On Behalf of My Father

The real voyage of discovery consists not in seeking new landscapes but in having new eyes.  (Marcel Proust)

My father is unlikely ever to read this.  He's drained and exhausted from four months of 24/7 care of my dying stepmother and, while he still feeds his birds everyday, he has no time for sending out messages from the environmental front.  So I'll do this one for him.

Marigolds2 asked me to refer folks to her entries on the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge.  As I write this, only the first one is finished, so I urge you to keep checking back as she presents the Administration's plans for imminent attack.  And, in case you don't make it over there:

This is the place we're talking about.  Far away -- FAR way -- from most of us.  Most of us won't be going there.  I've been working on our household budget all day, a budget for a household that will support three college students next year.  I don't see a trip to ANWR in my near future any more than most of you do.  No reason to preserve it so that I can make a visit.

Here's a more geologically/terrain-oriented map:

Looks a bit foreboding, huh?  Probably can't do one of those family camping trips there, at least not the kind where you transport the contents of the entire L.L. Bean Outdoor Equipment catalog along with a few coolers of beer and a tv that plugs into your car lighter.  On the other hand, if you COULD get up there, you would see this:

And if you emerged from the safety of your vehicle, you might have an encounter like this (from a safe distance, one would hope):

Or not.  Maybe these things don't interest you at all.  Maybe, like many Americans, you prefer to drive your SUV without contemplating that it must be fueled either by purchases via international relationships from which  we should be disentangling ourselves or by the destruction of habitat which we cannot recover after it's gone.  Maybe, like many Americans, you have a comfortable existence with so much stuff that you could probably live well with only occasional ventures from your home and car.

I can't claim superiority in any of these areas.  My husband, who carts around a lot of equipment for the soccer teams he coaches,  leased a mini-SUV a few months ago.  I was NOT HAPPY, but he told me it's more fuel-efficient than my six-year-old van with 125,000 miles on it, and he's probably right.  And we have a house full of stuff.  And we recyle those things which our community makes it easy to recyle, but we don't go much beyond that.  So no, we don't live environmentally sound lives.

But I can claim two things, and those are attentiveness and appreciation.  I think that if we start with a cultivation of those qualities, we cannot help but try to slow down on our personal purchases and national policies.  There is no question in my mind that we have the talent and capacity in this country to develop long-range solutions to our energy demands that will enable us to demand far less and to acquire it in ways that do less harm to our planet.

We need both.  We need our vehicles and our other conveniences to live the way that we want.  But we need places like ANWR, too, whether we get there as individuals or not:

You must have certain noble areas of the world left in as close-to-primal condition as possible.  You must have quietness and a certain amount of solitude.  You must be able to touch the living rock, drink the pure waters, scan the great vistas, sleep under the stars and awaken to the cool dawn wind. You do not play ping-pong in a cathedral. (Ansel Adams)

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The following is from the website of the Northern Alaskan Environmental Center.  You can click on "Arctic" and then on "Arctic Action" to read more.

This week, the House and Senate budget committees split over whether or not to include proposals to allow drilling in Arctic National Wildlife Refuge to be included in the federal budget.  The Senate is poised to vote next week on whether or not to allow the drilling provision to stay in the budget.

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Arctic Hotline for Capitol Hill: 1-888-894-5325 or go to http://capwiz.com/awc/dbq/officials/ and click on your state to get the direct number for your Senator.  You can call the Capitol Hill switchboard at (202) 224-3121

·        Ask your Senator to vote “Yes” on the Cantwell amendment to keep drilling in the Arctic Refuge out of the budget.