But you also know that things change; that someone will offer your grandkids a few million dollars to clear this land and put up a few condos one day. Your grandkids will think of you then, how you loved coming here and smelling those pines; how they and you foraged for mushrooms here; how you pitched tents and stayed up all night counting stars; how the silence and the grandeur hushed your thoughts and theirs and your sleep was never this peaceful.
We can't shut ourselves in ourselves and count our blessings when greed and corruption are running rampant, riding through the land counting happiness as though it was a concrete product listed on the stock exchange.
We have to think of what counts for the long run, for our grandkids and their great-great grandkids. Saving the forests and the rivers and the lakes form pollution and industrial waste will assure that seven generations of your family will continue to appreciate the same things you did.
And that's one of the reasons for staying involved with local and national political issues.
Politics is everyone's business; it is the collective ethos of a people who are bound together by place and time. You read papers, watch the news, listen to people. You know that information is available in many places. Are you doing your part in gathering facts and analyzing trends on your own? No single party or single person holds all the answers.
We need to keep informing ourselves all the time, and MOST OF ALL, advise our representatives of the values we hold dear.
37 comments:
You're SO right, Rosaria! I find that the most immediate thing I can do is to pick up thoughtless tourist garbage as I walk along the beach...to protect the wildlife that also occupy the landscape.
How true. I do listen to the news and try to connect my thoughts with them. Right now I am sharing my thoughts in the emagazine namely
deeperzone.com Please share your thoughts too as a lot of young people are on the facebook and deeperzone.com is there too.
In Berkeley, they are working on a plan to change over all the tree species because in fify years the climate change will make it impossible for the current trees to survive.
All this "busyness" in our everyday lives seems like a way to ignore the larger (and scarier) issues that need our attention.
Janet
You are so right, Rosaria. Sometimes I wish I didn't care about politics, but the very least I can do is vote! Right now I am disgusted with the political climate, but I still consider myself a Democrat. There seems to be no group that holds my values as much as this party. I hope the climate in your neck of the woods is better than here.
Being active in politics and in protecting the environment is a lifelong activity of mine. Defenders of Wildlife is one great group to join. Now if only we can get congress and our president to pass a BALANCED budget, our next generations will have a chance.
I was driving by a mall last night with my husband and he told me that it was called Severence Mall after the family who owned the 161-acre estate. Seems like a dubious honor. When I look around Cleveland at all of the abandoned and decaying property I think about what it must have been like before it was turned into an ocean of asphalt. How do you return to nature what has been stolen from it?
I am reading Becky's comments - about the tourist trash - *sigh* unfortunatly that happens here, too - in our beautiful mountains -and even today, when we hiked up to a sacred place, on the way there was trash someone threw on an old log trail - why?
Well, your post went even beyond that in it's analogy/metaphor - powerful post.
This is incredibly true. Most of the people that I know in real life didn't even take time to watch the president's State of the Union address on Tuesday of last week because they'd rather play video games. Staying politically active is extremely important and it is surprising how many people don't understand this concept, turn a blind eye to what's going on, and then go off in search of their next entertainment quick fix. Staying on top of issues, especially local issues, takes work. Sometimes I think the new generation of twenty-somethings are the laziest most uneducated generation to walk the earth.
I so agree with you!
I very much agree & get so frustrated at people who say they don't care about Politics. I want to shake them! We must stand for what we believe and fight for the future generations.
I left the workplace last June, intending to volunteer in useful ways. I took it easy, though, for the first six months. This month I joined the planning commission for my town. Last Saturday we went as a group with the city planner to look at the wetlands and other protected areas. Interesting - and a brand new area of discovery for this former IT professional!
Your thoughts are correct Thank you for sharing them. Today, your blog was the second on my reading list. "Here is the first":http://blog.douggreensgarden.com/how-do-you-make-a-difference/?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+DougGreensGarden+%28DougGreensGarden%29
Spot the similarity? It is one thing for us to say "Yes, you are so right, Rosaria!", but how many of us can honestly say that we are making a difference, beyond reading the newspapers, saying "Tut, tut" and picking up a discarded cigarette packet?
Sorry, the link in my previous comment didn't quite work out. Here it is (you may need to cut and paste):
http://blog.douggreensgarden.com/how-do-you-make-a-difference/?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+DougGreensGarden+%28DougGreensGarden%29
yes it is...and i am ....just wait until my tuesday post..ha
Well said, Rosaria. I couldn't agree more.
When I walk through our woods I often think the same thing..will it be here when my Grandkiddos grow up? Will it still be clean and beautiful? We all need to keep on top of what's happening in our backyards and across our nation. However, when reading your post this the thought popped into my head..did the Native Americans have the same thoughts hundreds of years ago?
All we need to do is love where we live... reconnect with nature in whatever way possible where you live. It is everywhere, it is us.
We need to make wealth/greed history as our world, our life can no longer afford it.
Voting is important and being the way you want the world to be is also.
It's foolish to rely on governments to solve our problems... we need to take action ourselves.
Great post Rosaria and I sincerely hope that your woods grow untouched.
x Robyn
You always seem to say the right things.
It really is all about making a choice. Isn't it? What happens when the right choice seems obvious to us, but not to someone else? What must we think when someone who is dear to us chooses the money over the splendor in the grass?
The level of corruption everywhere overwhelms me at times and, I admit, makes me feel like it is hopeless. But you are right. It isn't.
Politics is life. Your post is brilliant and right to the point.
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It is so actually now. Environmental contamination, cutting down of woods. We must struggle against it.
This is true; depressingly true.
Like others, I find it difficult to align myself with any current political group. It's like having to pick the best of a bad lot. Though in Canada, we have a bit more choice.
The world, as I recall a saying, is something we borrow from our children. I often wonder what it will be like, for them and their children, after I'm long gone.
In 2002, in Val-David the little village I used to live in, a movement was set up to create a regional park to preserve the mountains around us. Land was given by a wealthy family but it had to be protected.
I joined a group that put pressure on our municipal governmemt to expropriate the land. A referendum was organized and I joined the YES committee. We won.
Today whenever I go to Val-David I'm proud to think I contributed to saving a vital part of it.
Yes, we do have to take a direct hand in events if we want them to happen.
Proud tree hugger here who keeps a list of her congressmen by her computer. We do need to be heard.
Take the profit out of deforestation and pollution then you will remove the motive.
Put that motivation to profit into the re-use and restructure of the vast amounts of garbage we have on the planet. Why do I need a wooden table when I can kill a thousand water bottles reformulating them into a perfectly serviceable plastic one.
But there is yet no consumer desire to call a plastic re-cycled table a thing of beauty so we will continue to deforest, destroy and pollute the air, earth and oceans until the very Earth itself can no longer breathe.
Buy only what you need, reuse something until it reduced to nothing, and see the beauty of it all.
What a wonderful post.That really struck a cord with me. Our government (in Britain) are trying to sell off our forests to save money.Some of these are ancient forests, some of them not so ancient. But I firmly believe they should be remain looked after by the country and stay the property of the people, so that they will be there for generations to come. There are protests here and petitions about it. In fact there are protests about alot of the cuts they are trying to make. It is all of our duty to protect this earth now and not rely on future generations to do it.
You're so right Rosaria and that, sadly, is exactly why most Americans remain so ignorant... they just don't do the research and find the answers for themselves.
Having said that about my fellow Americans, I'm proud of America for being the only country in the world that actually sets aside massive bodies of land for national parks, conservation, etc.
Great post, as usual.
Our friend Gaston Studio forgets that other countries like Canada and many others in Europe, Asia, Africa and elsewhere have laid aside huge swats of land for parks and conservation areas. Typical USAers bragging about being the "best" and the "biggest".
Rosaria, here in Brasil we see why politicians must be well chosen. 30 years ago, someone approved the construction of homes on top of a landfill, which collapsed in the recent rain season.
Love your post. I am very concerned with keeping the area where we live as peaceful,clean and beautiful as it is today. Take the time to bring the children into the forests and nature areas. Take them away from the video game world, and help develop a love of nature. Living it, is what fosters a desire to save nature.Take the time to share those favorite areas with all the people you can.
All I can do is add a voice in accord with everyone else's. It can be frustrating to TRY to get at the truth behind the stories. And voting can so often seem more like an exercising in choosing the lesser of several evils, but vote I do. I must. Excellent entry and such cogent responses.
I do consulting and civil engineering for residential/commercial land development. This post poured some salt in an open wound. It's crazy what money can do. I do assure you that land development and policies have much more environmental awareness in these days. I've circulated your post around the office! Hopefully, it can make a difference!
www.rantychantykoko.blogspot.com
One whisper gets lost on lithe breezes, hundreds of whispers creates a wind to be reckoned with.
Thank you for giving us light - please visit me and post some light on my page:
http://normaltoeatpb.blogspot.com
That is so very true.
It is a great pity that some of the lovely places that we remember as children...... don't exist anymore.
We owe it to our grandchildren to save them.
Maggie X
Nuts in May
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