Keep Boreas Wild

Originally from India, I am a graduate student at University of Rochester for the last three years. The three years in which, the Adirondacks has opened a new world for me by allowing me to experience Nature intimately, finding joy in muddy trails, hopping over rocks and bushes than guided tours, trade the comforts of a hotel for a tent in the open. And I feel that each and every part of this wonderful place needs to be protected to the best of our abilities.

My knowledge about Boreas Ponds is only theoretical and yet, I strongly believe that it should be classified as a complete wilderness zone. Much of the world is already tamed by humans or tailored to our needs or at the very least affected, adversely in most instances, by our actions. Let there be one more place, a tiny addition to an already shrinking list, which we can call as truly wild. The rewards, that come from a journey into the wild, to witness Nature in its prime, will far outweigh the benefits of a motorized access. I am sure Boreas Ponds will still be beautiful with roads, dams, motorboats and the ensuing crowd- but is that enough? It might come at a cost to the land, the wildlife, the flora and it will be too late before we can evaluate the damages.

One of the reasons frequently put forward for making Boreas Ponds accessible is that there has been continuous human activity for long periods in the past and hence it is not deemed fit to be a wilderness area. Apart from the fact that this wetland tract is contiguous to other protected wilderness areas, we should not underestimate the healing power of Nature, even without human assistance. Let us think of Chernobyl that witnessed the catastrophic nuclear accident, one of humanity’s worst blunders. Now that the place is deserted and left on its own, Nature has been reclaiming it over time. Human footprints at one point of time don’t necessitate the need to prolong it forever, especially if we can avoid it, if our senses and understanding mature over time and make us see everything in a different light.

The other reason put forth is that the wilderness supporters are elitists that do not take into considerations the constraints faced by elderly and/or disabled people. I would beg to differ as I feel that handicap is not only a physical aspect, it has a psychological and social element too, among others. For example, I would like to stand atop Mt. Everest one day but I know that I don’t have the mental courage (or the physical stamina) to undertake such a venture, and this is leaving aside the concerns of my family if I were to ever take such a step. But I would never want a highway that will take me to the highest point on the Earth as that will negate all that the Everest stands for. If Boreas is classified as wilderness, probably I will never carry a canoe all the way to the ponds even though I would love to paddle the waters with the beautiful reflections of the high peaks. But the complete protection of these wetlands will enable such pristine beauty to be preserved which in turn will let others take in the joy that I would want to experience. We all have our limitations and we cannot hold on to everything and it is not elitist to have an understanding of our time and place. It is said that ‘A thing of beauty is joy forever’. Let us give our best to preserve the wild beauty and it will reward us with happiness in the generations to come.  

To quote the ancient Indian proverb- ‘We do not inherit the Earth from our Ancestors, we borrow it from our children.’- do we want to be defaulters? Do we pay back partially? Or we return in full to the best of our capacity? Let us not test Nature’s resilience but help protect it. Let us choose perseverance over convenience, wisdom over technicality and above all, wilderness over familiarity and domestication. 

P.S. Some useful links for further reading-

News about APA’s various proposals- http://www.adirondackalmanack.com/2016/10/apa-sets-forth-three-options-boreas-ponds.html

The group that made us aware of many things - http://adirondackwilderness.org/

An excellent article by Bill Ingersoll of Adirondacks Wilderness Advocates-   http://adirondackwilderness.org/case-wild-boreas/

Brendan Wiltse, spreading consciousness through photography among other ways https://www.facebook.com/brendan.wiltse.photography/?hc_ref=SEARCH&fref=nf

What we can do, sign the petition at- http://adirondackwilderness.org/take-action/?nocache=1

The Escape

I was alone, paragliding over the glaciers. Not ‘I’ exactly, and not alone either. The cold wind found many ways to get through the airtight suit. And the sun, being closer to me than it ever was, was not helping too. It was a strange, piercing feel of heat and chill. When you are invaded down to the veins and arteries, you don’t know where you ended and Nature began. There was no brooding, no luxury of time to be alone and worrying about the ordeal. With the skies above and the ground below, all I could do was to keep flying.

Flying? I turned around, looked at myself…I am here, glued to my garden chair and enjoying my evening tea. Funny that I thought about flying! Maybe a little bit of football on weekends with the village children to deceive myself that I am still strong but nothing this wild.

Now that the glider had considerable momentum, I relaxed to look at the grazing sheep. And the deodar trees seem so tiny. 

Wait. Why am I having all these visions? Glaciers are supposed to be vast expanses of white. Did the wind get the better of my vision while gliding? 

But I am not gliding; I am just out for a walk while the sun is setting over the valley. The sheep are being herded back to the villages and the evergreens are standing tall, as if in guard against the advancing darkness. This is my hamlet in an inconspicuous hill-station in India, nowhere close to Denali.

The last orange kiss of the day on the peak of Denali seems so dear. From above, I can clearly see the sunset hues criss-crossing the whites. But the cold is getting harsher, even the numbness has ceased to exist. I need to get past the peak and land on the other side where the National Geographic expedition team is waiting for me, with warm blankets and hot food. Probably wondering why on earth they agreed to the idea of me gliding over the Alaskan ranges. 

I pulled the blanket closer to me…but the cold doesn’t go away. A few more knots, then a descent of a few thousand feet and I will be safely back with my team, after a week of hiking and flying in the wilderness.

I twist and turn on the bed, rub my palms together. The cold is very stubborn. I need to steer the glider correctly during the descent. Am I dreaming?

Rubbing my eyes, I left the bed and took a seat near the telephone. It was a cold, new moon night; nothing to look outside of the window. Except for the stars that do not wax or wane. They are always here to look out for us, till they burn themselves out.

The warmth and light came with the ringing of the phone. ‘Daddy, I did it. I flew over Alaska.’

I didn’t understand whether it was the voice of an exhausted adventurer or a little girl. I cannot remember why I was feeling cold or having all those visions. Everything seems confusing with the Alzheimer’s. But I think I was living the dream. And now I can sleep.

Freedom

You want to sway with the leafy boughs

Remember they too have anchorage.

Eagles may soar above the midday sun

But the nests beckon them at dusk.

Crashing waves recede

While the sand is left naked,

And the rebel who walks out

Finds home in distant shores,

Like the seed that falls farthest from the parent,

And greener is the other side.

O heart, when are you free!

Are you when you break shackles?

When legs carry you as far as possible,

Faster than your beats.

Ah naivety, the earth is round

And all is dust.

Build on it, paint with music,

And the stars will be your bed,

And no dams can arrest your flow.

You shall burst forth with light,

With the shadows as your guide

And though the cord won’t be severed,
You will be born free.

Perspectives

Of the gentle war

And the cruel love

Of the blind betrayal

And the mild belief

Of the dark cloud

And the faded moonlight

Of the mad sanity

And the regular eccentric

Of the painful sob

And the faint smile

Of the strong dislike

And the weak passion

Of the cozy frost

And the shivering warmth

Of the ideal gibe

And the awkward hug

Of the long gospel

And the short sight

Of the wet sun

And the dry rain

Of the harsh censure

And the soft acceptance

Of the brazen knowledge

And the shy wisdom

Let us not be extinct in the former

But live in the footprints of the latter

For the ocean knows that the drops are not lost

But grow onto making itself.

To Us

Give me your hand, the sapling needs water

Give me your hand, the walls will be painted

Give me your hand, the puppy is restless for a walk

Give me your hand, the kitchen will be cleaned

Give me your hand, the baby wants lullabies

Give me your hand, the car will be repaired

Give me your hand, the novel is nearing the climax

Give me your hand, the long drive will be covered

Give me your hand, the starry night is waiting for the campers

And our hearts danced with the blooming daffodils

And postcards grew younger against the green walls

And the dog always ran to the door at the sound of our footsteps

And the bread was earned and relished too

And our child haven’t missed a good night wish from foreign land

And the sedan carried us without a grumble

And revisiting old books made the heart fonder

The road to stars is now shorter

While the light ever more radiant

All because we held our hands together.

Trying to shadow an epiphany

This is inspired from a writing of Brian Doyle (https://theamericanscholar.org/why-do-we-not-sing-these-things-as-miracles/#.VvQ6O-IrLIU). Please pardon if I did bit more than I can chew. 

I say wrinkles and you think of the bedspread after you have had slept like a baby in the arms of your love. I say blanket and you are beside the lake with the stars over you. I say rope and you think of how your big dog pulled you when you were small. I know you when I say you haven’t forgotten the castle you built in sand, and how you leapt into the puddle of water in rain, and the cold wind against your face, ruffling your hairs, as you rolled down the coaster. And you were glad that the ride ended soon, as your eyes were closed, yet you were also sad that it got over quickly because you could still see everything. Your palms were sweating while your throat was dry, like the way you felt while holding his or her hands for the first time, and then many more times, and you thought it was the best thing that ever happened to you until better things happened to you, when someone held just your finger with both of their hands, because he or she is tiny and helpless and sleeps almost all the time and yet knows you and trusts you.

I say pungent and you are holding the test-tube in the high school chemistry lab, or smoke, and there you are in the backyard having a barbecue, or bruise, and your father is helping you get on the bicycle again after your third fall and you could tell from his eyebrows that he is not worried. And you could wake up with the sun without an alarm, or stay up with the moon without a yawn, and you could tell that your mother isn’t pleased because you are scared and she’s not, even though it is your eyes that are red. You know that you can run on the grass, barefoot, and in the snow, for when you are a child, you don’t always paint the skies blue, or the leaves green, but you know camels can fly and you are invincible.

You know the silence while others had clamoured to remove the charred branches of your favourite tree struck by lightning. You see the old photographs, and in an instant you are doing the same things all over again. And you are not worried anymore about the way you were standing or the nose coming between the lips while you kiss. You remember the time you went to see-off your dear cousin, after your first vacation together, and he or she was right there and will soon be far away, and you would give right now to have what was long ago.

I say now and you think of then, but which was always and will be, whenever you have looked inside. You were humming these things, ever amused and bewildered, and while I say miracles, you were always singing softly, that they are the reasons anything ever happened, and someday imagination will become memories and never fade.

His Prayers

The chants of the Surya-Namaskar, deep in reverence but fervent in appeal, was His wake-up call. How soothingly it resonated with the Ajaan at dawn! A perfect daybreak, if you would ask Him. Still, He didn’t want to be left out and played His part through the chorus of birds.

The mundane daily schedule then takes over- even He cannot escape the drudgery. There are so many things that need His attention. The Yeti’s gene-mapping is yet to be completed- he tried studying a few mutations but before any conclusions were drawn, some mountaineers created such a ruckus that He had to slow down. The magnetic field near Bermuda triangle needs proper calibration, it goes off every now and then. He has to fine-tune the Earth’s temperature again; it has been increasing dangerously in recent times.

When He was exhausted, He could always turn His ears to any corner and listen to the melody from the other world. Last Christmas, He heard a Sufi saint singing carols in Istanbul. He listened to Honkyoku at a musical class in Nairobi. That particular synagogue in Berlin playing the Pizmonim was one of His favourites. And after shining all day, He quenched his thirst from the Baul songs of the Portuguese missionary in Darjeeling.

Though, of late, He was feeling that the orchestra was losing its symphony. The notes were off in India, there were piercing sounds from the middle-east and the western lyrics were hurting the soul. However, He was hopeful that experience will impart wisdom to the novice musicians. Also, He was pre-occupied with a glitch in the lunar trajectory. It took Him a few days but in the end, He averted a major tidal flood.

Happy with Himself, He opened His ears again to celebrate with music. But He was met with disappointment. What on Earth were they doing? The United Nations, before getting disbanded, was in the process of certifying the newly drawn boundaries of belief. He was always skeptical of the word ‘Nations’ after ‘United’.  And now, hymns are banned in middle-east, Qawwali is not heard in Lucknow anymore and the Lotus-Sutra cannot be uttered in the west. The concert was over.

He had so many dreams- He had actually started working on the one with providing water to the nearby ‘red planet’. All those trials now need to be put on hold.

He took out an old book from the shelf- the dusty cover read something like ‘Handbook of Rob…’ He started revising the basics-

0. A robot may not harm humanity, or, by inaction, allow humanity to come to harm.

1.  A robot may not injure a human being, or, through inaction, allow a human being to come to harm.

2. A robot must obey the orders given to it by human beings except where such orders would conflict with the Zeroth or First Laws.

3.  A robot must protect its own existence as long as such protection does not conflict with the Zeroth, First or Second Laws.

This time too, He is hopeful that the robot will help re-create the music. He does not care about naming them anymore; humanity was better than Him in this game. Krishna, Muhammad, Jesus, Buddha- what interesting names they came up with!

As He sends the robot away on the mission, His heart grew heavy. He had always thought that free will was the best ingredient in His creations. Alas! Humanity, with its free will, still forced Him to fall back on His lesser self. Himself.

(Humbly acknowledging Isaac Asimov, from whose works I have borrowed a significant theme and my deepest regards to Suvro Sir for introducing me to his books and so many other wonderful things.)