John Muir and my brother

John Muir said, "When one tugs at the strings of a single thing in nature, he finds it attached to the rest of the world."

Of all the things I could write right now, especially after such an unforgivably long time since last time, it would be about this one quote. So let me take a minute and at share at least a few thoughts about it.

Not long ago, I had a conversation with a dear family member about global warming vs. commerce, science vs. pseudo-science and "the sky is falling" vs. a reliance on technology to solve our problems. Although this family member and I are close, the discussion eventually dissolved into one of elevated voices, with each side dissatisfied that their point had been truly heard, let alone understood. If I could have that conversation again with my brother, I would be tempted to start with the quote at the beginning and try to help him see the truth of that statement. My brother is not very excited about the out-of-doors; he is excited about moving his family to a big city next month. Not that that defines one's feelings for the environment, it's simply illustrative of his particular tastes. He'd rather have creature comforts than creatures, I guess, if he had to choose. My wish and hope is that I have some chance someday to talk to him more calmly this time, to convince him that that is the choice sometimes. Increasingly so. I'd like him to believe with me that, for instance, low prices on lumber most often do come at the expense of large trees and real forests - not re-planted ones that will be harvested again in a certain number of years. Furthermore, I'd like him to see that the destruction of these ecosystems affects water quality, air quality and the quality of a good hike through a forest, where filtered light comes through needles and leaves, backlighting them as brightly as colored bulbs in a darkened room. And I think that's really the crux of the argument, isn't it? I've seen how a vine maple seems to reach out to put a few leaves in an area where there seems to be a ray of light, illuminating them so that from a distance they look like bright butterflies hovering. In the autumn, how aspens are firely yellow, a color that seems to say "thank you and good night" to every observer just before they lift off to fill the ground with spun gold as they re-fertilize the ground like they've done for eons. I just don't think my brother has seen this, not often enough, anyway. I think that if I am to have any hope to convince my brother of the inherent value of the natural world, I'm just going to have to haul him out into the woods. Maybe, if we do that enough, he'll have the spiritual connection that he needs to have to see that John Muir is right, it does matter, and that it's worth some inconvenience to save it.

I hope we can all resolve, instead of trying to convince someone of the truth of the crisis we face from a scientific point of view, that we'll simply take them for a walk - punctuated by long stretches of silence - along a creek bordered by tamaracks, maples and aspens. Maybe that's the best way to convince the skeptics we all know.