Water (12/29/2020)

It was Rachel Carson who wrote: “The edge of the sea is a strange and beautiful place.” Who am I to disagree? Having lived and grown up in the vicinity of the sea from my third through my sixteenth birthday and spending almost every day in it, I fully agree with her. I even have photographs of me as an infant at the shore of Lake Tanzania (or Lake Tanganyika as it was called in those days) one of the largest natural lakes in Africa. Technically that was not a sea, but you cannot see the opposite shore. Even later in Holland between my 16th and 22nd birthday, I was never far away from the water (those Dutch canals) or ocean. For the past 20 years I have lived on the Chesapeake Bay and have the almost daily illusion that when I am in Yorktown and look east, I actually have an unobstructed view of the Atlantic Ocean and thus can look all the way to Portugal or thereabouts. As a sailor I know I am wrong, because leaving Yorktown at the 90-degree compass bearing I would sail straight into Cape Charles on Virginia’s Eastern Shore, and never make it to the actual ocean.

This photograph was taken in August 2020 in Yorktown looking east!  Portugal I see you! (not).  But you get the picture, that is why I like living here. 

I often wonder what my attraction to the ocean or water is? I always blamed some form of claustrophobia, like the need to see the horizon. In fact, I grew up being able to see the horizon. On a clear day we could literally see the coast of Venezuela from our home some 60 kilometers (40 miles) away. Accounting for the curvature of the earth we actually saw the peaks of the coastal mountain range. This was especially spectacular at night, when the mountains got hit by thunderstorms and you could see the lightning. Pretty cool for us living on a more desert like island. But even in the Netherlands where I moved when I was 16, you can easily get to places where you can look to infinity.  Holland or the western part of the Netherlands, where I lived, is as flat as a pancake, and you can see for miles, even when not standing on a shore. 

The most miserable place I ever lived was Durham, North Carolina (sorry guys). This was probably because we lived in a rental and because we knew that it was only for three months. We lived there in the mid 1980s next to a racist who would stand in his front yard with a gin and tonic at 10 am complaining to me about those n...... But to me it was also because I could never get my bearings; too many trees, no horizon, I felt closed in. I really never knew where I was. Nepal, Yemen, Uganda all gave me a chance to look as far as I wanted.

Even living in New Mexico where I did not have to deal with claustrophobia. There were no trees in the desert, or when there were I could look around them and look far.  I absolutely loved it. But still, getting to the big lake called Elephant Bute in the Rio Grande was something spectacular to me. Open water! I wrote three posts about our visit to Newfoundland, and boy there again, the coastal areas were a delight. Oh, and coastal Scotland but then the single malt really helped too in my love affair with that country and its coast. 

Maybe, except for the single malt, what do all these experiences have in common? Water, oceans, lakes, and horizons. What does it tell you or me about me? I really do not know. That my body is comprised of something like 70 or 80% H2O? That I, like every regular human being, need to drink 8 glasses of water to survive or at least be healthy. Maybe that that like every one of you I have evolved from some lifeform that originally lived in water, especially that interface between water and shore? Getting back to Ms. Carson, that interface between ocean and land is beautiful and sometimes frightening. The area where the waves crash the algae, seaweed, oysters, crabs, etc. In evolutionary times those first creatures that ventured out of the waves onto the shores (plants, animals, etc.) to see if they could survive there. 

The horizon probably signifies my wander lust.  Not that I am any way like them, but I am sure that is what attracted the great explorers like Columbus, Cook or even Darwin.  They had the urge the discover what was over the horizon; new things to see, to experience.   More and more do I havve the need to see what is over the horizon and I cannot believe that I live in this house for more than 20 years.  Here I am couped up in it for almost a year thanks to COVID-19. I need to study these feeling and the deeper reasons behind them a bit more. 

One thing I do know is that we need to take care of our water. Water, clean water is so essential to us all, and it seems that we are forgetting this. On my daily walks I still see piles of dog shit around that people refuse to pick up. I observe litter all over the place. A lot of this, if not all of it, will be ending up in our surface water and pollute it. We need to take care of our water folks; it is all that we have. This is the only planet that we have, that our kids have and our grandkids.

I need to write more (12/22/2020)

Usually and the end of the year, or sometimes at the beginning of the new year I take stock of what happened during the year that has just gone by. Well’ I am not sure if this is my definitive blog for 2020, but I somehow feel like writing and excusing myself for not writing as much as a should, have been in the past, etc.

I am finding that it is more difficult to be creative after having to be creative for my job day-in, day-out and having to create on-line classes that keep people’s interest. In addition, being stuck at home and looking from my perch is somewhat boring and I do not get the inspiration that I usually get from traveling, listening to the radio and meeting people. Do I have the COVID blues? I do not know, but look at the graph below and you can see what funk I am in in my blogging (the 17 includes today’s blog). 

Previously, I wrote about inspiration in which I debunked this idea of not being inspired or not having a creative mind (somehow, the illustration was lost). Therefore, I cannot blame it on that. Am I depressed? Not really, in the sense of the word. Maybe slightly depressed, but I think we all are in a bit of a funk having that Sword of Damocles (the sword of COVID) hanging above our head on that tenuous string. When will I get it or a loved one, like my almost 94-year-old father-in-law get it? And how will I or they react to getting it? Yes, I can finally say that people in my direct orbit have gotten COVID. One survived; she reported that when her husband brought home her favorite ice-cream, it just tasted wet and cold. Esther, the 90 year-old (ex?) girlfriend of my father-in-law who has Alzheimer is currently in the hospital with COVID. We fear the worst. But by now, we are all waiting until it is our turn to get the vaccine, at least when you are not an anti-vaxxer.

What is my daily routine like? I usually wake up around 6:20. After getting dressed, I put on the coffee and get the newspaper with the dogs. They get their morning snack when we come back in, and we read the paper. Then it is breakfast and a dog walk, followed by “hi ho, hi ho, it’s off to the office we go” and that is just one flight of stairs away. Coffee around 10:30 and lunch at 12. We walk the dogs again, and I may spend a few minutes out back with my trees (bonsais). Back to work, which is interrupted by coffee around 3. I usually quit around 4:30 and take a shower. The shower is a great ritual for me to end the work day. Then it is time to make dinner and settle down for the evening. Boring isn’t it? Thank goodness, I still enjoy cooking, and at least once a week, the monotony is broken up by the need to bake bread. Baking bread requires more frequent trips down the stairs to fold the dough and to do something to it (“hey Google, set the timer for a half hour”).

COVID weekends are not any more exciting. One of the days is a dog park visit (Waller Mill in Williamsburg) and a walk in the woods (one of three trails). If the weather is good, we may stop for a brief visit for a beer at one of the microbreweries (usually the Brass Cannon, we sit outside of course). The other day is spent around the home. It is all very inspirational and I am sure, something many of you also spend your COVID year. Listening to my colleagues during our staff meetings that is about right.

So how should I get my writing mojo back and again write at least 30 posts per year? Maybe for next year I just need to take a word out of the dictionary and write a blog post around it. Just what comes to mind, but that would be crazy, wouldn’t it? At least now, I still have room to write my review of 2020.

From high on top of my perch (12/10/2010)

From high up my perch, there is the Amazon Prime guy, again. No, not for us. For the folks across the street. Not that we do not spend our money there. Heck, we are bleeding Amazon money, but not today. My wife even yelled to me, up the stairs: “Was that for us?” Actually, Alexa would tell us. “Alexa what are my notifications?”

However, I did not want to talk about Alexa or Amazon. I wanted to talk about my roost upstairs, overlooking the road in front of us. At times it is distracting as well as entertaining sitting here looking out of my window.

You get to see a baby blue unmarked construction vehicle with a ladder on the roof, and there goes the Prime vehicle, on its way back out of the neighborhood. People going to work, coming home. You see the regulars, walking their dogs: Bill walking Sophie; the woman walking Chaco; the guys from around the corner walking their what looks like a scotty but much larger; the big guy who collects military vehicles but actually is somewhat meek with his dog; the older lady who first walks her dog and then you see her speed walking by. You have your regular runners, the women with strollers, the groups of women trying to exercise and lose weight (I think). There is a (I think retired) couple who walk by every afternoon hand-in-hand, she is about 2 or 3 inches taller than he is. I also see people walk about 10 homes and walk back and I think: “is that all.”

You have a few individuals, but I suspect they have some social anxiety. Not bad, but it took a long time for them to even acknowledge me when I was outside and met them on my (or our walk). Especially one gal, she walks straight like an arrow, her arms cocked and really out to get some exercise. She is fun; you can sometime catch her and her husband shooting bow and arrow in their back yard. The other day I watched them throwing knives and axes.

Then there are cyclists. In the morning, there are often two cyclists on recumbent bikes. These two do not live in the neighborhood, but it is safe to bike here. I know they do not live here because they are members of the yacht club we belong to, and I know where they live. While typing this I have already seen two others bike by. The fun part is the kids from two houses down. They love to bike. But, the minute I step out off the front door, they race home, throw their bikes on the front lawn and run in the house. My wife and I are known as extremely liberal and these kids’ parents are T-party conservatives (Q-anon?). I wonder if the kids were told to watch out for us because we eat kids? I always smile at them and wave. You get the picture.

Finally, you have my favorite: Felicity. Felicity is pregnant; she walks her Great Dane: Bruce, who is a friend of our dog. When Bruce escapes from his home or yard, he comes to visit us, to play with Jasper out dog. Felicity has four kids already and you know she is coming by when you see some of her sons on a little bike coming by. They herald her and Bruce. Felicity and gang will sometimes stop over to talk and play in our yard, which is a welcome distraction from teleworking and looking at a computer screen. No cannibalistic fear here! Oh well, just some musing while looking out of the window. But now I have to go downstairs; the mail lady just delivered a (Christmas?) package.

There goes Felicity and Bruce.  I was prepared and knew they were coming by because there were little boys on small bike that  came by heralding her imminent appearance.  (photo was taken on November 16 when I still have leaves on the trees, now a month later it is all bare).

Does the earth love us? (11/26/2020)

 Do you think the earth loves you back?

An interesting question indeed.  I am reading Braiding Sweetgrass by Robin Wall Kimmerer and I one of her essays she mentions that she asked her students exactly that question.  Her students were dumbfounded.  But when she made it more hypothetical it became easier for her students to address the question.   "What do you suppose would happen if people believe this crazy notion that the earth loved them back?"  It seemed a discussion broke out, and one student proclaimed that you could never harm something that loved you!

So here we are.  Am I or is Robin anthropomorphising?  I really do not know.  I think there is an important point to be made here. Why would we want to screw up our environment and treat our earth, the only one we have, like crap and expect it to love us and treat us nicely?  But that is what we are doing.  No wonder it is throwing global warming at us and natural disasters like a record hurricane season.  Hopefully, you don't do this at home with your loved ones, or with your friends.  So why gamble and abuse that piece of real estate you, your children, and your grand children depend on?  It will definitely keep returning the favor!  Well, if I was the earth, I am not sure if I could love my human inhabitants, unless I am the benevolent earth.

In the past I have written a lot about what some of the religious thoughts about men's dominion over the natural world.  How early on many religious folks and philosophers considered that a supreme being created the earth.  They were convinced that everything on the earth was for us humans, who were created in his image, to exploit and use, and that we would be provided for.  I mentioned characters like Malthus who rang the alarm bell and told us that eventually this may come back to bite us in the but because we would exceed the earth's carrying capacity for humans.

I also wrote about my fear over Trump's view and what he would do.  I knew he hated nature and the natural environment.  Golf courses for him baby, highly modified and treated with fertilizers and pesticides; not exactly loving nature.  Moreover, I am sure his hands never touched dirt except to pick up a golf ball.  Well despite his loss in the recent election, he is still at it trying to wreck havoc to the environment and the earth, inflicting damage that will be difficult to undo.

Concluding, I (still) strongly believe that we were put on the earth to take care of nature and of mother earth so it would take care of us, not to exploit and abuse it.  If we do that, I am sure it will return the favor!

Happy Thanksgiving!

 

The woods behind our home.  I am so happy I live here, that they are under conservation easement, and that I can enjoy them every day.  We need more green space in our collective life, to protect our air, our water, our sanity and our soul.

Strange days indeed (11/17/2020)

Strange days indeed. That is all I can say. The current occupant of the White House, the orange haired guy, lost the election the Joseph R. Biden, but he does not want to concede and it looks like he is using a very blunt ax to go nuts with the government. He is firing folks, giving away the Arctic Natural Wildlife Refuge and doing other foolish things. It seems he does not care about the Corona Virus, which he claimed would magically disappear after the election, and now he spends more time on the golf course. Strange days indeed.

A large portion of this country laughed, cried, and celebrated. It was the Saturday after the election which was partially caused by the corona virus. Folks were afraid to show up at the polls and voted absentee, by mail, or early. However, they voted in huge numbers. More than ever, strange days indeed.

I do not want to make this a long post, but I want to add my 5 cents to history and my blog. Record what I saw, and what I experienced. I did vote on November 3rd. The main reason was that the State gave us a day off to vote. So, I decided I needed to do it that day. The day was also meant to volunteer during the election, which I did as well. First at my polling place and then later in the day with my wife at a different location. Maybe I was able to help two African American ladies with voting during the entire time that I was helping at the poll. One lost her I.D., for the other it was her first time voting.  My wife encountered one person who was not sure who to vote for. That still amazes me, he must have just emerged from his cave. Strange days indeed.

My wife Donna, at the poll.  She was knitting and actually attracting a lot of onlookers and comments while doing so.

Oh well, I will leave it there, and sign off. I am eagerly awaiting the time that Biden can officially start the transition to his administration and of course for that phone call from the chief of staff with a job offer to join the Biden administration. I am sure that day will never come, but if there was a job for me, I would not refuse; I am very excited about what is to come.  But, it would definitely be a strange day indeed, if that would happen.