righteous rage.

Behind our house sprawls many acres of undeveloped land. It's slated for roads and a sub-division, but for the last year we've been reaping the benefits of a slow housing market and the land has served, instead, as a little forest to explore with the dog. For whatever reason, tall grass is like cocaine to my canine companion and when he gets back there, he simply runs laps around me. After half an hour, his tongue is lolling obscenely out of his mouth, his ears are half-perked in a mischievous state, and he's exhausted with joy. In the middle of the night, I've heard Great Horned Owls hooting, there are Mule Deer and families of quail hiding back there, and Erin has even heard coyotes.

Well, that may all be over.

A week or so ago, the machinery of destruction moved in. Bulldozers, dump trucks, and some crazy, huge, driveable jackhammer are just a few of the pieces of mobile equipment lining up back there. From about 8am until 5pm, Monday through Friday, they drill, doze, and blast. The current project, from what I understand, is a sewer pipe. I have no idea how long this is supposed to go on for, and I don't know if this is just a one-time installation or if greater development will follow on its heels. But it sure has me thinking. (And Sunka has certainly not been himself, having been subjected to that noise all day while I'm at work - not to mention the blasting that shakes the house like an earthquake.)

Watching that giant jackhammer slam into the earth was like watching some kind of public rape. The diesel fumes flow into the house if I don't keep the back door closed. All the yellow and orange hurts my eyes. I miss looking at the trees; now I have to look at them through the metal. This morning, I really had to fight the rage. It's really like we'll just never learn. People in this town can't afford the houses that are for sale, and yet we just keep making more. More, more, more buildings and less, less, less space for the other living things. No one asked permission from the earth, no one thanked the earth, no one even thought about the earth. They just started ripping Her apart, jamming pipes into her, and tearing up her plants. (If this is all a bunch of woo-woo to you, feel free to piss off now, because it won't get any better and I won't apologize for it.)

I guess to be honest, I don't really know what they're doing or if this noise will continue. Maybe it will, maybe it won't. In the meantime, here's a little photo montage of the beautiful trees back there. At least if they get mowed down, they'll be remembered in photos. I also collected a jarful of pine cones from the incense cedar. The way I see it, humans and trees are really forever connected. Without trees, we wouldn't be able to breathe. Without trees, our ancestors wouldn't have survived without heat in the winter cold and with which to cook our food. We'd also be living in mud huts. Trees have shaped who we are as a species as much as dirt, air, and water have. They could use a little more respect from us.

Incense cedars (the reddish bark and strange looking pine cone clusters) are the trees that make those delicious-smelling cedar boxes. Then there are the junipers, some birch (I think that's what the white-barked tree is), and a beautiful aspen, the truth tree (you'll notice it's 'eye'). Many of them have white rings of paint around them. Is this a life sentence or a death sentence? I don't think that I actually want to know.

Then, amidst all this sadness in my heart,  I came across this post in the ground. It was painted some green color but had degraded to teal, with some of the original wood showing through. Despite the staples and its utilitarian purpose, it struck me as utterly beautiful. I am always reminded that for all mankind's ugliness, we can create beauty; even if accidentally. A hawk soared above to remind me to keep perspective in life.

It's not always easy.