I haven't written since August, because... what can I possibly say that isn't going to end up a rant or a wail? As I watch the Critical Areas in Eastsound be bulldozed, raped, logged, paved, destroyed - illegally and legally, with no repercussions for the violators, I can feel the pain of it in my own feminine body. It hurts more than I can say, and believe me, I've tried to express it more articulately than the hash I'm making of it right now. I can feel the earth's agony. Can't you? Maybe that sounds melodramatic but I no longer care how it sounds. It is so beautiful; all we've been given - and we throw it away. All we've been born into, been priviliged to have in our lives; don't our kids deserve at least as well? Don't they deserve to know the peace and beauty we have known? Don't they deserve our protection and stewardship of the lands we borrow from this Earth? Isn't the real wealth in our supporting lands, waters, and the community that comes together to honor and protect them?
I have wondered what my purpose is in writing these blogs. Who reads them? Who are they for? What do they really offer? Is it just mental masturbation, a journal written in the dark inside a crumbling coal mine as the oxygen runs out? How can I "just think positive," and then what - forget about it all and disassociate? Who even wants to know or ponder what we're doing to the planet, since pondering it hurts too much? Who is actually looking for being part of solutions, rather than just complaining, and who is willing to take the time to co-create them, implement them, and stand firm and hold steady against those who would destroy everything, and not give up or give in? Who in town (mostly moderate to low income people) even has the time or energy to do anything but survive and hope they can feed their kids from paycheck to paycheck?
I've wondered how to get people interested in sitting through arduously boring meetings that effect nothing, no matter how many times we tell the engineers and governmental officials that we don't want the trees cut, and have our offerings of other less hostile solutions for the land rejected in patronizing smiles. And what does "educating" people mean? It seems twofold. We have to be mindful of what is happening around us, and acknowledge the consequences of our thoughts, habits, and actions; ie our part in it. And if we then want to change those things to do least harm, we have to find ways to step outside the paradigm of this dysfunctional matrix and create something from the best of every one of us, and we have to want it really badly - so badly that we're willing to stop blaming our differences and learn to co-create and see them as a strength and an opportunity to have more creative ideas than if we were all alike. Easy to say, harder to do.
Then there's the whole white-male cultural rules: Men aren't supposed to be sad or feel the feminine inside them. (ie "no sissies."). Women aren't supposed to be angry ("bitches.") Everyone should just think positive and read a new self-help book, take more prozac, and go to a therapist or the latest motivational speaker or new age guru. Heh.
Even while understanding the historical moment we're in right now - the working class becoming a serf population, the hold the powerful few have on us all - I am frustrated by the lack of involvement locally. What will it take for Eastsound residents to be engaged with their own homeland? I am also disheartened that those outside of town with more acreage, time, and money - whose lands our sacrificial-lamb-the-Urban-Growth-Area, protect, turn away from our difficulties here. How can they look away? How can they not claim their connection with us and this land and these waters - in the heart, the hub, the most vulnerable geographic and geologic place in the island? In all the ferry islands, probably, due to our sea level location and narrow bridge of land which gets hammered by all the wind we get here, Eastsound is the most vulnerable.
Then there's the social ramifications: I am livid when someone moves to a place like Madrona Point and "loves" Madrona trees, then cuts down a bunch of them to build their "dream cottage" and complains about our dances at Oddfellows, the one joy many of us low-lifer blue collar workers have, while saws roar and trees fall around us. How can they call the cops on a fraternal organization that raises money for kids' scholarships and does all manner of good deeds for the community through rental of their hall for social events; here long before these new breeds who want closed gated communities for the rich with multiple homes, most not even willing to spend a winter here with just the locals? Who ARE these people?
Soon Eastsound area will feel the long-term effects of the latest onslaught by Public Works which dovetails nicely with their new excessively-monied grant program called "roadside hazard mitigation project."(more about that in another posting).
My frustration with Public Works is that they plan, engineer, seem sincere and probably are, but go about it backwards. First they apply and get the grant money. Then they spend some (plenty!) of that money planning and engineering. Then they have open houses, which are not really open houses, since they're "telling" us what they are going to do. It's frustrating to watch the engineers plan and then consistently run out of money for monitoring and maintenance; the very things that would make the new "constructions" work. The job goes to the lowest bidder; it has to by law. Never mind if they are skilled or ethically qualified to do the best job they can do. It's all about the dollars. There are too few Public Works "blue collar" crew to do the work of the white collar experts! Now, how is that?
And very soon Mount Baker Road, home of some longtime island families and friends, home to my own new garden (which will be 10 degrees colder when those trees are lost), and many other life-forms that can't speak up at "public" meetings and who depend on tree cover, will be irrevocably compromised in terrain where there are precious few trees left, and any new trees will have a terrible time growing, due to the almost continual buffeting winds and our new rabbit problem - people releasing domestic rabbits into "the wild" (illegal and destructive beyond belief).
In the vicinity of my new garden, built last spring/summer I have already seen cedar waxwings, anna's and rufous hummingbirds, goldfinches, western tanagers, garter snakes, tree frogs, all kinds and sizes of hawks, eagles, ospreys, pileated and downy woodpeckers, and much much more. I have heard several kinds of owls at night. Where will these creatures live without their homeland trees? What will hold stormwater and polluted road runoff from flooding in the lowlands, if not tree roots?
The Mount Baker Road Widening Project is at best, unnecessary. At worst, it's a long-term tragedy that will do immeasurable harm. Why is this being done? Supposedly, for safety and visibility on "dangerous" Mount Baker Road, which runs through a large category 1 and 2 wetland. Having lived here for 30 years, I can tell you that Mount Baker Road was a lot safer before Public Works's last project, the "truck bypass route" which many trucks don't use anyway. They made two promontory-type corners and don't have the manpower to maintain them so the visibility is terrible. There have been more serious accidents and fatalities, not less. The so-called trail is in a wetland and underwater most of the year; some parts all year long so people have to walk out in the shoulder-less roadway. Couldn't they have fixed the trail with a berm and flow pipes for a whole lot less money and carnage?
How does making this road into a highway where people can now do 70mph instead of 50, safer? Public Works refuses to acknowledge the part that excessive speeding, alcohol and drug impairment, and inappropriate cell phone use are the top contributors to accidents and fatalities. Their solution? Get state and EPA grants and keep the engineers employed and happy. SO... for the benefit of the few, the many must suffer. Same old tired song and I'm sick of hearing this discordant music. I'm mad and sad as hell.
Most of the trees on the North side of Mount Baker Road from Terrill Beach Road to Buck Park will be cut. The rest may not stand, depending on the treatment of the land by heavy equipment. The smaller trees protect the larger ones, as we can see by the sad example of the Mount Property Constructed Wetland Project, where the tall pines are drowning and being pushed over by the strong winds that prevail in Eastsound.
What do we stand to lose with each mature or maturing tree cut? How much water filtration do we lose? How many bird's nests? Tree frogs? Salamanders? Raptors? Bats? Beneficial insects? How much shade and shelter and windbreak do we lose? How much life does one tree support? Who speaks for that life, for all those lives? Are any planners and engineers asking these questions and will they take time from their desks and go out in the field, as gardeners do, and observe the life around them, over seasons? Over years?
What can you really say? How much broken-heartedness can a person take? How can that be used to make the world a better place; not by force but by gentleness? How can one turn fierce anger into an ally that will stand up and say "NO MORE CARNAGE?" I am now so cynical that I can understand why people just give up and decide to be selfish and "me" oriented. Bah. May as well just do art and garden and try to enjoy the few years or days we have left. But thoughts haunt: who will speak for the trees? For the next seven generations of humankind? For our great nieces or children or grandchildren?
If this blog had followers in numbers like facebook pages, then maybe some people would offer up solutions, ideas, prayers - because we need every one of us to stop going in this planet-destroying direction we are heading. Meanwhile, I hope we all take seconds and moments, as often as we can, make it our meditation and mindfulness practice to appreciate and give thanks for what is here and give that forth to the land, the waters, and their marvelous resident and migratory creatures. This earth needs to feel our love and thanks, now more than ever.
