A Response to Martone's "Flatness"

It is interesting that some of us as travelers aspire to see the background of a given area, not just brochures at a rest stop.  However, we still take the route most travelled (interstate) and Martone illustrates, that the "interstate defeats our best intentions."   The stereotypical flatness of the Midwest of America to travellers holds true to those seeing it from a modern road.  It isn't until you travel deep into the heart of these states that as Martone points out, one might begin to see the flatness' "slight unevenness."  Martone points out the significance of the Midwest's flatness in accordance with its geology and its necessity to ecosystems.  This reading sparked something in my mind I would have never thought about, let alone write about.  So I appreciate his thoughts on it.  However, he goes through a whole spill of beautiful, visionary writing and then in the last paragraph says "Perhaps I make too much of geology, topography imprinting on our lives."  To me, I think, that is the inspiration behind this text and that he second guesses.  I don't know, I feel as though he didn't need to make a mention of questioning his motives for this particular writing.  Although I do relate and understand his ideology.  And I feel that topography does effect us in some way, even subconsciously.     

Prompt Entry #1: The landscape of my birth, the home of my soul

Take me to West Virginia!  I know this is a broad place, but it is very important to my soul and has nurtured me and essentially given birth to me.  It's shaped me in so many ways to the woman I am today because it is pure wilderness.  My grandparents (now just my pap since my granny died) live in the mountains about 2 and a half hours straight south into W.VA. from the Pa border.  Since before I could walk I went down there several times a year.  In the winter, the snow accumulation is horrendous: a normal winter for my pap would be a total of 8 to 10 feet of snow through the entirety of the season.  But in the warm spring or summer weather, it is beautiful.  Everything is so lush and green and fecund.  The soil has an almost "perfect" feeling, a mixture of sandy, soft, fluffy soil, very easy to till.
Going into the woods or fields and feeling the wind around me, and the smell of grass is a feeling I remember since I was a little girl, and still make it a point to do so as an adult when I visit.  Ever since my granny died, I now portray her as the wind I feel the and earthy, country smells I inhale.  The wildlife there alone is enough to make me want to carry a gun with me for a feeling of security: bears, coyotes, feral dogs (people in these particular mountains by my paps seem to have a hard time getting their pets fixed).  When I was young I remember rarely seeing a car drive down their dusty road, maybe one or two a day.  Five was certainly busy. 
Now a days, with more people desiring to live in more remoteness and in a country setting, there are dozens of cars that drive by.  Not to mention the log trucks.  If my family decides not to sell the house after my pap dies, I fear that my children or grandchildren (should I have either) may not be able to go down there and see the same beautiful, nostalgic place I had grown up in.  I guess someone who owned acres and acres of some woodlands a little down the mountain from my paps sold it, or the kids sold it, and this has allowed logging to take place.  You can sit on my pap's porch and almost hear the diesel trucks roaring.  I'm just happy I don't hear the trees falling, that would be terrible. 

I'd be lying if I said I didn't feel a little bit of me get carried off with those lifeless logs down the dirt road, descending the mountain.

Place Entry #1 (full entry): Title Intro. and The Death of Nature

    The title for this blog is through the creative genius of Cesar Milan.  Yes, the dog whisperer.  I love dogs and all animals, and Cesar Milan is an amazingly novel person.  He refers to "living in the now" as the mode of dogs, and how that mindset is what humans need to channel in order to rehabilitate their dogs because dogs do not remember the past, nor think of the future.  It is also important that humans live in the now in a similar way that dogs do.  The past may be what has made us who we are today, but thinking incessantly about that does not allow us to progress and mature for the future.  But living in the now will allow us that passage.

Now moving on to the substance of what this blog is supposed to be about...

     It was not until last winter (the winter of 2009-2010) that I had decided to refute my own belief that winter only brought about a barren, desolate, empty season.  There is little reminder of life, it is cold (I HATE the cold/being cold), there is not much of anything to really look at or admire.  It wasn't until I put a bird feeder in my yard that I realized there is an existence about nature even in the most seemingly desolate season.  It may be much quieter, colder, more motionless, but existence is still all around me.  I had always heard of the importance of being outdoors as much in cold, wintry weather, as in nice warm weather because being in nature is just better for you, physically and mentally (especially mentally), despite the frigid conditions.  But one couldn't catch me dead in cold weather unless I have to be.  More recently however, taking a walk in the woods by my house brought to my attention that I actually appreciate the calm, the quiet.  It's beautiful.  Snow falling does not make an ounce of sound (except the really wet snow) and here it was, pouring like rain, but being humble and quiet, even in feet of accumulation.
     I also realized that the quiet in which winter exists is necessary for the survival of all living creatures.  It is the time for rest: no reproduction, or the competition that reproduction presents.  The metabolic rate of creatures slows to ensure survival on little food.  Hibernation, torpor.  Even trees partake in a sort of rest period: they lose their leaves in order to gain energy to simply stay alive until Spring, when the promise of rain and humidity quenches them enough to produce their thirsty leaves.  I then decided: "why can't we (humans) be required to do the same?" And "Where in our evolutionary development did we stray so far as to not enjoy the rest that winter brings?"  (Of course, "where in our evolutionary development did we stray so far from..." is always a prefix to things I contemplate on our connection to the natural world, for example where did we stray so far from our actual connection and obligation to the natural world, but that's a different blog for another day).
     Since my revelation last winter, I may not exactly look forward to winter, but it comforts me to know that it does not bring about the death of nature, simply a period of rest.  I now pursue walks in the winter, and feel that the quiet brings me closer to my natural surroundings than I could have ever imagined.  Of course, the promise of a warm house to return to makes it that much more pleasant.

Entry #1 (partial post): Nature & Environmental Writing

Never ever in my life have I wrote blogs, and rarely read blogs, however this is a new experience I welcome.  I'm looking forward to paying greater attention to the details in nature to write about, amongst other thoughts and observations.