This prompt seems like such a give-away for me, I hope I don't botch it up. The epicenter of my world is a biological station in the heart of a huge swathe of virgin lowland rainforest in a very remote area of Costa Rica. It is called La Sirena, and I have visited twice. I think about it every single day, although sometimes I wake up knowing I've returned in my dreams.
After the first visit, I was forever a changed person. I had seen the vibrancy of life, the pulsation of the Earth's richest biodiversity, the daily struggle of the food web, the wetness of the true tropics. So many things I saw. It was as being born, bloody and screaming and intimate and so full of life and future and beauty.
My brain has felt since then encumbered with a great weight of information to be learned and processed. The breath of wildlife and floral species beckons me to return and learn of all their secrets with a call so imperative it cannot be resisted for long. They are willing to divulge their lessons, their beauty, their intimacy to me. It is a ballad I hear always. A daily chorus that asserts a calm and patient dominion over me.
The station is reachable by three trails. One approaches from the beach that runs from the north of the peninsula, which is known as Osa, another from the south. The third trail runs through the beating heart of the forest. Each takes at least a day's worth of hiking to reach the station, and to someone so easily distracted by the superabundance of species as myself, it is difficult to reach the station by nightfall.
La Sirena is minimal. They have running water, yes, and it is an elevated wooden station where visitors can camp. They have a few beds for some guests who reserve them and are willing to pay a premium. And then they have everything else any person with a sense of wonder could possibly need. Corcovado, which is the name of the entire forest, is a climax ecosystem. It is vast, and it supports breeding populations of apex predators.
There are five different species of cats, all abundant. I have heard the jaguar roar close to me, although I did not see him. I have encountered people who moments before glimpsed an ocelot or margay. I was one time identifying some elusive wrens that tumbled through the underbrush, and I followed them off the trail. My girlfriend, who had accompanied me on my second visit, stayed on the trail, and called me back after a few moments. When I returned, she asked if I had seen the cat. I looked desperately for it, but it had melted back into the forest in the handful of seconds it had taken me to return to her. She described it to me, I said it must have been a jaguarundi, all black and compact, a diurnal visitor. After reflecting on it, I now believe the jaguarundi must have climbed up a nearby tree, and all the while I searched for it had watched me calmly, perhaps amused by my enthusiasm.
There are birds in marvelous profusion. Kaleidoscopic parrots and trogons, the former boisterous and the later nearly invisible despite their loud color as they perch motionless in the foliage. One time, I watched one and had hardly noticed the elegant green vine snake draped around a branch just a few feet in front of me. I would not have seen it if I had not stopped to observe the trogon, itself a highly camouflaged creature.
On evening, I followed a stream through a thick gallery forest, enjoying the pleasant crepuscular murmurs all around me. A splash close to my sandaled feet startled me, and my flashlight revealed a crocodile the length of my arm scrambling up the bank. Its olive iris stared suspiciously, contracting until its pupil was a thin reptilian slit. Those sharp, alternating ivory-hued teeth glistened in the light, reminding me of elegantly arranged silverware, just as eager to bite into warm flesh. I wonder if we are cruder than we imagine, or crocodiles more refined.
The trees are of epic height, towering above the forest in a manner so stately as to be reminiscent only of the most distinguished cathedrals. The verdure is so lush, so pulsing, so misty and humid and fecund. There is much to learn.
I will return to Corcovado with only the necessities I can fit in my backpack: some clothes and food and my library. My goal is to spend a season there, a year at least I hope, so I may see it's seasons change and learn deeply about the forest. I know that is where my first book will come from.
Monday, March 22, 2010
Place Entry 6
NOTE: This entry is from two different visits to the pond. Because the season was changing so rapidly and I wanted to document the changes, I visited over Spring Break and again on another occasion this past week.
First Visit:
The day has the crisp colors of sky and earth that tempt me to hazard spring has arrived, although I do so hesitantly. The snow has diminished to tiny islands, its dominion over the land broken. Much of the grass that now emerges is remarkably green. It's incredible to consider the resilience and evolutionary fortitude of something so ubiquitous as the grass all around me. I really can't get over how green it still is.
More than any of the other indicators - the warmer weather, the retreating snow - the grass's green vibrancy triggers in me the mental note that the seasons have changed. I did not detest this winter as much as most, although it was apparently a particularly severe one. I take pleasure in winter because it gives me an excuse to don my sturdy boots, which are simply too warm and bulky to wear at any other time of year. I also love the challenge of keeping myself warm in winter months, which considering I walk everywhere I go becomes slightly more difficult.
But I welcome now the arrival of a new, warmer season. The return of the robin and the emergence of the chipmunk, sighted scurrying around the brick wall adjacent to the bookstore. It's true. There appears to be more energy with the coming of spring. There appears to be more life.
Second Visit:
Because the temperature is comfortably cool at nights now, as opposed to uncomfortably cold, I've come to the pond this evening just as the sun has submerged itself beneath the crisp line of the horizon. The pair of mallards I had observed in the autumn has returned, as gradually all the different birds are returning. One female is missing though, and I hope she was not a casualty of migration, one of the greatest causes of bird death annually (along with feral cats).
Walking to the pond from my apartment, it was pleasant to realize that I've become accustomed to the songs of the birds of the area, and I don't need to see them to know what's around. When I first arrived here I was rusty with the calls, having spent so much time traveling abroad. But tonight, I heard the robins serenading like so many troubadours, along with one cardinal, whom I could not see in the waning light but knew him to be high up in an oak tree on Woodland Rd. There were also the chirps of the house sparrows to filter. I have frequently been hearing the ballads of the white-throated sparrows, although I think there are other sparrows in the area I need to refamiliarize myself with, too. I've not yet heard the raucous screams of the jays, but not doubt their blunt declarations of their presence will soon return to the area.
The light has fully escape, and the pond is mostly dark, bathed only lightly in the artificial light of campus. The moon is at just a quarter tonight, but it's quite high in the sky already and very handsome looking. I spot from the right corner of my periphery a thin shadow dance and dart above the pond. A bat. Then another, and they are both gone. Later in the evening, I will learn that it was probably a Little Brown Bat, the most common species in the area. There are only eleven to contend with in all of Pennsylvania, and a couple are extremely rare or not yet present this time of year.
Certainly, the pond has changed. It reflects the change of season in it's freed water and the verdant grass all around it. But my perception of it has changed, too. I was already familiar with many of the fauna that frequent it, and quickly learned the others. But it's been through learning the flora that I've garnered something of a deeper appreciation for it.
I learned through Professor Sterner this week that the presence of the Japanese Laceleaf Maple is in fact a result of affluence. It was very fashionable for Andrew Mellon to collect exotic, stately trees such as this one on his property, and many of the trees on the Chatham campus, especially around his estate, reflect this (not to say that the standard has really changed). Thinking about it now, the very name, Japanese Laceleaf Maple, seems to pretty clearly convey a sense of affluence and sophistication.
And there are others, too. The Japanese Flowering Crabapple and Honey Locust, individuals closer to Mellon Hall. Their exoticism and value is neatly accentuated by the tiny placards that boast their names. They come with inscriptions of Latin beneath the common name, appropriately in cursive. There is also, of course, the Chatham seal in the corner. They were not visible when the snow rose several feet above the ground, but now they are prim and clearly visible.
The snow has revealed something else, too. Apparently, the pond is actually named in honor of Anne Putnam Mallison, a Chatham alumna who donated generously in her time. I had not been conscious before how much affluence seems to pervade the very core of the pond, but it is certainly here. Even the animals, they are the dainty species that one would expect a sophisticate would want around, gentle and comely but in no way threatening. In this way, I can claim I've come to understand the pond better.
First Visit:
The day has the crisp colors of sky and earth that tempt me to hazard spring has arrived, although I do so hesitantly. The snow has diminished to tiny islands, its dominion over the land broken. Much of the grass that now emerges is remarkably green. It's incredible to consider the resilience and evolutionary fortitude of something so ubiquitous as the grass all around me. I really can't get over how green it still is.
More than any of the other indicators - the warmer weather, the retreating snow - the grass's green vibrancy triggers in me the mental note that the seasons have changed. I did not detest this winter as much as most, although it was apparently a particularly severe one. I take pleasure in winter because it gives me an excuse to don my sturdy boots, which are simply too warm and bulky to wear at any other time of year. I also love the challenge of keeping myself warm in winter months, which considering I walk everywhere I go becomes slightly more difficult.
But I welcome now the arrival of a new, warmer season. The return of the robin and the emergence of the chipmunk, sighted scurrying around the brick wall adjacent to the bookstore. It's true. There appears to be more energy with the coming of spring. There appears to be more life.
Second Visit:
Because the temperature is comfortably cool at nights now, as opposed to uncomfortably cold, I've come to the pond this evening just as the sun has submerged itself beneath the crisp line of the horizon. The pair of mallards I had observed in the autumn has returned, as gradually all the different birds are returning. One female is missing though, and I hope she was not a casualty of migration, one of the greatest causes of bird death annually (along with feral cats).
Walking to the pond from my apartment, it was pleasant to realize that I've become accustomed to the songs of the birds of the area, and I don't need to see them to know what's around. When I first arrived here I was rusty with the calls, having spent so much time traveling abroad. But tonight, I heard the robins serenading like so many troubadours, along with one cardinal, whom I could not see in the waning light but knew him to be high up in an oak tree on Woodland Rd. There were also the chirps of the house sparrows to filter. I have frequently been hearing the ballads of the white-throated sparrows, although I think there are other sparrows in the area I need to refamiliarize myself with, too. I've not yet heard the raucous screams of the jays, but not doubt their blunt declarations of their presence will soon return to the area.
The light has fully escape, and the pond is mostly dark, bathed only lightly in the artificial light of campus. The moon is at just a quarter tonight, but it's quite high in the sky already and very handsome looking. I spot from the right corner of my periphery a thin shadow dance and dart above the pond. A bat. Then another, and they are both gone. Later in the evening, I will learn that it was probably a Little Brown Bat, the most common species in the area. There are only eleven to contend with in all of Pennsylvania, and a couple are extremely rare or not yet present this time of year.
Certainly, the pond has changed. It reflects the change of season in it's freed water and the verdant grass all around it. But my perception of it has changed, too. I was already familiar with many of the fauna that frequent it, and quickly learned the others. But it's been through learning the flora that I've garnered something of a deeper appreciation for it.
I learned through Professor Sterner this week that the presence of the Japanese Laceleaf Maple is in fact a result of affluence. It was very fashionable for Andrew Mellon to collect exotic, stately trees such as this one on his property, and many of the trees on the Chatham campus, especially around his estate, reflect this (not to say that the standard has really changed). Thinking about it now, the very name, Japanese Laceleaf Maple, seems to pretty clearly convey a sense of affluence and sophistication.
And there are others, too. The Japanese Flowering Crabapple and Honey Locust, individuals closer to Mellon Hall. Their exoticism and value is neatly accentuated by the tiny placards that boast their names. They come with inscriptions of Latin beneath the common name, appropriately in cursive. There is also, of course, the Chatham seal in the corner. They were not visible when the snow rose several feet above the ground, but now they are prim and clearly visible.
The snow has revealed something else, too. Apparently, the pond is actually named in honor of Anne Putnam Mallison, a Chatham alumna who donated generously in her time. I had not been conscious before how much affluence seems to pervade the very core of the pond, but it is certainly here. Even the animals, they are the dainty species that one would expect a sophisticate would want around, gentle and comely but in no way threatening. In this way, I can claim I've come to understand the pond better.
Sunday, March 7, 2010
Prompt Entry 5
I've lived in Pittsburgh for two-thirds a year now, so it's high time I cultivate some understanding of the environmental ills of my immediate surroundings.
Last semester, I was able to enjoy a couple educational walks (one geological, the other botanical) in Frick Park sponsored by a local organization called the Nine Mile Run Watershed Association. My first inclination was to research their mission and goals and see what environmental issues they take to task.
The Nine Mile Run (NMR), I've learned, is a stream that flows through my very neighborhood of Squirrel Hill as well as several others including Wilkinsburg, Edgewood, and Swissvale. Most of the stream runs underground, but some of it emerges in Frick Park, which is just three blocks from my apartment.
The stream suffers pretty seriously from pollution. The problem goes something like this:
Pittsburgh is of course an urban environment, which means that there are many impermeable surfaces like blacktop, concrete, roofs, and sidewalks around NMR, the same area where I live. These surfaces don't allow water to filter into the soil. During really wet weather (I wonder if all the recent snowfall counts) the city sewer systems become overloaded with water. They dump onto the NMR, of course contaminated with lots of sewage. This is actually called a "fecal fountain." As one can imagine, this makes the NMR both unfit for wildlife as well as human recreation.
I absolutely am concerned about the possibility of a "fecal fountain" in my neighborhood, although I may have some difficulty writing lyrically about the phenomenon. Apparently, the city of Pittsburgh in conjunction with the Army Corps of Engineers has been working since 2002 to restore the ecosystem, filter out the pollution, and improve the sewer system. However, I'm skeptical of anything the Army Corps of Engineers does because of all the terrible things I've heard of their other "restoration projects," particularly the way they screwed up the Everglades. They're arrogant and always seem to make things worse.
For my part, I wonder why instead of defecating in clean water people don't just poo in their gardens or somewhere else outside. Wouldn't that alleviate the issue? I would totally do it if it was socially acceptable, and I've done it plenty of other times anyway (usually don't anymore because I'm three stories up and it's too much of a pain). Hmm, how much drinkable fresh water do we have to crap in before we realize we should be shitting somewhere else?
Last semester, I was able to enjoy a couple educational walks (one geological, the other botanical) in Frick Park sponsored by a local organization called the Nine Mile Run Watershed Association. My first inclination was to research their mission and goals and see what environmental issues they take to task.
The Nine Mile Run (NMR), I've learned, is a stream that flows through my very neighborhood of Squirrel Hill as well as several others including Wilkinsburg, Edgewood, and Swissvale. Most of the stream runs underground, but some of it emerges in Frick Park, which is just three blocks from my apartment.
The stream suffers pretty seriously from pollution. The problem goes something like this:
Pittsburgh is of course an urban environment, which means that there are many impermeable surfaces like blacktop, concrete, roofs, and sidewalks around NMR, the same area where I live. These surfaces don't allow water to filter into the soil. During really wet weather (I wonder if all the recent snowfall counts) the city sewer systems become overloaded with water. They dump onto the NMR, of course contaminated with lots of sewage. This is actually called a "fecal fountain." As one can imagine, this makes the NMR both unfit for wildlife as well as human recreation.
I absolutely am concerned about the possibility of a "fecal fountain" in my neighborhood, although I may have some difficulty writing lyrically about the phenomenon. Apparently, the city of Pittsburgh in conjunction with the Army Corps of Engineers has been working since 2002 to restore the ecosystem, filter out the pollution, and improve the sewer system. However, I'm skeptical of anything the Army Corps of Engineers does because of all the terrible things I've heard of their other "restoration projects," particularly the way they screwed up the Everglades. They're arrogant and always seem to make things worse.
For my part, I wonder why instead of defecating in clean water people don't just poo in their gardens or somewhere else outside. Wouldn't that alleviate the issue? I would totally do it if it was socially acceptable, and I've done it plenty of other times anyway (usually don't anymore because I'm three stories up and it's too much of a pain). Hmm, how much drinkable fresh water do we have to crap in before we realize we should be shitting somewhere else?
Place Entry 5
Much of the pond's ice cover has melted, and what's left is sort of weak film. Several faded and slightly decayed corpses of fish have reappeared. There are also some that look fresher, not as dead, and they have not lost as much color. About thirty or so blood orange fishes linger along the edge of the thin ice sheet and still count themselves among the living. So it is that some of the pond's fishes seem quite empowered to survive the winter.
Besides them, there is essentially no wildlife today, not even birds, and that seems best. I've decided to engage in a new quest, to pursue new knowledge regarding this place. I seek botanical literacy.
To help commence this new enterprise, I've acquired a map of the university's arboretum. It's not really an arboretum the way I think of one, that is, a stretch of land with several exotic trees very conscientiously planted for the specific purpose of appearing well groomed and mapped out in a way that suites the academic environment of whatever university or other cultured institution the trees belong to, all underscored by a bit (or a lot?) of in this case well-directed pretension.
Chatham's definition of an arboretum is not like that. Instead, the map I hold is of the entire main campus with the many different trees on campus identified by number and listed below. Sadly, and somewhat perplexingly, most of the trees around the pond are actually not identified.
But imagine this. The closest one is actually Number 1. So I begin there. It's slightly to the left of the chair where I typically perch myself, and for a brief moment have been observing the fish. I crunch over about twenty meters to take a look. I inspect the map. Yes, it must be this one.
First, I look at the tree. It's a little taller than me, maybe about one and a half me's (I'm 5'9 or 5'10ish). The boughs bend and contort erratically, yet somehow demand to be described as stately as well. Their squiggly undulations are both smooth and knobby. Despite my novice understanding of trees, this one certainly seems foreign, and I recall that having glanced down at number one passingly before, I think this one had the word "Japanese" in the title.
Yes, it is the Japanese Laceleaf Maple. Interesting. Can it make maple syrup? The tree seems something like a giant bonsai. It bears no leaves, and besides its overall exoticness, I can hardly think of what else to think about it other than how it got here. How did it get here to Chatham? Does someone have an inclination to cultivate an international garden in the English tradition? Is it here for the benefit of all the undergraduate Japanese exchange students, or to honor them somehow? Is it just as much a small banzai as it is a large bonsai? Sterner will know, hopefully.
I'll post an addendum as soon as I know.
Besides them, there is essentially no wildlife today, not even birds, and that seems best. I've decided to engage in a new quest, to pursue new knowledge regarding this place. I seek botanical literacy.
To help commence this new enterprise, I've acquired a map of the university's arboretum. It's not really an arboretum the way I think of one, that is, a stretch of land with several exotic trees very conscientiously planted for the specific purpose of appearing well groomed and mapped out in a way that suites the academic environment of whatever university or other cultured institution the trees belong to, all underscored by a bit (or a lot?) of in this case well-directed pretension.
Chatham's definition of an arboretum is not like that. Instead, the map I hold is of the entire main campus with the many different trees on campus identified by number and listed below. Sadly, and somewhat perplexingly, most of the trees around the pond are actually not identified.
But imagine this. The closest one is actually Number 1. So I begin there. It's slightly to the left of the chair where I typically perch myself, and for a brief moment have been observing the fish. I crunch over about twenty meters to take a look. I inspect the map. Yes, it must be this one.
First, I look at the tree. It's a little taller than me, maybe about one and a half me's (I'm 5'9 or 5'10ish). The boughs bend and contort erratically, yet somehow demand to be described as stately as well. Their squiggly undulations are both smooth and knobby. Despite my novice understanding of trees, this one certainly seems foreign, and I recall that having glanced down at number one passingly before, I think this one had the word "Japanese" in the title.
Yes, it is the Japanese Laceleaf Maple. Interesting. Can it make maple syrup? The tree seems something like a giant bonsai. It bears no leaves, and besides its overall exoticness, I can hardly think of what else to think about it other than how it got here. How did it get here to Chatham? Does someone have an inclination to cultivate an international garden in the English tradition? Is it here for the benefit of all the undergraduate Japanese exchange students, or to honor them somehow? Is it just as much a small banzai as it is a large bonsai? Sterner will know, hopefully.
I'll post an addendum as soon as I know.
Subscribe to:
Comments (Atom)