Best wishes on Aldo Leopold’s birthday

It isn't really a January thaw if the temperature doesn't reach at least 32℉, right? I’m feeling as though  we’re coming close to, but being robbed of, a January thaw. Rather than rely on thermometers, we’re going to see if we can observe signs of melting on the deck, patio or front stoop.

January sunrise

Photo by J. Harrington

This morning’s sunrise was, again, spectacular. The picture above, from several years ago, doesn’t even capture the strength of all the magentas and hot pinks in the dawn sky prior to sunrise. It’s one of my favorite aspects of winter in the North Country. I’ve been looking around for better guidance on how to better capture the red end of the spectrum, but to no avail so far.

Today is the 135th anniversary of the birth of Aldo Leopold. We’re once again rereading his masterpiece, A Sand County Almanac, with emphasis on the land ethic. As the urban / rural; Red /Blue; vaxx / antivaxx divide continues to have US at each other’s throats, we continue to hope and believe that the benefits of adopting such an ethic have increased geometrically since

Ethics direct all members of a community to treat one another with respect for the mutual benefit of all. A land ethic expands the definition of “community” to include not only humans, but all of the other parts of the Earth, as well: soils, waters, plants, and animals, or what Leopold called “the land.”

If  you have concerns about the importance of belonging to a “community,” perhaps you could spend some time thinking about where the air we breathe, the food we eat, the water we drink are produced if not from Leopold’s “the land.”

Our Land

Langston Hughes - 1902-1967

We should have a land of sun, 
Of gorgeous sun, 
And a land of fragrant water
Where the twilight is a soft bandanna handkerchief 
Of rose and gold, 
And not this land
Where life is cold. 

We should have a land of trees, 
Of tall thick trees, 
Bowed down with chattering parrots
Brilliant as the day, 
And not this land where birds are gray. 

Ah, we should have a land of joy, 
Of love and joy and wine and song, 
And not this land where joy is wrong. 

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