October 4, 2003 ~ Re-centering
Saturday.
Heavy frost covering the world when we woke yesterday morning. After sending Morgan off to work, taking a hot shower, eating a little, and finishing a few chores, I forced myself to stop for a minute and assess where I was.
Not well. Not myself. Tending toward bitter and distrustful. Expecting the worst from people. Unbalanced. Grief was certainly understandable and allowable, but this wasn't just grief. Dark thoughts, pessimism. I'd lost my center.
I'll try to explain. I was feeling and thinking many ugly things. I was thinking that all of our wild places would be dead and gone before enough people cared enough to stop consuming them. I was thinking that if some people are so apathetic that they won't even do the simplest little things that take no effort at all--like putting a piece of paper into the recycling bin instead of the trash can right next to it--how the hell will the forests ever survive humanity? I was thinking that it takes a spectacularly selfish "advanced" species to not even have the foresight to see the very essence of what keeps us alive--this planet and it's resources--disappearing right before our eyes.
I mean, how much more basic can you get? We must breathe to live. Yet we are ridding ourselves of the forests that provide that oxygen; we are polluting to dangerous levels the air that we do have. We must eat to live. Yet soil is the basis of food, whether one eats plants or eats animals that eat plants, they all draw originally from the soil (and return eventually to the soil), and we are badly polluting that as well. We need water to live, yet, there, again, we are polluting and wasting--water tables have been dropping dangerously.
I knew, deep down, that this sort of thinking would get me nowhere but the deep dark hole of depressed, and that would do no good. I was even thinking badly and pessimistically of the people close to me, and that would do even less good. I've always been deeply concerned about our environment, our forests, our wild lands. But the impact had never been so personal. I imagine this will only be the first in a lifetime of personal disappointments and losses of this sort. So I'd best figure out now how to let myself mourn, but not let it wash me away. I started pulling on my shoes.
But then the phone rang. It was Morgan. He, unexpectedly, would have the night off. His first Friday night off in months and months. "I was about to go to Craggy Gardens for a hike... But do you want to do it tonight, together?" Much to my surprise, he was enthusiastic about the idea.
I spent the afternoon in a lot of thought, working through my hang-ups, trying to make sense of all of the thoughts that were swirling around in my head. Morgan got home late, and after dinner it was already after sunset.
He cursed. "I'm sorry, I guess maybe we'll just go some other time."
I shook my head. "No. I need to go tonight. There's a half-moon to hike by. We'll be fine."
He gave me a hard, considering look. "Okay." The man knows me well.
We knew that it would be cold, up at that elevation, what with the frost even down in the valley the night before, so we pulled on thermal clothes and coats, and drove out to Craggy Gardens, on the way there having a really good conversation, the sort of meaningful conversation that I thrive on, the sort that dips and crests and hits in all the right places.
We got out of the car and made our way to the trailhead. Morgan looked doubtfully into the seeming pitch-black under the thick rhododendrons and mountain laurels. "We won't be able to see a thing in there."
"I will. Your eyes will adjust. Just follow close." (I've always had very good night vision.)
We took it slow, and the moonlight filtered through those thick evergreen leaves, casting eerie shadows. It is so very quiet there, and it is cold enough in the evenings now that nighttime visitors to the Parkway are a rarity. We only heard one car pass on the parkway the entire time that we were there. Instead, every little movement of that strange, wind-stunted forest could be heard for miles. A small mammal of some sort walking a ways off to the left. The leaves of one of the few deciduous trees brave enough to root this high, rattling in the wind. An owl's call. A few lonely night insects.
I've always loved the dark, and especially loved the dark under trees. There is no fear in that for me, only a sense of mystery, a quiet waiting.
We made it to the top, and held each other in the cold, under the stars and the moon, staving off the biting wind. Mars burned bright, and the Milky Way reached across the sky. Wispy clouds skittered past the moon. The lights of towns and cities in the valleys twinkled golden far below, little seas of light under that great expanse, the endless mountains seemingly infinite in number, us looking down on most of them from our high perch, we two small beings on a mountain top, sheltering one another.
Something moved back into place in my spirit, and I could breath easy again.
Yes, terrible things will continue to happen to lands and forests that I love, because some people act on what is best for their wallets rather than what is best for their souls, best for their world. There will always be those who do not consider their impact on the planet, on the future, on their fellow breathers (and yes, trees and plants and planets breathe).
But. The existence of those who do not care makes the existence and action of those who do all the more important. Yes, sometimes it may seem as if the trees, the waters, the sands and soils, the air, the wild places of the world... are losing. But they'd be losing even more if I weren't pouring my heart into their survival. They'd be losing even more if I stopped fighting, or worse, stopped caring entirely and started adding to the mess.
Jones Mountain has a clear-cut. Loss. I've lost a section of forest very beloved to me. But losing my faith, losing my will to fight, that would be yet another loss. And I can't afford that. There's too much apathy and negativity in the world.
Tonight, I was chatting with A., and she said, "Hey! The real Melissa is back! The other day, you were so, so down. It shocked me. Not you at all."
Yes. The real Melissa is back. And she's sorry for misplacing her faith, losing her balance. She went to the mountain, the forest, though, and she found what she was looking for. Hope.
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