Welcome to the Jungle

Today I went out a-wandering as I tend to. I decided to go a new direction and found myself walking steadily uphill until I hit the Water of Leith. Yes, that is the water that runs by my flat, but evidentially it's a busy little bee because I found it quite a ways from home.

A path ran next to the Water of Leith and I have never been one to turn down an unknown path into the woods. Now, I think that one of the aspects of American living is that we are not accustomed to real, true wilderness. Most of the states have been taken in as part of human existence. That situation, in itself, is not a bad thing, but I consider myself lucky to have experienced true wilderness in the land my dad owns in northern Wisconsin. I need to say all this as a preface for my natural revelation, so stay with me. Even in the woods up north, I haven't ever really felt uncomfortable. I know the woods fairly well, my dad has taught me enough about the woods so that I understand them, and I have been going there since I was a baby. In the woods up north, there are bears, deer, bobcats, porcupines, coyotes, and various other unknowns. Granted, usually having a pistol nearby will make anyone feel more comfortable in the woods, but you understand my position.

I was not comfortable in the woods by the Water of Leith. I cannot with any kind of conscience describe this as "woods," for one thing. It was a jungle. There were so many rich shades of green, I couldn't understand how we had gotten just one word for this varied color. The trees had creeping, vine-like, spindly branches that seemed to crawl, twist, and grow even though I knew that they were not actually moving. Some of the trees had so much of this creeping branch, that it looked like matted, wild hair cascading down into the rushing water. For anyone who has ever uttered the words, "the silence of nature," you don't know what you're talking about. The sound of the water was gushing, echoing back on itself in the hollow under the trees. The various insects made a chaotic cacophony of buzzing and humming. Wind, too, screamed through the hollow between the branches and the moist ground. Not only was nature deafening, it also had that muted sound of moss and dew and leaves enveloping the sounds as they were being created. I had to continually remind myself that there weren't any wild animals in the whole of New Zealand, so animals couldn't possibly come running out of the green overgrowth on either side of me.

Also, the air turned eerily cold as soon as I walked under the leafy balcony. Although there was a path, I felt in entire wilderness and a kind that I had never before been in. The sound of my feet on aged gravel felt intrusive and wrong in this natural atmosphere. Being there, I understood why people have a certain comfort in living in cities and seeing our own concrete jungles. I could entirely understand the need to bring concrete here so I could have something solid, human, and relatively permanent to make me feel comfortable. I realized that the love of nature that I have is so thinly veiled fear and awe. Had I tripped and fallen into the water, not one part of nature would have cared. Nothing about nature is forgiving. I can see why people like to put trees in a row, have flowers line their little houses, and even have zoos with fences. I enjoy seeing nature, but its chaos is absolutely terrifying.

I thought about Tsunami and how nature can so quickly and coldly turn on anything, including itself. I thought of the hurricanes in Florida and seeing houses collapse as if made of popsicle sticks. Security in this world is so shallow. Even to say this, though, creates a feeling of a harsh, evil, anthropomorphic Nature. What's even more distressing, is that this isn't even true. There isn't a personality. It's just a chain of events, which makes all of existence so coincidental.

The moral to my story is that I think there needs to be an awe and respect for the fragility of existence at all, let alone the inconsequential nature of the specific existence I happen to be leading. Maybe I had forgotten that because I hadn't spent enough time out there, instead of in here.