It’s easy, normal, maybe necessary to go through the day, concerned only with daily tasks…with work and its complexities, with getting groceries and keeping house and keeping appointments and helping out…yet for us to remember that we live on this tiny, fragile, self-sustaining fleck of stellar dust…that the sum of our daily actions effects the life support systems of “spaceship earth” as Buckminster Fuller taught us…that seems so very difficult, for us, collectively, to do…

I remember one night, long ago, driving from Atigun Pass to Prudhoe Bay…one black, crystal, clear night…so lonely, solitary, isolated, unknown…oh, night, how small we are…i drive north away from Atigun…black. clear. the haul road is empty, just my little red truck. along the way the wide night sky, the clear stars…the sliver moon…and on one arctic horizon the faint glow of sunrise…on the other horizon, fading sunset colors…things are smaller at the ends of the earth, horizons coalesce…the aurora borealis is out tonite, the pale red and pale green, the blues and faint yellow white…all silver shimmer in the wide night sky…i stop and get out … minus 50F …barren snowscape…endless, merciless…i see a green glow; creeping down toward the horizon a huge green glow, a wide circle, a huge ball of green…slow, down…gone. leaving me again, alone, in the the endless arctic night…

in this achingly lovely moment, i could not escape understanding the smallness of my existence, the raw, horrible beauty of the universe…

oh what a beautiful garden we live in…what a gift, to have such a gentle place to tend, to love, …to live

Today I’m walking down Ashland Avenue, past the lovely old homes and their manicured gardens, walking in the shade of huge white sycamore trees—taking a walk on a perfect day. Blue blue sky, leafy-soft spring-green trees, flowers and flowers and flowers. As I walk, I’m amused by the sudden nearby call of an American Robin; they are so loud! It’s a tenacious bird, the Robin. A migrating songbird that winters in Florida and Mexico, they always return early in the season, the very harbingers of Spring. With a total population of about 320 million and a range of about 6 million square miles, Robins are a thriving species. Amid the mass extinctions brought about by the geometric progression of human population and its appetites, on the IUCN Redlist the Robin is listed as “Least Concern.” And that’s a good thing; to lose the Robin would be to lose yet another piece of our pastoral heritage. Indeed, the Robin is such an engrained part of American culture that a certain shade of bright turquoise is called “Robin’s-egg blue.” And not only is seeing the first Robin of spring considered a sign of good luck, but the great Emily Dickinson waxed poetic about a Robin, and the perky little bird is featured in at least two pop-culture songs: “When the Red, Red Robin Comes Bob, Bob, Bobbin’ Along” and “Rockin’-Robin.” It’s even said that Batman’s youthful sidekick was nicknamed “Robin” because he was born on the first day of spring. Robin’s red shirt, so the story goes, symbolizes the Robin’s red breast. What a bird! And here on Ashland Avenue, this particular bird is belting out one rowdy personal rendition of “I Love Spring!”

Just as I start to look around more diligently, hoping to actually catch sight of the ecstatic Robin, a deafening Rrrrr-Rrr-Rrrrrrrrr ruptures the gentle peace of the spring day. I turn to see a woman wielding one of those 2-stroke gas leaf blowers—bright yellow plastic, with a black plastic blower tube. She walks along the path to her elegant home, waving the tube here and there as she chats with her companion. He follows her, laughing and gesturing, as she randomly moves along the branching garden paths, retracing her steps to blow grass clippings from one side of the path to the other. In her form-fitting navy blue warm-up pants, turquoise tank top, and blue Keen sandals, she’s the picture of outdoorsy fitness. Her friend points along the path and she happily turns to wave the blower tube in that direction. They laugh and shout above the engine noise—what a glorious day to be outside, in the fresh air, getting a little exercise. Yet, wouldn’t it be more exercise to sweep the grass clippings off the path, rather than using the blower? And quieter, too—I can’t even hear that jubilant Robin anymore. I remember an article I read once, about how the birds along busy thoroughfares are becoming deaf from the constant street noise, the way that their courtships are disrupted and their nesting behaviors altered because they can’t hear each other sing. I think about the powerful 2-stroke engine making all the noise, and the gas-oil mix that provides the fuel, a mix that depends heavily upon global trade.

If about two-thirds of the oil we use in the US is imported, then maybe a third of the fuel for her leaf blower came from some oil patch in Alaska or Texas, and about 67% came from places like the Middle East, Central and South America, Africa—places very far from Lexington. I remember my own time spent in the oil fields, the complexities and dangers of transporting crude oil long distances, the ecological compromises, the difficult nature of the work, the long hours and dangerous conditions. I watch the happy woman and her friend as they laugh and talk, leaf-blower roaring away, and I think about my hard-working friends in the oil patch, the war in the Middle East, anthropogenic climate change, ocean acidification, plastics in the food chain, the heritage we’re bequeathing our children… and the incessant arguments that we need fossil fuels, gotta-have-‘em, that oil and coal make our nation great, that renewables can’t possibly provide enough power to keep America great—the arguments that life in our country wouldn’t be American life without fossil fuels.

What does “American” really mean, I wonder—is it where we live? how we dress? what we buy? Which is more American, I wonder, the Robin, or the leaf-blower?