Another $100 million in R&D to change all your tool strings and you'd be set.
4) In a similar light they recommended high speed EM communications that would deliver 100k bits/s… for 100 yards underground. (Yeah… we already know where everything is that's 100 yards down. Maybe we could use a wire or something for that.)
5) Oh! Cased hole drilling! Drill the hole 'pre-cased'. Never worked and ignores all the now known issues with having good cement logs. $100's millions gone.
6) I've even been asked how come we don't use GPS when we drill. As politely as I could, I asked, "Have you ever used a cell phone in a tunnel?" That question question came from an R&D manager.
Plans to do this shipping were probably drawn up long before the shale oil boom kicked in.
Michael pointed out to me that they can use Shale Oil for diluent. Before that, oil companies were looking at importing foreign diluent (from fill in name of America's hated enemies here), and realizing that foreign content would render tar sands dilbit 'foreign' and therefore taxable.
Diluent also cranks up how toxic and dangerous the fuel is, so avoiding it is a good thing. You'd also have to ship a heck of a lot of it up to Canada. 20%?
Michael Berndtson replied on Permalink
I meant to reply here
See below
Peter Moss replied on Permalink
I'm guessing also the issue
I'm guessing also the issue is selling raw bitumen straight from the well bores without upgrading or diluting would mean it's in a less usable, less transportable state, and therefore would not be as valuable and would need to be sold at a lower price. US customers would have to upgrade it at their end.
Michael Berndtson replied on Permalink
to dilute or not to dilute
Here's the diluted bitumen by pipeline versus straight bitumen by rail argument from the folks at Pembina Institute. I guess it comes down to volume, weight and price. Environmental and health risk factors were pushed aside as outliers.
Who are those guys and why do they seem like US environmental NGOs?
Pemina are the good guys.
Good find. Thanks.
Pembina is a bit more than a Think Tank. They do a variety things to make money, they do some think tank style work, they broker carbon trades (wind in Alberta is subsidiezed by Californian carbon credits), and they hire out their technical staff (who are educated, unbiased and competent) to consult.
Naturally they stand in sharp contrast to conservative Think Tanks (Fraser Institute) who are clearly brimming with talent. :-)
I like the conclusion of that report. "Earning Public Trust starts with Acknowledging The Risks" As an engineer I've learned that you can't ignore problems. You have to accept them, understand them, and finally you have to address them. This is pretty core to my concerns over the Global Warming Denial.
My wife took a public engagement course with some some co-workers and some oil field pipeline workers. The things those guys said was disgusting; "Avoid speaking to the public at all costs. Give as little information as possible. Never tell the whole story." It sounds like their cunning plan is working…
Michael Berndtson replied on Permalink
Not another one
So they are somewhat like the Environmental Defense Fund (EDF), Natural Resources Defense Council (NRDC), Pew, Breakthrough Institute, and on and on and on.
I'm getting this sinking feeling that these groups were setup to buffer heirs of past generation's endeavors in natural resources exploitation than say a deep concern for the environment and the health of the huddled masses. Or - environmental NGOs were setup for Top-tier University environmental policy graduates - to pass some time until the hedge fund manager boyfriend proposes. The happy couple will need to bury some income somewhere.
Please note: hedge funds do provide something for society - it's just not clear what that something is.
I don't know about the others.. (Not liking EDF..)
Over the years, Pembina has been at the forefront of factual discourse. Its sort of the logical version of carpet bomb denial.
"Please don't do this… but if you are, you should be concerned about this this and this." Naturally that kind of logical thinking is an anathema business agendas, and typical conservative thinking. They don't seem to be or use any parrots.
I don't think they are under the thrall of industry stake holders. Indeed according to one of the loudest denial trolls here, Pembina is controlled by foreign powers, and since it influences the Alberta government, the Alberta government is under the direct control of foreign Environmental Groups. The evidence… Tides Canada funded Pembina, Desmogblog, David Suzuki, and David Schindler's research into Athabasca river basin pollution. And (this is the criminal part) the Alberta Govnerment backed David Schindler's assertion that the tar sands were polluting the antire region.
Conspiracies know no bounds or logic. Pembina is not liked up here.
Peter Moss replied on Permalink
From the Pembina website:
From the Pembina website:
"The Pembina Institute is an organization unlike any other working to protect Canada's environment today. We combine the research and technical capacity of a think tank with the values and advocacy of an environmental non-governmental organization (NGO) and the entrepreneurial and business sense of a for-profit consulting firm. This equips us with a unique ability to employ multi-faceted and highly collaborative approaches to change".
They've been doing consulting work for municipalities, public institutions and also (beleive it or not) for some of the largest oil & gas companies operating in Canada e.g. Suncor, Cenova, Shell, TransCanada, EnCana, Talisman, Total, etc. They combine research, advocacy and consulting.
Michael Berndtson replied on Permalink
Thanks. Why's there a Dot Org on its website?
Pembina seems like an EDF or a not for profit environmental consulting firm that offers policy steering. Here's a story on front groups. Here's a old saw: "Technical consultants don't do science, they do clients."
The rest was copied from the link below
Dinner on Wednesday night was served at the Petroleum Club, sponsored by the Canadian Association of Petroleum Producers. On the Thursday morning, just before their return flight, legislators did have a brief meeting with a representative from the Pembina Institute, an Alberta environmental group that calls for responsible exploitation of the tar sands. According to the ALEC trip itinerary, this was to "provide the opposing point of view."
Although Pembina does represent a different view from those that want completely unrestrained extraction of the tar sands, the group is not representative of those that oppose tar sands extraction. There are plenty of organizations that could have provided alternative viewpoints, particularly First Nation tribal leaders who are campaigning vigorously on this issue, but perhaps unsurprisingly they were not included. Even Pembina's – somewhat limited – opposing voice was not wanted during the tour of the oil sands facilities, and they were not invited to the lobbyist-sponsored dinners.
Peter Moss replied on Permalink
Yes, the fact that Pembina
Yes, the fact that Pembina even uses the term "oilsands" shows their hand. For nearly a half century the oil industry itself referred to the regions with bitumen deposits as tar sands. The largest such region was known as the Athabasca tar sands for decades. Tar sands was the term used by engineers, oil industry magazines, press releases, newspaper articles and the government up until about 2001. Then oil sands became the "official" term.
Here's some more from the Pembina Institute website:
"Our goal is to advance responsible oilsands development, which we define as:
•capping the impacts of oilsands development within the limits of what science shows the ecosystem can support;
•shrinking the environmental footprint of oilsands development for every barrel produced; and
•ensuring a meaningful portion of the benefits of oilsands development are used to support Canada's transition to a clean energy future."
Ian Forrester replied on Permalink
It has been "oil sands" since at least 1974
The Alberta Government formed the Alberta Oil Sands Technology and Research Authority (AOSTRA) in 1974. So the term has been in use for a long time. The original name given to the oil deposits was "bituminous sands".
I don't understand the negative feelings towards the Pembina Institute. They are a breath of green air compared to the usual nonsense emanating from Calgary via the Fiends of Science, Fraser Institute and Barry Cooper from the U of C.
Fiends of science! LOL
Peter Moss replied on Permalink
You say tomato, I say...
My memory failed me and I got the dates wrong. According to oil industry historian David Finch, the term 'tar sands' has actually been part of industry lexicon since 1939:
Up until the 1960s everyone called them 'tar sands' and both terms were used interchangeably until about ten years ago when the Alberta government and Big Oil "officially" made the switch to oil sands. A year or two ago the CBC also made it official media policy to use 'oil sands'.
Of course, it makes about as much sense as calling a potato farm a 'french fry' farm. Tar, just as oil, can be made from bitumen. So the end product argument doesn't hold in favour of one term or the other.
I do agree with you about Pembina. They do good work, without which we wouldn't have a lot of detailed ammunition for criticism. They're also nice people, I've talked with a few of them. I am a little leery of their cozy relationship with Big Oil as well as their funding from the Rockefelers, however.
All good stuff guys.
I don't actually fit the desmogblog concerns over pipelines\and bitumen. I only want a carbon tax, and I figure the rest will take care of itself. I'm OK with trashing the place. (Sorry guys.. that's just me.) I'm upset that the so called solution for tailings is to leave in a pond and hope its all clean later on. There have been numerous alternatives that Alberta hasn't moved on.
My take on the carbon footprint of the tar sands is that most of it is from energy consumed in extraction and upgrading. There is no reason that it can't be done with solar, wind or even BC Hydro.
I am finding all this grit on Pembina interesting to read. One thing that strikes me is that environmental\political groups take on a stance that is close to their home. I've seen a lot of information coming out of Pembina that is pretty negative on Alberta's Environmental efforts, and of course carbon foot print. Yet they soldier on. I don't feel I'm getting a green wash like that recent release from EDF on 'Green Completions'.
Anyways, I think Pembina has the right idea;
"Greening the Grid outlines two scenarios for meeting Alberta's electricity demand. The more aggressive "green scenario" shows how Alberta could move from 70 per cent coal to 70 per cent renewable energy in just 20 years."
Note that Danny the Denier has a video on here. Daniel Smith is Alberta's 'Tea Party' leader. She was booed on stage, on TV (CBC) in Alberta for saying there was no consensus on Climate Change. Rumor has it that her party is now 'luke warmers'.


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subset: commoncrawl


text:
Major Section: SYNTAXP
See syntaxp for a basic discussion of the use of
syntaxp to control
A common syntactic restriction is
(SYNTAXP (AND (CONSP X) (EQ (CAR X) 'QUOTE)))or, equivalently,
(SYNTAXP (QUOTEP X)).A rule with such a hypothesis can be applied only if
x is bound to
a specific constant. Thus, if
x is
23 (which is actually
represented internally as
(quote 23)), the test evaluates to
t; but
x prints as
(+ 11 12) then the test evaluates to
(car x) is the symbol
binary-+). We see the use
of this restriction in the rule
(implies (and (syntaxp (quotep c)) (syntaxp (quotep d))) (equal (+ c d x) (+ (+ c d) x))).If
c and
d are constants, then the
executable-counterpart of
binary-+ will evaluate the sum
c and
d. For instance, under the influence of this rule
(+ 11 12 foo)rewrites to
(+ (+ 11 12) foo)which in turn rewrites to
(+ 23 foo). Without the syntactic
restriction, this rule would loop with the built-in rules
ASSOCIATIVITY-OF-+ or
We here recommend that the reader try the affects of entering expressions such as the following at the top level ACL2 prompt.
(+ 11 23) (+ '11 23) (+ '11 '23) (+ ''11 ''23) :trans (+ 11 23) :trans (+ '11 23) :trans (+ ''11 23) :trans (+ c d x) :trans (+ (+ c d) x)We also recommend that the reader verify our claim above about looping by trying the affect of each of the following rules individually.
(defthm good (implies (and (syntaxp (quotep c)) (syntaxp (quotep d))) (equal (+ c d x) (+ (+ c d) x))))on (the false) theorems:
(defthm bad (implies (and (acl2-numberp c) (acl2-numberp d)) (equal (+ c d x) (+ (+ c d) x))))
(thm (equal (+ 11 12 x) y))One can use
(thm (implies (and (acl2-numberp c) (acl2-numberp d) (acl2-numberp x)) (equal (+ c d x) y))).
brr, perhaps in conjunction with
cw-gstack, to investigate any looping.
Here is a simple example showing the value of rule
good above. Without
good, the
thm form below fails.
(defstub foo (x) t)
(thm (equal (foo (+ 3 4 x)) (foo (+ 7 x))))
The next three examples further explore the use of
quote in
syntaxp hypotheses.
We continue the examples of
syntaxp hypotheses with a rule from
books/finite-set-theory/set-theory.lisp. We will not discuss
here the meaning of this rule, but it is necessary to point out that
(ur-elementp nil) is true in this book.
(defthm scons-nil (implies (and (syntaxp (not (equal a ''nil))) (ur-elementp a)) (= (scons e a) (scons e nil)))).Here also,
syntaxp is used to prevent looping. Without the
(scons e nil) would be rewritten to itself since
(ur-elementp nil) is true.
Nil is a constant just as 23 is. Try
:trans (cons a nil),
:trans (cons 'a 'nil), and
:trans (cons ''a ''nil).
Also, don't forget that the arguments to a function are evaluated before
the function is applied.
The next two rules move negative constants to the other side of an inequality.
(defthm |(< (+ (- c) x) y)| (implies (and (syntaxp (quotep c)) (syntaxp (< (cadr c) 0)) (acl2-numberp y)) (equal (< (+ c x) y) (< (fix x) (+ (- c) y)))))Questions: What would happen if
(defthm |(< y (+ (- c) x))| (implies (and (syntaxp (quotep c)) (syntaxp (< (cadr c) 0)) (acl2-numberp y)) (equal (< y (+ c x)) (< (+ (- c) y) (fix x)))))
(< (cadr c) '0) were used?
What about
(< (cadr c) ''0)?
One can also use
syntaxp to restrict the application of a rule
to a particular set of variable bindings as in the following taken from
(encapsulate ()We recommend the use of
(local (defthm floor-+-crock (implies (and (real/rationalp x) (real/rationalp y) (real/rationalp z) (syntaxp (and (eq x 'x) (eq y 'y) (eq z 'z)))) (equal (floor (+ x y) z) (floor (+ (+ (mod x z) (mod y z)) (* (+ (floor x z) (floor y z)) z)) z)))))
(defthm floor-+ (implies (and (force (real/rationalp x)) (force (real/rationalp y)) (force (real/rationalp z)) (force (not (equal z 0)))) (equal (floor (+ x y) z) (+ (floor (+ (mod x z) (mod y z)) z) (+ (floor x z) (floor y z))))))
brr to investigate the use of
Another useful restriction is defined by
(defun rewriting-goal-literal (x mfc state)We use this restriction in the rule
;; Are we rewriting a top-level goal literal, rather than rewriting ;; to establish a hypothesis from a rewrite (or other) rule?
(declare (ignore x state)) (null (access metafunction-context mfc :ancestors))).
(defthm |(< (* x y) 0)| (implies (and (syntaxp (rewriting-goal-literal x mfc state)) (rationalp x) (rationalp y)) (equal (< (* x y) 0) (cond ((equal x 0) nil) ((equal y 0) nil) ((< x 0) (< 0 y)) ((< 0 x) (< y 0))))))which has been found to be useful, but which also leads to excessive thrashing in the linear arithmetic package if used indiscriminately.
See extended-metafunctions for information on the use of


text:
It had been a shock, though it shouldn't have been. He was fifteen, after all, and healthy, and it was utterly ridiculous that I had not anticipated acquiring this knowledge at some point. Some of it had to do with the way I found out, walking in on him, already halfway across his room before I looked up and realized why he was frozen, with a pained, desperate look in his eyes, hunched over as if his stomach pained him. But, even though I am no innocent and know men have their desires and the various ways they tend to them, I somehow had forgotten to notice that my sweet boy was grown up. Almost a man himself.
And the rest of the shock had to do with how I had responded, after the initial full slam of mortified embarrassment. How I had tried to make it seem perfectly normal as I gathered up the clothes I had dropped in my haste to avert my eyes. How once that frantic need to not embarrass my son or give away that I was shocked and dismayed…..how there had been a pulse inside of that fading heat, a pulse that lingered somewhere low in my abdomen and drew my eyes inexorably over to his hands, clutching himself. How I was on the verge of telling him to continue, that it was natural, that I would just finish putting away his shirts and socks and underwear. A very unmotherly desire to see my son masturbate.
It was a heat that I thought I would never experience again, and I wrenched myself from that lingering look, and prayed he had not noticed. I had shut the door with a promise that I would always knock from now on. With a determination to shut away that rush of bewildering desire. And yet, I could not shut it out. I could not focus on my chores. My face buzzed intermittently for the next hour as I kept seeing over and over his lanky, young body, entirely nude for some inexplicable reason, his hands covering himself. I kept imagining what would have happened if I had told him to continue. The beginning of that imagination, anyway. I refused to entertain the thought, and jumped away from half formed thoughts, sometimes with a physical turning of my head. I realized he would probably not be coming out of his room tonight.
When I could not shake the thoughts or the increasing restlessness and swooping feelings, like the sensation of that first drop from a rollercoaster, except sweeter…..I retired to my own room, and I played my fingers over my own sex, not with the desultory efficiency that I usually conducted this task every few months or so. I came again and again, feeling as if my entire body was involved in the release. I bit back cries and shuddered and indulged as I had never indulged before. And I could not help wondering if we were masturbating at the same time. I could not stop myself from imagining him just next door, spasming into his hand, spilling onto the carpet. I could not help the immediate, sharp sweet release as I saw him, over and over again, only this time I stayed. Only this time I helped….. I gave in to the thoughts.
Shocking, yes. But, it was only masturbation. It was my head only, and while I apparently could not control myself in this, there was no need to treat him any differently. There would likely be a few weeks of awkward dancing around it, and he would likely begin locking his door, and he probably hated that it had happened at all. No need to bring it up. Force normalcy and don't talk about it.
I masturbated again this morning though. I was sore from last night's abuses, but I woke up aching and needful and I could not go through the morning routine of waking him up ten times before dragging him from his bed and making him eat his breakfast before Roger came by to pick him up. Dear Lord, I could not have touched him and felt that spark of immediate possibility. I came as the insistent blaring of his alarm sounded through the thin wall separating our rooms. I came to the surety that, as a strapping young man inundated with hormones and the constant build of testosterone, he would wake up hard. That in his heavy lingering sleep, he would not notice if I simply….brushed it with my fingers. That he would already be coming into my mouth as he woke with a start, and he would not have the presence of mind or the willpower to reject.
Just thoughts.
I washed my hands and poured his cereal and woke him up a dozen times. And he did not look at me, he moved slowly as if he was reluctant, and I hated that last night had happened. I daren't run my fingers through his hair and kiss his cheek this morning. When Roger walked in, tossing back a Red Bull and full of morning jocularity, he had appraised me with a lingering look that told me all I needed to know about how experienced my son's best friend was. He became almost flirty as he leaned against the sink and told me I looked very nice today, Miss Davis. And my son had pushed away from the table, pushed between us to dump his bowl in the sink and, still not even glancing at me, hauled Roger to the door, slinging his backpack over one shoulder.
I sat for a long time at the table. I experienced the cool prickle of shame on every down beat of the bloom of desire. It had been so long since I had wanted anything sexual, and now….now with a desire stronger than anything else I had ever felt, I wanted to know my son. Intimately, lavishly, and unconcerned with the psychological fuckery. I tried to tell myself it was natural, but I knew deep down that the fact it was my son was a large part of this sudden need.
It became my obsession, this morning. How long had he been jerking off? Did he have a girlfriend? Or, perhaps a boyfriend. My mind flashed onto Roger and his easy, knowing look, but Roger was definitely straight. Did he have a collection of magazines? Except it wouldn't be magazines, now, would it? Not these days. No, it would be the internet. Porn. What porn did he jerk off to?
That question stayed. And it was easily answered. I turned on his computer, logged into the master account, and pulled up his desktop. I brought up the internet history first. There was a lot. He spent a lot of time on the computer, something I could not stop him from doing. He needed the computer for homework, for his papers and Facebook and whatnot. But his internet history was scrupulously clean. I felt a hard disappointment as I scrolled through the last week. Perhaps he did not search internet pornography. I knew that couldn't be the case.
So I delved into his folders. I looked for downloaded videos, and finally hit upon them, in an unnamed "New Folder". I opened the videos, many of them the darkly lit kind of home made videos, amateur porn. They often featured pretty girls, naturally endowed, not shaved, and enjoying themselves. I was happy to see he did not seek out the plastic, over-acted and hard-bright professional videos. He came to reality, and I shifted a little, imagining him playing the videos, right here in the same seat that I was perched on.
When I had forwarded through his smallish collection, I clicked the next folder within, another unnamed folder. Curious why these would have their own separate place – perhaps they were his favorites.
The breathless blush slammed into me again as I saw his dark, lovely eyes looking up at me from the video thumbnail. Enough was visible to see that he was nude – or at least shirtless. There were three videos, and I moved the cursor onto the first one, in a daze. I clicked it.
He was settled on his futon, and I watched as he stared into the camera, pumping his hand up and down over himself, his muscles tensing. I got my first good look at my son's uncircumcised penis and could not look away. I watched the foreskin slide over and down again, met his eyes as he made himself come for the camera. I did not skip through the video. I watched the entire eight minutes, my mouth watering and my throat dry, the nerves singing over my entire body. And when he came, I felt a gush of warm wetness spill from me, an overwhelming desire, soaking my panties and making me whimper out loud.
I moved as if in a dream, to close that video and start the next. This time he was standing, only his legs and lower half visible as he tugged on himself. The vantage was so that I could imagine kneeling in front of him, my face turned up to watch him pleasure himself over me. Who did he make these videos for? The frightening thought came to me that he was sending them out over the internet for others to watch, for perverts to get off to. Except, here I was, in the privacy of my son's room, practically passing out from the rush of desire that his young, sweet body was rousing inside of me. I was the pervert.
I accepted it. My hand was already buried between my thighs, and I realized I had been pressing against my wrist and fist, grinding unconsciously against myself. I closed my eyes, took a deep breath, and stood. I hesitated only a moment before undoing my pants and pushing them, and my underwear down to my bare ankles, settling back into the chair and groaning at the thought that I was likely sitting on dried come. My son's dried come, against my naked and slick vagina. I shifted deliberately back and forth, the canvas fabric providing enough friction across my engorged labia as I imagined I was re-wetting his spilled semen with my own juices. And I came as he did, without having to touch myself at all.
I glanced to the time at the lower right of the screen. I still had several hours before the high school let out, and I already knew how I would be spending them. I would not get a damn thing done today, but I was beyond caring. I closed the finished video and clicked on the last one, hitting it to full screen and settling back, sliding my fingers into the puffy and swollen lips of my vagina, revelling in the delicious slickness.
He was standing again, wearing tight briefs, and he was hard. He grabbed himself for the camera, squeezing through the fabric and pushing down on himself. He was certainly beautifully endowed. I was beyond wondering why he was filming himself masturbate, only waiting breathlessly for him to really start, sliding my fingers over down to my clenching, grasping opening. Come on, baby, I thought wildly. Show me. Take off your underwear. It's okay.
I came to the thought of saying this to him in real life. He did not remove his underwear. He sat down onto the futon, and I realized he had a tshirt on as well. This was a relatively recent video, as his hair had begun growing back from the last time he buzzed it off. I guessed it was only a few weeks old.
In the video he glanced up, listening, searching with his eyes, pausing. Then he looked back at the camera before picking something up….A pair of black panties. I paused, a cooling sweeping over me. For just a moment I wondered whose they were, but I knew very well. Or, I thought I knew. I was wearing a pair just like them, part of a three pack. And I only had two pairs left from that pack. My mouth went entirely dry as he folded the fabric over and around until he was staring at the gusset. He brought my panties up to his face and ran his nose along the soiled gusset, and a sound – like a gasp and a whimper – burst from between my lips. I couldn't move as I watched him pull in several deep sniffs. I saw his sensuous lips part and his tongue flicked out, lapping at the fabric, and suddenly I was masturbating furiously, crying out with utter abandon as I watched my son savour the scent and flavour of ME.
I came three times in rapid succession, even as my mind told me over and over – this means nothing, he just wanted underwear, mine were convenient, OH GOD WHY CAN'T I STOP COMING. I pulled my hand away and squeezed my thighs together, almost crying, gasping breathlessly. On the screen, my sweet boy suddenly put down the panties and removed his shirt. He kept his skin tight briefs on. He picked up the panties again in both hands and buried his whole face in them before letting go with one hand and reaching between his own legs to push and grasp at himself. I watched him close his eyes with an almost heavenly reverence as his pink tongue flashed out again. He drew the panties into his mouth and bit down on them, chewing a little, before going back to sniffing them and licking them as he squeezed himself between is splayed legs.
I watched, my mouth gaping stupidly, breathing harshly over my own too dry tongue as he finally stood again and shucked his own underwear. He sat back and smelled my dirty panties as he began to truly masturbate for the camera. I didn't know which to look at – his beautiful penis or my panties in his mouth. It was quickly resolved when he draped my black panties over the head of his penis and started to masturbate with the fabric of them.
I was sitting forward now, my face only inches from the screen, and I pushed my own hand between my legs again, briefly thinking I would need to use the hair dryer for a long time to dry his seat before he came home before completely losing myself in the sinfully erotic nature of watching my son masturbate with his mom's dirty underwear.
He leaned his head back as he slowly drew the fabric up and down, and he spoke the first word he had spoken in any of the videos, in his too manly voice which had deepened three years ago, and seemed so incongruous with his build and his youth.
"Oh, mom," he said.
I froze again.
"Mom," he practically whimpered. "That feels so good."
My fingers were not moving, I was completely still, but suddenly my body convulsed and I came anyway, sobbing out a surprised cry. I watched as he pushed the fabric aside and licked two fingers of his right hand and ran them lightly over his shiny head. "Oh mom, oh please, it feels so good when you lick me…."
My mouth, so dry just moments before, flooded with saliva and I could practically feel his bulging head against my tongue. My fingers were moving of their own accord now, my mind no longer insisting that this was wrong. I could not think, there was no room for thought. He wanted me, he was masturbating to the thought of me me flicking my tongue over his cock, as I had masturbated this morning to that very thought.
I stopped noticing the peaks of orgasm, they were so close together as to seem almost one long orgasm felt in swells and falls. He shifted and turned to lie down along the length of the futon, on his back and continued to masturbate with my panties around the base of his penis, only now he was pumping his hips up and down into the air, slowly, sensuously, barely moving his hand at all, and I imagined him beneath me – something I had purposefully kept out of my head. I imagined myself sitting atop my son and having him pump up into me. I pushed my fingers into my painfully tight opening and came harder than I had ever come before.
All the while, he uttered "mom", sometimes begging in a strangled whisper, sometimes saying it loudly with an insistent urgency. He picked up the camera and moved it around so that I had a close up view of my panties strangling the base of his hard on. A close up of his head, shiny with precome, a close up of the thin stretched foreskin enveloping and releasing the tip.
It was when he moaned, "Oh, mom, your pussy feels so good," that I was reminded of the fact that I was masturbating to my son. Instead of falling from the edge of arousal, though, it only pushed me harder. I whispered his name out loud, testing it on my tongue, and was blinded by another sweeping orgasm. I pumped my fingers in and out of myself, imagining my sweet boy filling me, spreading my lips with his width, begging me….
"Mom, I'm going to come," he cried out. "Oh mom, can I come inside of you?"
My fantasies had never gone so far. I ground down onto my knuckles and gripped the edge of his desk with my other hand and said, "Yes, baby, come inside of me."
He spurted, ropes of thick come fountaining into the air and I was sobbing out his name, and I came too, suddenly wanting nothing more than to actually feel him come deep inside of me, to have him drip from me, to look into his eyes – which were not visible from this point of view – as he cried out for his mom, and clutched at me.
The aftermath of that wild abandon was worse, in a way. I watched the screen as the portion of his abdomen that was visible heaved slowly up and down, wishing he would move the camera so I could see his expression. Was he disturbed? Euphoric? Was this a fantasy he regularly indulged in, or a once off? He had come harder in this than in the less thematic videos, but, did that mean anything? I could see a glob of white come quivering on the black fabric of my panties, still wrapped around his slowly softening penis, and I felt a strong urge to suck that up into my mouth and mash it with my tongue, consume it with a slow swallow.
He did not move the camera angle. One moment I was hanging on the verge of desire – a desire that somehow entwined with a sudden surge of love for my precious boy – and the next second, the screen went dark, the video was over.
I slowly extricated my aching fingers, clenching them and loosening to relieve the ache, feeling a little numb, perhaps in a state of higher shock than last night's initial awakening. I tried to feel chagrin, or shame, or disgust…. Maybe that would come later.
It hasn't yet. And I have downloaded that video for myself. It is enough, for now. It is enough to know that at least once, my beautiful boy came to me – specifically me. To the smell and taste of me, to the thought of burying himself in me. That is enough.
Tonight something happened that I will never forget, for as long as I live. As I type this, feeling loose and sated and trapped in a state of surreal wonder and almost giddy contentment, my son is sleeping in my bed. The sheet is draped over his naked body, rising over the contours of his chest and legs. One arm is curled over his head, his hand in a loose fist, his sweet mouth open as he breathes in long breaths of sleep. He looks so young and strong, so vital. His lips move every once in a while, and I hear him sigh that one word that makes my heart trill; "Mom…."
The last two weeks have been full of a strange duality. The day he came home after I found his home videos, I realized that something inside of me had been broken open to the point that it couldn't be repaired. I followed through with our routine, knowing my role from years and years of doing so with him, but there was a presence inside of me – a presence that was wet and dark and pulsing, a presence that watched my son avidly as he sat at the kitchen table, one hand buried in his lengthening hair as he slumped over his homework. This …. awareness focused deeply on his mouth as he lifted the spoonful of spaghettios; it trembled with need as his lips closed over the metal and I watched him swallow the bite. He looked up at one point and I almost flinched away from his gaze, certain that he would see my lust in the clear bright study of my eyes, the high colour on my cheeks, the throbbing fullness of my own lips. Instead, I smiled at him and told him I loved him, and he didn't smile back – our encounter had happened just the night before, after all – but he blushed sweetly, a burning blush that seemed to travel slowly down from his cheeks to his neck, under the collar of his t-shirt. And I was strongly reminded of him coming to the thought of me.
After he was finished with his schoolwork and had disappeared into his room, I picked up his empty bowl and spoon and took it to the sink. A sudden urge overtook me and I put his used spoon in my mouth, curving my tongue along the dip of it, shuddering with pleasure at the thought of tasting his saliva. I found myself doing many odd things like that over the next two weeks. Rummaging through his dirty clothes and savouring the smell of him. When he showered, I would retire to my room and masturbate furiously as the sound of the running water thrummed through the house, through me, and I imagined him tugging at himself in the shower, imagined walking into the bathroom and offering my assistance. Imagined fucking my son. It was a darkly lit two weeks, and I believe I kept my composure through it, though I slipped twice.
The first time was last weekend. Some of the embarrassment and tension had slipped away and we had fallen back into our normal pattern of interaction; I was Mom, he was my exasperating 15 year old son. The duality was still there, watching him with lust, but it was easier to keep it in the back of my mind. I had come to the realization that no matter how badly I wanted to taste him and feel his bare skin against mine, it would not happen. And with that came a sort of peace from my obsession, and I could resume life with an easier step.
On Saturday morning, he asked if he could spend the day with Robert; they were planning to go up to the skate park and be moody and cool. I told him I didn't mind as long as he left time to mow the lawn – it was supposed to rain all next week starting on Sunday. He agreed and we went about our separate mornings; I had a few errands to run, some bills to pay. I got back home at noon and he was already gone. I put away the two bags of groceries and lowered the blinds in the house and went to my computer – located in the common room – and opened up my hidden folder. I spent a good hour masturbating to my son's singular video, still surprised at how sudden and intense the arousal was after two weeks. My obsessive watching and imagining had not dulled the spark and desire. After that hour I planned to shower….but instead I pulled my panties back up and shifted around, wetting them. I went about the rest of my daily duties in a kind of feverish state, alternately feeling extremely aroused by what I was half planning, and somewhat ashamed.
When my son got home right before sunset, he went right out to mow the lawn. He came in reeking of grass and fresh sweat and asked what was for dinner; I told him waffles, with a smile. He smiled back at me, and said he was going to take a shower.
"Alright, baby. Just leave your clothes outside the door; I'll throw them in the wash with mine." He waved a hand in acknowledgment as he turned away. I waited, my body buzzing with a dangerous feeling; elation and that strange roller-coaster fall sensation. When the shower started up, I stripped quickly, grasping my still-damp panties in one hand and went to the bathroom door where his jeans and t-shirt and boxers were crumpled right outside. I bent to pick them up, wholly intent on this plan, when I realized the door was ajar.
I am not entirely naiive. The fact that my 15 year old son had left the bathroom door slightly open seemed a gross transgression, far outside the norm. If I had been a boy his age, I would have closed that door tight and thrown the lock. I stayed there for a moment, naked, staring at the band of light and the steam curling lazily from the crack, and I leaned forward just a little to try to see him, wondering if he had left the door open in an absent hurry or if it was somehow an invitation to me. That last part was ridiculous. I shook myself and stood, my inner thighs once again slick with arousal, and I almost forgot my plan. I let my panties fall from my fingers, onto the floor between the bathroom door and his room. I hoped he would assume they had been dropped as I carried the load to the wash. I hoped he would ignore them….no. I hoped he would take them and pick them up and use them, perhaps in a new video. I threw on a thin, sky blue camisole and a pair of cotton shorts. Saturday dinners are usually very casual affairs.
That night as I made my way to the laundry room, the panties were gone from the hallway.
The second time I slipped was when he came home with his mid term report card, on Monday. He had gotten mostly B's, one A, and a C. We were standing in the kitchen together as he slung his back pack off his shoulder and handed the envelope to me, smiling with an earnest pride that made my heart sing. I looked at his grades and shouted, "Oh my God! Congratulations!" He ducked his head, smiling even more and blushing. I grabbed him by the shoulders and pulled him into a tight hug, full of pride for him. He seemed to freeze as I squeezed him, praising him for bringing his math and geography grade up and managing an A….I felt him try to pull back a little and all of a sudden that other part of me, the dark and lustful part realized why.
I should have let him go. Instead I pressed in closer, no longer talking, but needing to feel him against the length of my body. He shifted his hips back but I held him, and he let out a little sound, like a breathless "whoof" next to my ear as my thigh brushed his very obvious erection. Still I held on, my heart racing, my blood risen to the surface of my skin and singing, my muscles tight.
"I'm so proud of you," I said again, though now my voice was a whisper. I turned my head slightly so that my mouth was almost brushing his ear, so that his hair moved in the breath of my whisper. I drew back a little and planted a lingering kiss on his cheek, near the corner of his mouth, wanting so badly slide my lips onto his, to reach down and grasp the belt loop of his jeans and tug him forward against me. I hung on the brink of that action for more than a second, quivering, every part of my body needing me to do this one thing.
Of course, I didn't. I let him go and managed to smile at him. His entire face was a bit pale, his dark eyes wide and almost frightened looking. As I stepped away he hunched forward a little and tugged the hem of his shirt down, trying to do so casually. My eyes fell to the motion of his hands and he spun away, going to his backpack and picking it up, walking a bit stiffly. "I have a report to write," he mumbled, and he disappeared into his room, shutting the door all the way. I waited, but I did not hear the latch of the lock. And again, I thought to myself, that was very strange behaviour for a boy unwilling to have his mother walk in on him. I lowered myself into the kitchen chair and sat there, staring at the report card, wanting to feel some sort of misery at what I had done, what I had almost done. But all I could do was strain my hearing, trying in vain to hear whether he was masturbating.
Then, today happened. Or, I suppose, now it was yesterday; I can see on my clock that it is twelve minutes past midnight. Wednesday. He came home from school with a permission slip for me to sign. He handed it to me without a word and went to refrigerator for a soda. I looked down and saw that the school was asking parental permission for my son to attend an in-school sexual education seminar. Because he was under 16, they needed my signature. The option for kids who did not have permission was to sit in the cafeteria and watch a nature show documentary. I was sitting at the kitchen table, and I looked up to see that my son was blushing hard and studiously examining his shoes.
I picked up my pen to sign; of course sex ed is important, but before I touched pen to paper I looked up at him again. We had had a version of "the talk" several years ago, but he had still been a boy then. I knew now how much he'd grown.
"Are you still a virgin?" I asked gently. I told myself it was responsible of me to ask, the right thing to do. After all, I was his mother. But no, that was not the only reason. Of course it wasn't. I was very interested in what he had to say.
He flushed even darker and stared at me, taking a quick swig of his soda and clearing his throat. "Um, yeah?" he said, in his slightly sarcastic voice. His, "what's it to you?" voice. I nodded and looked down at the permission slip, again not seeing the school document. I felt as if I couldn't quite catch my breath, and my palms were suddenly slick with sweat. I dropped the pen and wiped them on my thighs beneath the table. I cleared my throat then.
Without looking up I said, in as casual a voice as I could, "You know you can talk to me about anything, right?" I did look up then, and he wore a pained expression. "If you have any questions, or anything, if you need condoms or -" a blowjob,I thought wildly, "-anything, you can come to me. No judgment."
"Jeez, mom," he said, refusing to look at me. I felt an immediate rush of chagrin. I hadn't meant to embarrass him, and had I taken it too far? I wiped my palms again and picked up the pen once more.
"I mean," he said. I looked up and he had stepped closer to the table, still looking pained but suddenly very sweet and open. "Thanks," he said.
I signed the paper and handed it to him with a flourish, trying on a teasing grin. "Have fun," I said.
"Yeah, right." He stuffed the paper into the front portion of his backpack and zipped it up. We stayed like that for a very long, awkward moment. I could feel myself sweating heavily now, my armpits slick with it, my blood racing. It was that same feverish feeling that had sat upon me when I was planning to leave freshly soiled panties for my son to find. I kept trying to push the thought, the frantic thought of him being a virgin, of him having never experienced that. How much had he experienced? It wasn't my business. I couldn't help wondering.
I stood up suddenly, making my son raise his eyebrows in surprise.
"I'm going to take a shower," I said, needing to masturbate, to assuage this ravenous need, this unasked question from between us. Do you want me? I clenched my teeth together and walked quickly to the bathroom, shutting the door and leaning against it for a moment, my heart still beating very fast, feeling sweaty and feverish. Do you want me to take your virginity?
I stripped quickly, dropping my clothes where I stood, and turned the shower on hot, as hot as I could stand it. I stepped in and leaned against the cold tiles, slipping my hand between my legs and closing my eyes, imagining him putting his hand there. Imagined directing him on how to make me come.
I came several times, to the point that my legs felt like jelly, but I could not shake the feverish feeling. I eventually took a perfunctory shower – how long had I been in there? – and twisted it off with a final, savage yank. The water stopped. I opened the curtain….and realized there was no towel.
I looked at the untidy pile of my clothes on the floor, and at the small hand towel hanging by the sink. I looked at the door. In a voice too soft to be heard, I called my son's name. I was starting to sweat again, as I dripped on the bath mat. Just having called his name was enough to set me spiralling deeper into the immense need, and I closed my eyes. No, it was fine, I would dry off with my pants as best I could, maybe I could manage to wrap them around…..
"Mom? Did you call me?"
My heart slammed up a notch. I took a step towards the door. How had he heard me? Unless he had been standing right there.
I swallowed several times, my throat dry. "I …" my voice cracked and I tried again. Jesus, he had to have been right outside the door to have heard my tiny call. "Could you get me a towel, honey?"
Silence for a few excruciating heart beats. "Yeah," he called back.
I waited on the cusp for what seemed an eternity, alternately shivering and sweating. I'd need another shower, and I might need to think about sending him to stay at my brother's house for a while. This wasn't going to work out, I needed to realign my thoughts. I was his mother for fuck's sake.
The knob turned and his arm appeared, holding a towel. I stared at it, unable to move.
The door opened further and he stepped in and froze, looking like a deer caught in headlights, stunned and frozen in place as he saw me standing there. His eyes raked me from top to bottom and he flushed bright red, and I closed my eyes, trembling a little, biting back the rising sigh caught in my throat. When I looked again, he was still there, still with his arm out, the towel clutched in his white knuckled fist, his eyes locked on me, on the dark shadow between my legs. I reached out and took the towel from him.
"Thank you," I said, in a voice that was more like a whisper. He nodded rapidly and felt clumsily for the door. I drew the towel against me, still shivering now but with a thrilling and dangerous anticipation. I did not wrap it around me, just held it between my breasts, waiting for my son to leave, or stay. I didn't know what. I was close enough that I could reach out and touch his chest, if I had the ability to move.
His eyes finally travelled up to mine, and he looked struck dumb. His quest for the door had stopped.
I licked my lips and tore my eyes from him, looking at that door. "Were you outside the door?" I asked. The words just spilled from my mouth without conscious thought. My son turned an even darker shade of red.
"I was waiting to take a shower, um, and I thought you were….I had to pee," he finished. I looked down at him and he immediately covered himself, crossing his hands in a pitiful attempt at casualness.
I swallowed again. "Don't let me hold you up," I said, slowly gathering the corner of of the towel and pulling it around myself, flashing my body one more time, affecting a nonchalant manner that was only surface deep. Inside I was a taut wire, a gleaming steel sheaf of nerves and muscles. I could feel the last two weeks of need bursting within me as I tucked the towel under my arms and gestured towards the toilet, the shower. I knew he was hard, and I knew that he wanted me. Every time his desperately wandering eyes settled on me, they lingered, and oh, yes. He was hard. Suddenly none of my reasons for keeping this secret to myself mattered. He wanted me, he was desperate for me, and in a mingling of sexual need and motherly devotion, I wanted to ease his agony.
"Go on, I just need to brush my teeth and hair. Don't mind me." I stepped around him to the sink and started the water running. I looked up from under my eyebrows, watching him in the reflection of the mirror. He did not go to the toilet, he did not even move. But his eyes were on me all the same, his mouth open.
I began brushing my teeth, bending over the sink and thrusting my hips back to spit the thick white paste from my mouth, shifting my stance. In the mirror, he was staring at my ass, and I thought I saw his hands move a little. A small press into his clothed crotch. I felt the need strum higher in me and leaned further to spit again and rinse my mouth, bending at the waist and feeling the towel ride up high over the backs of my thighs. I could feel myself pulsing and aching down there, and when I stood and turned, my son froze again.
"If you need to shower, please, go on. I left enough hot water." I paused and lifted an eyebrow. I reached out to touch his face and saw his breath hitch. "Are you alright, honey?"
He pulled away from my hand, his eyes slipping closed for the briefest moment. "I'm just waiting for you to…."
"Go?" I finished for him. "Suit yourself. I'll be a few minutes more, I just need to put on lotion after I brush my hair. If you are embarrassed, don't be. I assure you I've seen you naked before." I stepped a little closer and put my hand on his taut forearm, curling my fingers lightly around his chorded wrist. I looked up at him from under my lashes. "There are no secrets, between us."
He stared into my eyes, his lips moving, forming words he could not manage. I smiled and took my hand away, reaching for my brush. "Don't worry about me. Just, you know, do your thing."
He looked too incapable of thought to realize I could easily brush my hair and put on lotion in my own room. I started brushing, still watching him, a small voice inside asking me what I was doing. I ignored it.
My son turned so that he was facing away, towards the door, and he pulled his shirt off over his head in one quick movement.
My own breath caught as I stared at his back, young and sinewy with the muscles of youth. He kicked off his shoes and pushed down his pants, but not his boxers, stepping out of them. He glanced back at me over his shoulder and I realized I'd stopped brushing my hair. I set to it again, still keeping my eyes on him.
He turned on the shower without removing his boxers, still facing away from me. For the briefest instant I could see the tent he made with his hard cock pressing against the fabric, and another deep pulse of need flared within me. He was so close, in real life, standing there almost naked and so aroused that he couldn't even move properly. I watched his shoulders tense, and then he shoved off his boxers and jumped into the shower, drawing the curtain closed….and then letting it fall back. I looked up at him, meeting his eyes as he turned to face me, the water flattening his hair to his head. He looked at me with pleading eyes, and he slowly reached down and grabbed himself, gripping his impossibly hard erection, the foreskin slipping back a little to reveal his shiny wet head.
I just as slowly set my brush down and looked back into his desperate eyes.
"Mom," he said, and I didn't exactly hear him, though I could see his lips forming that word. An electric jolt of powerful energy surged through me and I felt my wetness oozing warmly down my thighs. "Please," he said, a little louder. "Please….."
I didn't make him finish the plea. I dropped my towel and stepped forward, into the shower with him, my eyes still locked on his. A look of gratitude swept into his eyes.
Do you want me? My mind seemed to breathe the question. But I knew the answer, and did not need to ask it. I moved close to him, so that his knuckles grazed my thigh as he gripped himself. I lifted my hands to his face, and the moment my fingers touched him he seemed to sag, his eyes fluttering, a moan escaping his lips. I waited for him to focus on me again, needing to be sure, though I already was. I felt as if I would faint, or float upwards into the rising steam. I had never wanted something more than this, and I could hardly believe it was happening.
His eyes focused on mine, still pleading, his pupils so dilated I could barely see the rich dark brown of his irises. I tilted my face and stretched my neck out and planted the softest kiss upon his lips, feeling my love for this sweet boy and my lust for him expanding as I brushed my lips across his. I had expected a spark, or a bolt of damning lightning. Instead, the sweetest chord of desire bloomed from that joining and seemed to travel over me with a gentle, rising heat. This was right.
This was right.
I wanted nothing more than to bury my hands in his wet hair and pull him into a lover's embrace, but I remembered what he had said earlier. He was still a virgin, and I had no way of knowing how far he had gone before with a girl. I released him from my hands and lips with a sigh and opened my eyes to see him, less than an inch away, his own eyes closed, his brow furrowed deeply. After a second he let out a little whimper and I stepped back half a step. Waiting.
He opened his eyes and tried to speak, but no sound came out.
"Let me wash you," I said, reaching around him for the scrubby thing. I poured liquid soap onto the rough netting and clapped the lid shut. I started rubbing the soap into the scrubby, working out a rich lather, staring down at the suds, almost hypnotized, hanging on the brink, my mind a clamouring blankness. I found that I, too was having difficulty speaking. I reached out and gripped his shoulder, turning him towards the shower head. I pressed the scrubby thing to his back and began, making slow, widening circles with the soap from one shoulder to the other, and down across his flesh. His shoulder blades and muscles flexed and as I worked the soap into his skin, he put a hand out to brace against the tiles. His other hand was still in front, holding himself, though his arm did not flex with movement.
I turned him back to me and we stood there as the spray washed the soap down his legs, pooling around our feet and swirling to the drain. I poured more soap on and pressed the scrubby against his chest, watching him tremble a little. I ran it along his arms and over his flat stomach. He still held onto himself, and the further down that I moved along his abdomen, the more he shook. His eyes were on me, wide and almost fearful, but there was a hunger in the way he watched me. I crested the roller coaster and dropped every time I saw that almost possessive need. He was leaning towards me unconsciously, and I rested my free hand on his chest to keep him from falling forward.
A moan escaped his lips as I moved the scrubby from his upper pelvis to the left, washing his thigh. I wanted to touch him, to replace his hand with mine, but there was an invisible barrier. I came as close as I dared under the flimsy guise of bathing my son. I didn't even dare to look directly at his erection. A part of it was the knowledge that once we crossed that barrier, nothing could ever be the same between us. Another part was a desire to hold onto this moment of anticipation for as long as possible. I knew he was in a sort of sexual agony; the hand he had wrapped around his penis was almost white from the pressure of his grip, and the tip of his head that was peeking out from his taut foreskin was almost purple. I turned him again to face the spray and as he let it wash over his soapy body, I gathered another pool of soap onto the scrubby.
I reached out a hand and touched his side. He almost flinched, and then his ribs expanded under my fingers in a deep breath.
"Will you wash me?" I asked him.
He stilled, his breath caught in my hand, then he expelled it in a rush. I reached my other hand around him, holding the scrubby out to him face up. Now I was almost embracing him, and as I waited for him to take it from me – I had no doubt that he would – I gave in to one of those sudden, strange desires. I licked his back, between his shoulder blades, barely managing to stifle my own whimpering moan. He tasted faintly of soap, and water spilled over my tongue as I dragged it over his warm skin, but still….I was tasting my son. I shuddered as he arched his back at the strange action and immediately submitted to it, seeming to melt a little, almost pressing back into me. I pulled my tongue back in reluctantly and pressed my lips to him briefly, and sighed, closing my eyes.
I said his name. "Wash me," I said again, my mouth moving against him.
I felt him take the scrubby from my hand and I immediately turned to show him my back. I waited, knowing he was staring at me, wondering if he would, wondering if he was jerking off behind me now that I couldn't see him.
I felt him touch my left shoulder very lightly, with his fingers. He wasn't holding onto himself anymore then. He slid them over my wet skin and gripped me lightly as he pressed the scratchy scrubby to the center of my back. He drew it back and forth, too lightly and quickly. I doubted he was getting any real suds.
"Harder," I said.
His hand paused, then he pressed the scrubby more firmly and slowed his motion. I closed my eyes, concentrating on the feel of his fingers still resting on my shoulder, as if he were holding me in place. When the direction of the scrubby shifted and slowed even more, my entire body pitched into a roiling torrent of focus, shifting to the scrubby's path. He drew it from the middle of my back to my side, and with excruciating slowness, ran it up over my ribs. He slipped it forward, following the curve of my body and now he was washing my front right side, just under the swell of my breast.
What he was doing could hardly be called washing, anymore. He inched the scrubby up ever so slowly, and I opened my eyes to look down and watch the progress of his soap frothed hand as he dragged the scrubby inexorably upwards. His other hand slipped down from my shoulder and settled on my left side, just under my ribs.
My entire body pulsed with the force of my rapid heartbeat. The scrubby stopped, just at the heavy curve of the bottom of my breast, and my son remained standing like that for what seemed an eternity. I couldn't move, either, and it truly was agony, wanting to beg him to just touch me, please, cup my breast and feel my nipples and please, oh please….
His other hand crept forward, up my ribs, and he did. I couldn't stifle the sound I made as his feather light touch caressed the underside of my breast before letting the weight of it rest in his palm. I hunched forward a little as I moaned, and his hand spasmed a little as his thumb brushed my nipple. He dropped the scrubby and brought his other hand up to cup my right breast and he pressed them with his hands, moving them in a slow circular motion, squeezing them. I moaned again and as he massaged my breasts from behind, I felt the tip of his penis gently poke my ass and he moaned too.
"Mom," he cried out, and he pressed himself harder against me, his erection like a burning steel rod as he humped harder into the soft flesh of my ass cheek and it slipped down to poke at the underside. I couldn't breathe, my mind inundated with nothing but the roaring desire to have it poke between my legs, along the crack. I shifted my hips and with his next insistent thrust forward he was there. I arched my back, rubbing my ass up and down and the sounds he was making were almost like quiet sobs. I turned suddenly and his hands fell to my waist. I closed the small distance between us so that the tip of his penis pressed into my belly and kissed my son fully on his mouth. He moaned into my mouth as I pressed his lips open with mine and slipped my tongue forward, finding his. He kissed me back with all the eagerness of a 15 year old boy as he continued to hump against my stomach with a mindless instinct.
"Mom," he murmured against my mouth, his lips sliding over mine as he begged me. "Oh mom, please," he said.
I moved my questing mouth down to his jaw, his neck, his chest. I lowered myself to my knees, kissing down his stomach and he made that soft sobbing sound again. I placed my hands on his hips and tilted my chin to look up at my beautiful boy, blinking through the spray of the shower. His penis was hard and hot along my neck and he was watching me, his face scored with an agony of pleasure. Still watching, wanting to see him react, I continued to kiss down along the dark, wet hair surrounding the base of his erection.
I couldn't remember the last time I drew a full breath, I was panting shallowly between each kiss, my mouth flooded with saliva, and strangely I had tears stinging the backs of my eyes. I needed him with a need that could not be denied, and he needed me, too.
I turned my face and slipped my tongue out, curling it around the base of his shaft and a full body tremor ran through me. I pulled away and looked back up at him; he was staring down at me with his mouth slightly open. I moved my right hand in from his hip and closed it around him. I lovingly licked the tip of his penis, and his knees seemed to give out a little, his penis pulsing in my hand and against the back of my tongue. In my mind's eye, I could see him sitting with my panties around his dick, touching himself and saying, "I love it when you lick me, mom," and a groan issued forth from my parted lips and my eyes slid closed at the taste of his salt. His slick precome ran along the back of my tongue as I lapped at him slowly and he shuddered and whimpered above me.
I moved my lips over the half exposed head and drew him into my mouth, my heart hammering painfully, saliva spilling out around my tongue as I slid my lips further, my throat pulling him in with the negative pressure of suction as my tongue continued to explore the contours of my son's penis. I could hear him gasping over the rushing sound of water and as I shifted on my knees I was made aware of how slick I was between my legs. I let his penis rest against the back of my throat for a long moment, breathing heavily through my nose, my eyes still closed, my tongue furling over and around him. Then I drew back and moved my hand with my mouth, revelling in him. I increased the suction in my mouth a little, flicking my tongue over his head with every draw back, not really focusing on him so much as the feel of him in my mouth.
I wasn't thinking anymore, losing myself in the moment entirely. I don't remember starting to touch myself, just that suddenly I was coming over my fingers as I wildly sucked and sucked, and when I cried out around his dick his cry followed a moment after.
"Oh God, mom, I'm…I'm going to…"
I enveloped him entirely in my mouth, licking the underside of his shaft with my tongue and clamping down on him to keep him there. Hot spurts of thick come hit the back of my throat and I sputtered a little before sucking harder and swallowing convulsively. He bucked, ramming my throat a little and I felt him grab ahold of my head, his fingers sliding over my wet hair as he sobbed out. His come frothed up a little; there was so much of it. I drank of my son deeply until his shuddering slowed and his fingers loosened. I drew back slowly, feeling drained and floaty. His penis exited my mouth with a slight "pop" and I sat back on my heels, licking my lips and extracting my hand from between my legs. I could feel my face buzzing with a flush born of extreme arousal and a sudden realization of what I had done, the taste of his semen coating my tongue and making me shiver.
I looked up and saw that he was shivering too, and a moment later I realized the water had run cold. I stood up and reached around him to turn off the water, wrapping an arm around him to lead him from the shower. I bent down to pick up the towel, shivering as well. He moved in a dazed way, and I draped the towel over his shoulders, drawing it up to ruffle dry his hair, our cool skin touching. I gathered the ends of the towel under his chin and held them closed as I finally looked into his eyes. He still seemed dazed, but gratitude shone from him, as well as a questioning embarrassment. I pulled him into a tight hug, and after a moment, his arms slipped around me and he buried his face in my neck.
We stood like that for a long few minutes, the sound of the dripping water and his ragged breathing. Eventually his shivering slowed, as well as his breath, and he pulled away a little.
He took the towel from his shoulders and clumsily tried to wrap it around me. My heart swelled to near bursting as he earnestly patted my arms and back dry. My sweet boy, oh, what….No. It didn't matter. He loved me, I loved him. And now he knew that I, too, wanted him.
"We should get another towel," I said. He nodded a little. "Do you want to…." I swallowed back a fear of disappointment. "Do you want me to let you go to your room?"
He shook his head, again looking a bit lost and questioning. "No," he said.
I grabbed my hairbrush and lotion. "Come to mine," I said.
He followed obediently, walking with the unthinking confidence of youth even in his nudity. He paused at my doorway.
"Sit on the bed," I said, gesturing with my brush. I set down my items and toweled off completely as his dark eyes watched, following the movement of my hands and the towel. I began to tuck it in place around my breasts, then looked back at him over my shoulder.
Instead, I pulled it away and hung it on the hook on my door, the air conditioned air raising goosebumps along my arms. I went to the bed and sat down a couple feet away from him, as naked as my son, and began brushing my hair. My fingers felt nerveless, and a tense silence bloomed between us. I pressed my legs closed and barely managed to bite back my sigh as I remembered swallowing his come just moments before. My eyes fluttered closed a bit.
"Mom?" he asked, quietly.
I focused on him and smiled. "Yes, baby?"
"Are you….are you mad at me?"
Heat rushed to the surface of my skin and I fumbled over my words a little. "Oh, no, I'm not at all. I….I wanted to do that."
He swallowed visibly. "You did?"
I nodded, and adopted a natural tone of conversational voice, though my belly trembled a little at the thought of needing to assuage my son that I wanted to fuck him, and desperately. I set down my brush and gooshed lotion onto my hand, rubbing it briskly onto my arms. "I've thought about it since I walked in on you a couple weeks ago." He flushed a bit at this and sat forward a little. His eyes flicked to my breasts, swaying with the motion of my ministrations. I pretended not to notice. "I know it isn't something that is….done, really, but I, I couldn't stop thinking about it. And now that it's happened, I don't regret it at all." I paused. "Do you?"
He shook his head quickly, droplets of water spraying lightly onto my skin from the still wet ends of his hair. I smiled and reached out to touch him with my fingers, brushing along his shoulder down his arm. "I want to do it again."
He let out his breath with a painful sigh that ended on a rising groan and put his hands in his lap, hunching further. My mouth flooded with saliva again as I stilled. So soon? God, he was young. Of course.
"You don't need to hide yourself from me," I said, grasping his arm and gently pulling his right hand away. He resisted a little then let his hands fall back. Yes, he was hardening again, rising inexorably from his lap, the skin seeming to stretch and tighten. I felt another gush of wetness between my legs and wriggled my hips a little. I licked my lips as I stared down at his lengthening erection, then shook myself. His penis seemed to jerk a little as I wetted my lips. I sought something to distract me, because now all I could think about was having my son's penis pushing into the warmth that was spreading from my center. I reached for the lotion again.
"Can I…"
I glanced at him, and he was looking so uncertain. Yes, I wanted to say. Whatever you want, yes, please, my darling.
"Can I put your lotion on?"
Every nerve in my body seemed to flare and sing. My lips felt swollen and buzzing, the heat between my legs surged with another wet gush and I almost whimpered. I couldn't speak, so I simply nodded and handed it to him.
"Where?" he asked.
"My, my legs," I whispered. I felt a rush of shame that I hadn't shaved in the last week, though my leg hair had always been light and soft.
My son slid down off the bed and knelt before me, pressing a palmful of lotion into his hands. He hesitated, then lightly grasped my ankle and smoothed the cool lotion up my shin, pressing it around my calf and back over my knee. I watched the progress of his hands with a suddenly dry mouth, my mind blank and pulsing, and I felt an ache for him so deeply that it was almost painful. As he raised up on his knees to rub the lotion into my thigh, I could see that he was fully hard again, his penis standing rod like before him. It brushed against my leg, just under my knee, and I convulsed a little, letting my legs fall open. His hands paused, then he slid one lotion slick hand down around my inner thigh and pressed himself against my leg, his gaze flicking up to mine with a sweet apology in his dark eyes. I spread my legs further and his fingers dug a little harder as he massaged his way along my thigh.
He paused again, just at the top of my thigh, where my leg joined at my center, my inner lips glistening with pulsing wetness. His mouth was open and he was breathing hard, staring down at my pussy, unconsciously pressing himself against my leg with tiny thrusts. I waited, unable to breathe, and when he remained too long like that, I shifted my hips forward so his fingers and knuckles brushed against my painfully sensitive folds. I moaned a little and he looked up at me again, his mouth still open. He watched my eyes as he let go of my thigh and lightly caressed me. I shuddered and cried out, arching my back. I felt his tentative fingers bolden and he slipped them between the deliciously slick and puffy folds, stroking me.
"Oh," I moaned out.
He continued to slide his fingers through and around me, exploring. "Does that feel good, mom?" he whispered.
I opened my eyes and nodded, unable to speak. I opened my legs further as his roving fingers slipped along my center and he found my pulsing, grasping opening. I moaned and he pushed a finger inside slowly.
I gasped out his name and his mindless humping became more insistent, though now he was humping the side of the bed between my legs.
"Mom," he said, sounding strangled as he pushed his finger slowly in and out of me and I tightened and released over my son's probing finger. "Mom, can I….." He was grinding himself against the bed now.
I reached out and grasped his shoulders, pulling him to me and wriggling forward on the bed, kissing him deeply and running my hands through his hair. "Yes," I said against his eager mouth. "Yes."
He pulled his hand from me and stood up, stumbling a little in his haste. I shifted back on the bed and pulled him onto it, covering his mouth again as he laid back beside me. I clambered over his thighs and pressed myself against his rock hard member, sliding my wet pussy along its length. His cries were muffled by my wide, devouring mouth, his breath hitting my throat with each desperate expulsion. I moved my hips up a little so that his hard head was pressed against my opening.
With a muted cry of my own I pushed down, slipping around the head of my son's cock, pushing further until he was fully buried inside of me, and I came. I came so hard that I shuddered, shaking us both with my ecstatic embrace. I wrenched my mouth from his and dug my fingers into his shoulders, still coming, squeezing him tightly with my pussy, not even moving over him, just orgasming because he was in me, he was inside, and it felt so incredibly wrong, and immensely right to have my natural son once again within me.
My shuddering stilled and I realized his fingers were digging into my sides with grasping spasms and his head was thrown back, his throat exposed to me, his face twisted in a look of supremely agonized pleasure. I drew up along him and pressed back down and he sobbed out, "mom," over and over.


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"Let It Go," the soaring showstopper from "Frozen," has an unlikely remix coming out soon.
The Academy Award-winning smash sung by Idina Menzel got a reworking by Dutch electronic dance music DJ Armin van Buuren.
His remix is just one of more than a dozen that Walt Disney Records commissioned for "Dconstructed," a compilation album that placed Disney tunes, including several beloved classics, into the hands of EDM stars.
Songs have been pulled from older Disney films, such as "Dumbo," "The Lion King" and "Toy Story," and more recent hits, such as "Monsters University" and "The Incredibles."
The 14-track set will include contributions from Buuren,...


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|2012 Equator Events
Since its inception in 2002, the Equator Initiative has hosted and supported a large number of events in support of community work to achieve the MDGs. These events have explored the community role in protecting the environment and raising incomes and provide a highly substantive backdrop for the many additional advocacy and outreach events that the Equator Initiative organizes each year. Each event has been documented on its own website. We invite you to learn more about these special activities and about the critical role communities play in poverty reduction and biodiversity conservation.
17 October 2012 - Associate Administrator of UNDP Rebeca Grynspan visits the Community PalliOn Wednesday 17 October 2012, Rebeca Grynspan, UNDP Associate Administrator visited the Community Palli to meet face-to-face with participating communities and engage in a discussion on bridging local best practice with global priorities in sustainable development.
15 October 2012 - Ten Stories from the Frontlines: Achieving Aichi Target 1 at the Local Level
Raising awareness of the need for biodiversity conservation at the grassroots level is a critical task that underpins progress towards Aichi Target 1. Across the globe, Equator Prize winners are at the forefront of this effort, leading environmental education, communication, and public awareness campaigns in their communities using a diverse range of media and strategies. On Monday 15 October, ten representatives of prize-winning initiatives from nine different countries shared their best practices during an evening reception at the Communications, Education and Public Awareness (CEPA) Fair, held parallel to the CBD CoP-11.
16 October 2012 - Equator Initiative Participates in Launch of Two Publications on Lessons Learned at COP 11
On Tuesday 16 October 2012, an evening reception was held in the Community Palli to mark the launch of two lessons learned publications – the Equator Initiative's The Power of Local Action: Lessons from 10 Years of the Equator Prize, and the GEF Small Grants Programme's 20 Years: Community Action for the Global Environment – as well as the Equator Initiative Case Study Database, which features detailed stories of leadership, innovation and resilience from the front lines of sustainable development.
9 October 2012 - Linking biodiversity, traditional knowledge and community health
At an evening side event on Tuesday 9 October 2012, during the CBD CoP-11in Hyderabad, India, the Equator Initiative participated in the launch of the International Biodiversity and Community Health Initiative. Led by the UN University Institute of Advanced Studies (UNU-IAS), the initiative brings together a diverse coalition of UN agencies, international organizations and NGOs in collectively calling for the need to put biodiversity and health on the CBD agenda.
8-17 October 2012 - Community PalliThe Community Palli, a peer-to-peer meeting platform at COP 11, was open to all local and indigenous leaders from around the world. Leveraging the unique partnerships of the Equator Initiative, the Palli aimed to position local advocacy and knowledge sharing within the larger policy dialogues on poverty reduction and biodiversity conservation. Held alongside the eleventh meeting of the Conference of the Parties (COP 11) to the Convention on Biological Diversity, the Community Palli acted as a forum for discussion of the role of local communities in biodiversity conservation and in achieving the Aichi Targets.
1-5 October 2012 - Equator Initiative Participates in International Training Workshop on Medicinal PlantsFrom October 1-5, representatives of nine Equator Prize winners participated in a training workshop on the conservation and sustainable use of medicinal plants, held at the Institute for Ayurveda and Integrative Medicine in Bangalore, India, as a preparatory event for the CBD COP-11 in Hyderabad.
13 October 2012 - Equator Initiative Launches Book on Lessons Learned
On its 10-year anniversary, the Equator Initiative has undertaken a comprehensive analysis of the commonalities, trends and lessons across the pool of winners. In the newly launched book The Power of Local Action: Lessons from 10 Years of the Equator Prize we ask: What can these communities teach us about successful community-driven development focused on the sustainable use of local ecosystems?
26 September 2012 - Winner Stories from Rio+20
Equator Prize winners share their stories from Rio+20, what it meant to their organizations to win the Equator Prize, and how the recognition and prize money have benefited them.
7-11 September 2012 - Community Ma-eulThe Community Ma-eul (마을) is a five-day dialogue for local and indigenous practitioners at the IUCN Fifth World Conservation Congress, held in Jeju, South Korea. From 7th to 11th September 2012, the Community Ma-eul will bring together a number of Equator Initiative partners for a series of workshops focusing on the human rights dimensions of conservation, and particularly those relevant to local and indigenous communities. Join us in Jeju, or read about the workshops below.
30 August 2012 - Discussion Socio-Ecological ResilienceOn Thursday 30 August, the Equator Initiative hosted a discussion on socio-ecological resilience led by Caroline Petersen, Technical Specialist, Ecosystems and Biodiversity, in UNDP's Environment and Energy Group. Niloy Banerjee of the Bureau for Development Policy (BDP) and Samuel Doe of the Bureau for Crisis Prevention and Recovery (BCPR) also spoke about the work of a joint BDP-BCPR Working Group on Resilience, tasked with carrying out consultations aimed at articulating a UNDP corporate strategy on a resilience approach to sustainable human development. The Environment and Energy Group is participating in this process, drawing on its climate change work in which resilience and vulnerability are key concepts.
20 June 2012 - The Power Of Local Action: Honoring Communities on the Frontlines of Sustainable DevelopmentOn Wednesday 20 June 2012, the Equator Prize 2012 Award Ceremony was held as part of the Rio+20 UN Conference on Sustainable Development in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil with a gala event at the Vivo Rio concert hall. Celebrating both the 10-year anniversary of the Equator Initiative and the 20-year anniversary of the UNDP-implemented GEF Small Grants Programme, the evening was a vibrant celebration of local action in thematic areas such as food security, freshwater access, sustainable energy, oceans and biodiversity. The 25 prize winners took the stage to enthusiastic applause from the more than 1,700-strong audience in recognition of their outstanding achievements. Presidents and prime ministers from countries including Fiji, Madagascar, Marshall Islands and the Solomon Islands were also on hand to honor the communities.
13-22 June 2012 - Community AldeiaThe Community Aldeia brings together the winners of the Equator Prize 2012, other civil society leaders, and the Equator Initiative partnership in a ten-day dialogue on the margins of Rio+20. Join us to see what sustainable development looks like on the ground: explore the true meaning of development and the means to sustainability. Hear about what we've achieved, the future we need, and the steps it will take us to get there.