Activist tells of 2 years spent living in tree

A barefoot Julia "Butterfly" Hill spoke Tuesday night to a packed Whittenberger Auditorium. Hill, an environmental activist, spent two years and eight days living in a tree to protect a community of ancient redwoods in California. As she spoke about her best friend, Luna, the tree she inhabited from 1997 to 1999, her experiences and passions, she called all the people in the room environmentalists, even if they didn't call themselves that. \nPiper Ingram, a junior in the audience, said that she attended the lecture out of curiosity, and that she felt "inspired to do something. She made me think that even my little contributions can make a difference, that we all can help."\n"I knew that this women was in business before all of this," Ingram said. "I just wanted to know how someone who was a business major in college ended up living in a tree."\nHill was not involved in environmental issues until a 1996 car accident. A drunken driver hit her, leaving her without short-term memory or motor skills. It took 10 months of physical and cognitive therapy to recover from that accident. During that time Hill said she started thinking about her values, purpose and reason for living. \nHill began crying Thursday as she described the motivation for her way of life. Through tears, Hill remembered the image of a tricycle handle sticking out of a pile of mud, all that was left of a home destroyed in the Pacific Lumber Corporation clear-cut mudslide. \n"The part of the picture that hits me every time I think about it is the picture of the man holding his little son's hand," Hill said. "And they are walking away from their home and from that tricycle. And they had to learn a lesson the hard way. That what we do to the earth, we do to ourselves." \nThat was the beginning of Hill's activism and love for the earth. She discovered a group called Base Camp, which was looking for someone to sit in Luna. \n"I had heard that a tree-sit is where someone sits in a tree in order to protect it. That was about as much training as I got on tree sitting," Hill said. "But I grew up with two brothers and no sisters on the road, so I figured I could sit in a tree." \nHill lived on a platform that was about 6-foot-by-6-foot. The walls and roof were made of tarp, and her water came from rainwater captured through a funnel. She owned few things in the tree -- just clothes, a hand-powered radio, a sleeping bag and eventually a portable phone. \n"I spent six to eight hours a day on the phone. And I don't even like phones," Hill said. "I addressed the United Nations. I lobbied the government. I spoke at festivals like Woodstock. I spoke at conferences and rallies. I spoke to religious groups. I spoke to preschools, to Princeton, to law schools. I spoke to anyone who would listen." \nUnion Board's director of lectures, sophomore Nick Hillman, said he wanted to bring Hill to IU because he knew there was a community that wanted to listen. Union Board was one of the lecture's sponsors.\n"I love seeing everyone together. People who didn't know each other were talking afterwards about the environmental cause," Hillman said. \nHill discussed how students can get involved in environmental protection in the community. She said this means finding courage and love and helping everyone else see that love.\n"You know that saying, if a tree falls in the forest and no one is there to hear it, does it make a sound?" Hill asked. "Part of my purpose is being the ears, the eyes, the heart and the spirit in the place in the forest where it hits the ground. And helping people to hear it and feel it." \nWhile in the tree, Hill founded the Circle of Life Foundation, which works toward solutions to environmental and social problems. \nAfter 738 days and a few near-death experiences, she left Luna, successfully saving her "best friend" and the community of redwoods within a three-acre span. Hill said that area of forest is protected as a symbol of beauty, power and action and can never be used for timber. \nHill stressed the importance of getting involved and not taking anything for granted. She spoke of the first moments after she descended the tree. She said she knelt and kissed the ground she had been staring at for two years. \nShe said people often asked her what she missed most while in Luna. \n"I missed everything that I have ever taken for granted," Hill said. "I missed everything because it was all gone. My ability to walk, my ability to turn on a faucet and have hot water come out, my ability to go into some safe, warm shelter when the winds were raging and the sleet and the hail, snow was pummeling me. My ability to go to the store and get food. All the things that I had ever taken for granted in my life were right there in front of my face"