No More
I found my way to the marsh quite by accident several years ago. Out for an early morning walk, I turned off the highway onto a dirt road which twisted through a forest of palmetto and oak and emerged on the banks of the river.
Woodpeckers and warblers called from the trees, deer occasionally crossed the dusty road, and from the edge of the water I could scope an eagle's nest on the other side, a mile away. One morning an eagle took off from a dead branch practically over my head.
I knew it couldn't last. Plats had been marked by surveyors' red flags and, although several years went by before any development began, it was inevitable that it would. I began to dread what I would find each year.
First, a fishing pier into the marsh. That was a plus for, as you walk its length, you feel that you are floating over the water. One evening several years ago I stood at the end of the pier as pelicans sailed across an enormous full moon hanging low in the sky. A couple of years later, a platoon of skimmers raced atop the morning glint of water.
http://data2.itc.nps.gov/nature/photos/thumbnails/thumb_Skimmer%20skimming.jpg
Next, the housing. Too close to the water that attracted the owners in the first place. So much for the proximity of eagles.
Finally a gate -- this year, an impassable one. Oh, you can still drive in to look at real estate -- and to find another firmly locked gate baracading the marsh pier.
What on earth is it that people are so afraid of? Why all these gated communities in the south? Maybe they exist elsewhere as well, but they are not a feature of my part of the world and I think that most people I know would find them reprehensible.
I'm not a development-type person -- I prefer to live either in a city or inner-ring suburb with walking neighborhoods, or way out in the country -- but I would have considered living in this one just for the morning walks to the marsh. No more. The property, although vanished as the space I knew for birds and deer, isn't too badly despoiled, but the appearance of the gates, blocking entry to the streets, woods and, finally, the marsh, offends me. They exude fear and exclusivity rather than community.
I asked my kids what they thought it was that compelled people to make fortresses of streets in quiet and safe developments.
"People like you, Mom!"
Walked: 5.5 miles
4 comments:
This is my first visit to your journal & I'm so glad I found it!
It makes me so sad that people feel compelled to "develop" so much that is wild and beautiful. I live in the suburbs, and I am watching the slow distruction of every patch of woods in the area. Yesterday I watched deer walking through the steel framework of what will soon be a new Eckerd Drug Store---there's another Eckerd 1/2 a block away, but doggone it, it's just not big enough! It really pains my soul.
Wouldn't you think that, at some point, they would have developed ENOUGH land, and they could leave the rest to the wild things? Lisa :-]
Robin, sorry I haven't commented in awhile. Your pics make me wish I were back in NC. Or at least on vacation somewhere.
This sounds like such a beautiful place - I know I would love it at this marsh. It is a crime that it is now unaccessable. At one point...we were considering a move and a realtor kept taking me to gated communities. I also find them offensive. I don't think the gate is so much about security as it is the appearance of exclusivity. Possessiveness...."This is just for US". I find that even MORE distasteful than the concept of a gate for safety.
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