My name’s Emily Pollard. I’m 30 and live in beautiful Portland, Oregon with my wondrous fiance, Ian. Here is my Friendster profile, my MySpace profile and my Tribe profile. If you’re on there, drop me a line.

In June 2005, I received my Bachelor of Science in Sociology with a minor in Women’s Studies from Portland State University. I’m an organizer with a local grassroots group called Portland Peak Oil and I work part time as a research admin and web designer. I enjoy being with friends, activism of all stripes, various creative projects around the house, outdoorsy stuff, hobby web design, reading, traveling, writing, taking photos, film, web surfing, singing, listening to music, and recording music on my keyboard. I have serious autodidactic tendencies and thus wind up spending a lot of time reading articles and news. Issues of current interest include spirituality (particularly Advaita), peak oil, social justice, inequality and poverty, ecological sustainability, unschooling, women’s, race, and gender studies, medicinal herbs, linguistics, critique of capitalism and corporate globalization, pop culture, the media, music, social interactions, and community building.

My background is pretty unusual. I spent my childhood in and out of foster homes - some better than others. Places I’ve lived include Cambridge, Massachusetts, Fairfield, Iowa, Knoxville, Tennessee, and now Portland. I grew up within the Transcendental Meditation ™ movement and attended grades 6-12 at the Maharishi School of the Age of Enlightenment, where in addition to the usual subjects, I took courses on the Bhagavad Gita, ayurveda, Sanskrit, tabla, and sthapatya-veda. Of course, at the time we kids took it all for granted and couldn’t wait to get the hell out of Fairfield. Now, looking back, I can appreciate the unusual springboard that growing up in roo-town provided. I have since dabbled in Wicca and Chaos Magick, currently consider myself a spiritual pantheist and “empowered existentialist”, and credit my participation in Landmark Education’s courses as a key source of many instrumental breakthroughs in my life. My politics lean entirely toward progressive and radical activism, and I believe strongly that the personal is the political. Consider me part intellectual/art snob/romantic/radical/freak/feminist/enviro/goth/web geek. Ultimately, what lights my fire is self-expression, love, creativity, wonder, and making a difference.