Understanding Place

The central point of the readings from this week is meant to make us aware of the innate connection humans have with nature and how as humans we have lost touch and must realign once more. Homesteading as a way to live off of the land and to grow our own food for health reasons or other. Many women in the story by Shana Tiayo experienced a sort of natural healing through the act of homesteading. A lot of the reason why we have become so out of touch, in general, is tied to the fact that “more than half of all humans now live in cities. The natural habitat of our species, then, officially, is steel, pavement, streetlights, architecture and enterprise—the hominid agenda,” -Barbara Kingsolver. Especially the Great Migration of black agrarian southerners and the effect this had on them, since “industrial capitalism was not simply changing the nature of black work life, it altered the communal practices that were so central to survival in the agrarian south” (Hooks, 366). We don’t have to move to a farm or buy 10 chickens to be able to reconnect with nature, though. Planting a garden and consuming home- grown produce, etc is enough to make a lasting change.

The “place” which informs who I am the most would be the beach. Although I am not the most avid beach-goer of my friends and family, I have always known salt water. The town I grew up in, Scituate MA, has 5 beaches (Minot Beach, pictured above). Today, although I traded south shore beaches for the north shore Revere Beach, I can’t help but notice how at home I feel living by the water and how the salty air here reminds me of home. “Each of us belongs to a particular landscape, one that informs who we are, a place that carries our history, our dreams, holds us to a moral line of behavior that transcends thought. And in each of these places, home work is required, a participation in public life to make certain all is not destroyed under the banner of progress, expediency, or ignorance” (Williams, 19). Revere Beach has come a long way from the days of being a tourist attraction, complete with a roller coaster, to a more reserved and nature centered public space. I noticed while walking the beach this past summer that a stretch of sand was taped off. The sign posted informed me that it was protected for bird mating. Considerations such as these, even though it seems small in the grand scheme, add up to balance the ecosystem. It is our duty to protect the other inhabitants of this planet, human or otherwise, to ensure the natural order of the ecosystem continues to run smoothly as God intended. “I believe that spiritual resistance- the ability to stand firm at the center of our convictions when everything around us asks us to concede- that our capacity to face the harsh measures of a life, comes from the deep quiet of listening to the land, the river, the rocks. There is a resonance of humility that has evolved with the earth. It is best retrieved in solitude amidst the stillness of days in the desert” (Williams, 17). This all being said, I agree with Kingsolver that “wilderness puts us in our place,” in the way that it gives us perspective of just how little the things we stress over like paying the mortgage, or which gym we hold a membership to, really are compared to the worries of a wild and beautiful bobcat who loves its life for the simplicity of it all. I think this reminder is one that we as humans can benefit from manifesting since we have turned away from the natural jungle, and embraced a concrete one instead- causing us to lose touch with not only nature, but eachother.