Boat Across the River
Just another WordPress.com weblogArchive for Environment
St. Ives
I love these products — soaps and lotions. Paraben and phthalate free, affordable, and most notably no animal testing. I don’t know if PETA would agree or not — gotta’ check that out!
Trash on the Beach…
Again, I was sent into a tailspin of despair after eating at a restaurant that uses only disposable plastic cups. After I asked the server if they recycle, she first said yes. Then she seemed confused and changed her answer to, “Well, no…We just throw them all away.” How hard would it be? For just one person working at every restaurant to care enough to collect recyclables in a trash can?
Every time I go on vacation, I have to come to a resolution about where the trash goes. Will it go in a landfill? Will it go in an incinerator? I’ve convinced myself that an incinerator is preferable. At home, I’ve made my peace with the impact I have on Earth. I know exactly where my trash is going. I’ve limited my consumption both in terms of the amount of things that I buy and also what it is that I buy. And I’ve come to terms with what I do and don’t control.
When I go on vacation, I go into this tailspin that I mentioned. I worry about everything from the unnecessary bags that Subway puts every sandwich into, to my child’s diapers, to other people’s trash that I see left on the beach, or even in trash cans. Where will all this trash go? I watch the dolphins swimming nearby and whisper my apologies. At least once an hour, I have to remind myself of what I actually have the power to control.
(P.S. I am very excited to read the new book coming out on this topic, called Garbology!)
Flowers at Night
White flowers
on the pear tree –
even more
lovely at night.
The petals
and the darkness both
are softer
still
beside each other.
Strange Comfort
Is it weird that the constant construction noise in our neighborhood, as the city puts in sewers, has started to become soothing?
Strange that I smile in my sleep and turn over at 6 am as the man driving the backhoe in my yard begins his day’s labor?
Odd that I have considered making cookies and coffee for my old friends slopping away out in the street?
Favorite Thing She Said Today
Today, my daughter and I were driving back from an art class for kids. School is out, summer is here, and she and I are doing all kinds of fun activities. She had really painted her little heart out in the class. Before we got there, she asked hopefully, “Do you think we will paint?” She held her palette and brush, wore her smock, and dabbed away at the paper on the wall with great focus. When the teacher moved on, I thought there would be a tantrum, but she was swept away by the ladybug activity.
On the drive home, I thought she might fall asleep in the car, and although she looked exhausted she did not. At a stoplight near home, she sat slumped against the side of the car seat and gazing out the window at the tall grasses growing in the median. She said wistfully — I am not kidding, it really was wistful! — “Maybe someday I could walk in those flowers.”
It caught me off guard and I couldn’t help but chuckle. It just goes to show that “nature” really is a frame of mind. I would never have thought, “Oh, what a lovely spot for a hike, here on the exit ramp off the highway,” but she was right. The flowers and grasses were very pretty. She made me see them with fresh eyes.
Ceremony
Closing my eyes on the couch
in the house above the ocean,
I heard what I imagined was a woman
shaking out the laundry
to hang it on a line.
Wet clothes smacked the air;
I was dozing and dreaming
of this woman working.
I saw her behind closed eyelids:
hair pulled back but flying away
in the salty air, red
and yellow shirts, blue jeans
kept slapping, slapping
as she shook them out.
Finally getting up to see,
I leaned against the rail of my balcony.
Ten pelicans sat like fat footballs
on the calm water below;
they were taking turns
smacking their wings with purpose
against the ocean’s face.
One set off the next, and they beat
their wings on water.
Until eventually: they pumped their feet
against the soft runway,
and then they flew away.
Nuclear Power
“Crying is useless…”
“We’re in Hell. All we can do is crawl toward Heaven.”
– quotes from workers in Japan power plant affected by tsunami, as heard on CNN
Cool Kids
I have been doing a huge project with my students this semester, with all the lessons centering around our local river. This thing has involved two field trips, one a canoe trip on the river, and another a visit to our local university next to which the same river runs. I almost lost a tooth canoeing when one of my kids slammed me in the mouth with her paddle…all’s well that ends well. At the university, we walked through campus, getting a little tour of my alma mater, and then we walked down through the woods to the river. I had the kids sit by the river by themselves and in silence while they wrote in little notebooks for fifteen minutes. I want to share some of the things that they wrote:
Student One: It’s so hard to write about life or your future when you can’t see what’s ahead and don’t want to look back. I’m glad I came on this trip. I’ve been to this college at least a hundred times, but I’ve never been to this spot. It’s a soothing place to be. Being here opens my mind and lets thoughts pour in…Maybe there’s a blessing for us in the future.
Student Two: I can see myself here at this college, being out here just enjoying it, but I don’t want to go to college. This place here at the river makes me want to get out more and do lots of stuff. It inspires me to want to get out and just have fun.
Student Three: You know, sometimes I wish that my life was like the river – soft and calm, or maybe like the soft soil that blankets the earth, or even the evening breeze that blows on a Fall day…So the question occurs to me: Why is life so hard? Why can’t my life be as simple as the elements of the earth? And as an answer to that, I feel that to the elements of the earth there are greater components than what we see. So as a result, it becomes difficult, but like the elements there is a deeper meaning than what is actually seen. That is my reasoning why life is so hard.
Student Four: This is my first time sitting out by a river in complete silence…it is wonderful to just hear the birds and the water. It’s cool to just look out and see nothing but water banks and trees and river, to feel the sun and the wind. I love it.
Student Five: Life is like the river that flows through things. Life hits us hard and when it does we cry and it just flows away. The water comes from heaven and the river hits the rocks hard, but then it flows away. Sometimes there is time for us to stay still and not move. That time is the time where old memories come to mind. You say to yourself, I wish that I could turn back time. I wish everything could be the same, but sometimes it’s not. It gets worse. And that time is the time where you think to yourself, “Man, I wish my special person could be here to help me react or answer my question.” We just have to keep that memory in us to enjoy later on in life with others. Sometimes you love doing something, but the one who is higher than you takes it away from you and all you can do is smile and not show you’re angry or sad. Be strong for others.
Student Six: Today feels like I’m alive because it feels so good and warm. I want to stay here forever and listen to the water flow away. Every tree has a different color. Most of the leaves have fallen down. Nine of us are sitting writing and eating cookies and most of the others are yelling over behind the trees and chasing each other. I like the sounds they make and the way the water moves. It feels like you can sit here forever. Listen to it; everything is peaceful. I wish the city would be like this. You can feel the wind going into your skin…I have nothing in my mind right now other than this peaceful place. The other kids are coming back now. I want to stay forever, you know, but after awhile we will go.
Student Seven: My path, where I’m going to end up, is like the water that I see. Flowing without an ending. How the sun beams on the water! It’s how the spotlight will beam on me. My impact on others will be like the waves I see; I will touch one and the rest will be touched by me. And my determination to do as I speak is just like how the water passes by the rocks; it reminds me of the obstacles and how I squeezed by them to reach my destination. How the water resembles me! My voice will be like the leaves falling of the trees. They were silent at first, but they spoke and everyone was listening.
Student Eight: Peaceful, calming, the sun is shining bright. Everything is fine and I don’t feel like going back. When I see the woods and listen to the water running, it makes me feel better. I have enjoyed coming here, but I hate leaving. I would want to stay here forever and never go back. I like to think about them when I’m here…it’s like they never left. Every time the wind blows, they get closer…They never leave; they are always the same.
Student Nine: This was nice of the teachers to do this for us because it’s peaceful and tranquil to just sit down and write what comes to mind. We’ll see where I will be in the future, but I will miss this field trip. I don’t really write, but in this case I will because when I am in a peaceful environment I can think.
Student Ten: A lot has been going on in my life…and I feel like I have the worst luck…I miss my mom. I pray every day that things will get better for me because I want to better myself. I don’t really know how to deal with the pressure of the things I am going through. I love the fact that God can make things better. That’s why I never give up hope. I really like the fact that we came here today because it’s very relaxing and it soothes me. This is the first time I have really faced my problems and talked to myself about them. I would love to come here again very soon to relax myself more.
The Paper Cup
Last night, J. suggested that we drive an hour south and eat dinner in a hilly and tree filled little town that gets really popular in the Fall for its nice colors. Up here, there are relatively few trees to look at thanks to urban sprawl and poor city planning. I have many pipe dreams about buying land somewhere down there and building a cabin that’s “off the grid” as a retreat from this god-forsaken, asphalt covered, murder capital of the world. Not really. But it’s pretty bad sometimes. So needless to say, I jumped at the invitation.
We rolled into town in time for dinner, having survived the rush hour, and chose to eat in a restaurant housed in a building established in 1900. There was even a picture on the wall of the building at that time. I love this kind of thing. At a local museum with my mom and daughter, sitting in an antique stagecoach, I asked Mom if she sometimes doesn’t wish we were living in a simpler time. I was reminded by her of the amount of hard labor and soaring mortality rates from that time, and decided that even with the pollution and strip malls, it’s nice to have a little free time once in awhile to think about something other than survival…
Anyway, we sat down to dinner and the server asked if I wanted my daugher’s drink in a “paper cup”. Paper! Usually they give us styrofoam and I neurotically carry it home with me to recycle. I jumped at the chance to be able to leave a cup on the table guilt free. Well, relatively guilt free. There will always be that part of me that wonders what hundred year old tree was hacked down for some cheap paper cup, but there is little that I can do without obsessing about some thing or another. So a paper cup sounded good to me as opposed to styrofoam. All I would have to worry about would be the plastic straws. I wonder how quickly all the straws passed out in restaurants in this state alone could fill up a landfill?
So the server delivered S.’s drink, and plopped down a styrofoam cup on the table. I stared at it, wondering why this woman had thought to describe styrofoam as paper…J. kept eyes averted, face expressionless, well trained in my neuroses and careful not to give me one thing to latch on to, careful to say nothing that might encourage any conversation on this topic. I stared angrily at a plastic straw. When we were finished eating, I decided to take my wriggling daughter outside while the bill was being paid, and asked J. to grab her cup for me so I could take it home. As J. walked down the sidewalk to me, I could see there was no cup in hand. You can imagine my dismay. Well, hopefully you can’t, because I hope you have less of an issue with this than I. I can’t eat out EVER without spending half of my time thinking about stuff like this. It really is exhuasting. I rationalize this monumental waste of my energy by telling myself that our thoughts affect each other, and maybe all this energy I spend thinking will somehow benefit a scientist who is feverishly working on a plastic eating bacteria that puts of oxygen as a by product of its plastic consumption. And these bacteria will be injected into every landfill everywhere within the next fifteen years. And I won’t have to keep thinking about how I will be walking on top of plastic with every step, or worse living some WALL-E type of existence.
It’s too bad that the thought of one styrofoam cup in a landfill sends me into a tailspin. Surely this experience was an opportunity for me to grow and to let go. I’m aware that I don’t control other people. Part of what bothers me is that so few of the people around me seem to be concerned about plastic piling up in landfills at best, and in the ocean at worst.
All I control is myself all I control is myself all I control is myself.
All I control is myself.
