Saturday, October 25, 2008

Theme Week 9

When I climb a mountain, even a small one with thoughtfully marked trails, I prefer to climb in the light of day with clear skies. Not every day of mountain climbing is like that and today is a perfect example. I feel the slope in front of me because the soles of my boots are inclined up towards my toes but at 5:15 A.M. the air is dark. I have to use the feeling in my feet to tell me that it’s alright to place weight there on the ground. I have to use my sense of balance to tell me I am still going upward. As I rise in elevation the air is damp with fog and my clothing gets damp from perspiration within and fog without. I stop on a ledge to rest and fall into a nap wakening with a shiver. I cannot remember which way is up. I should not have stopped to rest. I cup my hands together and breathe foggy breaths into the hollow and shiver again. I have to stop and dance one foot around to tell which way is up. I start upward again and am lucky to find that I am walking along on a ledge bound on my left by a rock face. I pause for a moment and reach a hand as high as I can and still feel lichens clinging to the cliff’s side. To my right outstretched fingers feel air. At least here I can brush along with my left shoulder with a connection to the earth to orient me. Soon the ledge opens and the cliff on my left disappears. Remembering I have a flashlight I take it from one pocket and a map from the other. I study the map for a long time and best I can figure I’m on the right trail and approaching the open, broad accent to the summit. I shut off the light and wait for my eyes to adjust but realize that dawn is coming. I can actually see the trail opening ahead. It’s there just ahead; the pile of rocks marking the summit. What exhilaration finishing just as the fog thins and an orange glow fills the eastern horizon.

Friday, October 17, 2008

Theme Week 8

Many years ago copper was mined commercially on the Blue Hill Peninsula; an area known today for its parklike setting and wild coastal beauty. In the 1960’s and 70’s large copper deposits were mined by multi-national concerns that left piles of spent ore, from which leftover metals continue to leach into coastal streams. The environmental effects may be limited in the local scope to wild plants and animals. But if there are fewer clams in Blue Hill Bay that does diminish people who live there, or over on the other side of Penobscot Bay, or other people in Maine, our country, and the entire world. These little critters are worth the EPA’s recent listing of the former Kerramerican Copper Mine site in Brooksville, Maine to their Superfund Priority List. You or I should care that a few bugs or bunnies die, get sick, or can not reproduce, even though we would not be aware of their existence if not for the environmentalists’ fuss. The Blue Hill Bay ecosystem mixes with the Gulf of Maine then to the open Atlantic where currents play under the waves mixing its bounty around the globe. Add all similar industrial insults from other waste streams from all the coastal towns and cities on every inhabited shore. As difficult as that may be to take in, try to imagine the economic cost if natural systems failed to absorb and recycle our waste. A 1997 study estimated the value of the earth’s disposal service to us at 33 trillion dollars, twice the total of every country’s gross national products.

You may believe the earth is a female deity, lovingly cleaning up after her progeny, or a creative gift from God for us to use as directed by scripture, or a spaceship of happenstance. No matter, you must realize that there is a limit to nature’s ability to put up with our waste, and all those little bits of waste can only flow down to the ocean. The sea is the ultimate destination for water and any natural or manmade compounds that it can carry. Without care we will end swimming in a sea of our own making with only the wits that got us there to aid our rescue, and one other thing; the realization that we must change to survive.

Wednesday, October 15, 2008

Theme Week 7

Even among the group of construction workers Scotty stood out. Not by height or weight, both average but his teeth, crooked and yellow stood out past his lower lip. Scotty remained taking long puffs on his smoke as the rest of group of super-safety-certified workers made their way to the safety zone they stamped out their cigarettes and reached into their pockets for their smokeless tobacco. Scotty grinned and said to me, “Them guys are getting double cancer. At least I’m only getting the lung cancer.” He took one last drag, hot end pointing toward the sky, flicked the butt down and flattened it on his first step toward his buddies.

We will have to work on that “a scout is obedient” stuff with the new scout Bobby. His mom brought him to our meeting without registration or warning. She said something about a child in a nearby troop harassing Bobby so the district council recommended our troop and here she was with Bobby. He looked like a typical 11-year-old except with small but protruding ears that seemed too high on his head. At the first drop-off meeting various chaperones peppered him with chides, directions, and warnings he finally fell off a rock and made a 6 inch long gash in his arm. Luckily the camp nurse was attending so she swabbed and bandaged him up while the scout master called his mom. He put Bobby on the phone and his first question was “Mom, what is my name?” an odd question from an odd kid.