sho' nuff

This lapse in posting must happen to all...some of my favorite bloggers are sadly sporadic, and now I am among them. Every time I had the urge it was still all about death of some kind, and I began to sound obsessed. In the future, I may just have to surrender to sounding that way.

Today, however, marks yet another low for the south, as racism is alive and well among at least two residents of Albany, GA. This story will reflect badly on me, as I was not quick-witted enough to figure out an appropriate (as in will I get fired for this) retort, and ashamedly let the man's words go unchallenged with anything more than a stricken facial expression. They were camping, and wanted to travel a long bike trail the next day. I was happily chatting, answering many questions, providing directions & maps. They had a sweet small dog with white fluffy fur, so I asked what they did with him while biking. "Oh, he comes along with us," the man replied. "We have one of those little trailers people use for children, and he loves it."

Though I always found that debatable, the dog looked well cared for, and they even assured me that they kept a leash fastened in case a squirrel caught his eye. They were about to drive on, and the man offered even more reassurance: "Yeah, he just sits back there in the sun like a big nigger."

I don't have to explain the impact of this statement, do I? I had about 10 seconds to think of a reply that, as I mentioned above, would not get me fired, and I could not. I do believe I just stared and took a step back into the safety of the ranger station. They both thanked me profusely, rolled up windows and went with the wind before I could quote Rhett Butler or Elvis or Stokely Carmichael. I wasn't concerned about speaking my mind (I seldom am) but this required a minute or two of diplomatic finger-wagging, and my time was up.

Crap, ya'll. Hey, I'm not dense enough to believe that racism is not a major, major, major problem in this country---what disturbed me was their assumption that our mutual whiteness meant I would share their bigotry. And my inability to challenge them just re-enforced that belief.

I flashed on the prior week, every day hot & sunny, watching a crew of black men working to widen a county road. They endured the dust, dirt and diesel for hours and hours, looking way too much like a 1950s prison road gang, despite the trucks that said otherwise. When I was close enough to hear or speak, they talked mostly with each other---the young ones about dates later in the evening, the older ones about the great food they brought for lunch---but without exception, they were polite, professional and kind to each other and to me.

'nuff said.

out of the loop

The connection I have with the prairie is personal. It doesn't really matter that I do not often get to do "ranger" work, as even the scut work takes me outside, independently chugging around in the truck or walking from place to place. I love it.

Insert long ridiculous story here, and poof, my job duties are at least temporarily reduced to counting money in a back room all morning. (I already do a 2nd shift later in the afternoon inside Ranger Station...meet & greet & taking fees.) Though I and others have proposed many viable alternate solutions, it remains so for the time being, and has given me serious pause about working there.

It hit home when I came in extremely early last Sunday to clean at least a couple of the restrooms/picnic areas in anticipation of a special event that day. Many agencies, Park Svc, Forestry Svc, etc. cooperated to hold a "Fire Fest" during Fire Awareness Week with the aim of educating people about wild and prescribed fire---an excellent idea which will happily turn into an annual event. To say that I wanted the prairie to look its best was an understatement, as I had not been allowed to do my usual beautification for several weekends.

It was dark driving in, but when I left the one area, I was astonished to see the evidence of a small prescribed burn along the road. The dawn dawned on something I hadn't seen because I had been cooped up in a room, and for a moment, aka day or two, I no longer felt like a park employee. Silly, as there are other "office" people, and I DO an office job at my other park...but I suddenly felt out of the loop. The team had burned "my" park and I didn't even know. Well, pretty much the entire event was planned without most of us being in the info loop, but at least the Rangers all had specific assignments related to the prep. It was as if someone stole into my apartment and moved the furniture or painted my walls a different color.

Not to diminish the success of this event---Smokey Bear even came, for Pete's sake---but I didn't get to see him, nor any of it, having once again been trapped in said room, endlessly (okay, it just seemed endless) counting money. How to change this?.....should I hope for fewer people to visit our trails, thus possibly giving me a precious hour with broom, johnny mop, or covered in ashes? Shall I wish for blazing hot weather and mosquitoes? Maybe. I have already pestered my managers to their limits, and I cannot afford to do these tasks for free. (Actually, by state regulation, I am prohibited from doing it for free, and may only volunteer for tasks that do not fall under my job description. And there is nothing at the park that does NOT fall under my job description.) And, of course, I cannot afford to quit. But if 4 walls is all it becomes, I can get paid much more elsewhere for that.

Just when you thought it was safe....

Not sure I was astounded, but was highly disturbed by two separate incidents at work this past weekend.

As I was finishing cleaning the visitor center, one of our volunteers--a few years my senior, but not extravagantly so--lowered her voice, speaking under the protective cover of her hand. "If you go downtown today, be sure to not wear red." Huh? My quizzical look said it all, so she continued. "The gays....they are having that parade today, and they have all agreed to wear red."

Thankfully I did not skip a beat. "Oh, I didn't know it was today---I've often walked in the parade before I started working weekends." She knew I was not gay, as we had had many conversations about sex & boyfriends, and she was quick to add that she didn't do that simply because she didn't like "getting hit on," I suppose assuaging herself of any bigotry at that point.

I responded that getting hit on didn't happen much, but when and if it did, I would take it with the same compliment (or non-compliment) that I took anyone's attention with.

My disturbed state was furthered the next afternoon, when returning to work for my second shift. Two rangers and myself, all working, all in uniform, when one says, "go look at the door to the back room---there's a cartoon I think you'll like." Obviously, he didn't know me very well, as the "cartoon" was a photo of our asst. park manager and one of our ranger's backs---both very "manly" appearing men standing just millimeters apart, up on a wall, looking down into a corral area, hands so near they could have been touching. He had written a "brokeback mountain" type caption across it and taped it to the door.

I didn't bother flying off the handle, but simply came back into the front office and stated that it was not funny, and that he could either take it down or I would. It's just too boring to repeat all that was said (including his saying that his sister was gay!!----what a wonderful time she must have had with such a sensitive brother.) His supposition that it was funny BECAUSE it was two of our most burly guys just made me sigh and point out that he was still saying that it would be hilarious if they WERE gay.

Of all the things to be concerned about in today's world...how sick that this is still on anyone's list.

And wouldn't the park service be thrilled to see how "well" their mandatory diversity training works? Oh, wait---they don't care if it works, only that they satisfied the letter of the law and avoid discrimination legal suits.

there otter be a law

It;s too much to ask---that these sleek wonders somehow "learn" not to cross a highway.

For me, it's never been too much to ask, even back in the day of the inception of Highway 441, and more so I-75, that consideration be given to routing above, around, over known and possible animal crossings and corridors. Slightly raised bridges or underground tunnels every so often should have been a basic requirement of road building everywhere, saving countless animals and people.

I'm told that otters don't go far afield unless courting, and these two were together, running home to play and make babies when so brutally hit. No one ever calls anyone unless the human or car is injured----a great sadness, as some animals can survive if given treatment---and they are left to be found by saddened park staff.

My own world has begun to shrink in some ways when I avoid night driving, but begins to grow in more depth when I know it means one less deathly automobile on the dark roads.

whole = less than its parts

not final edit...gotta bookmark it near July 4

Okay, let's just get the obvious over with: I am an American, I don't want to live anywhere else, and though it's debatable on some scores, we remain the country with the most individual "freedoms." That said, our history, with a few exceptions, is no "prouder" than anyone else's, and has been driven by greed, power, and brutality more than ethics--again, as have all nations'. We lucked out with our mutt mix and astounding natural resources, and despite ourselves this has continued to be a formula for a type of success.........so far.

As I mentioned before, I grew up in a household that was not steeped in the culture, but it speaks for itself that we were taught to call the Civil War the War Between the States. I am no longer of that persuasion, probably never was, but simply respected my parents enough to not be maniacal about challenging them. At least until I was 17.

What this sort of upbringing did accomplish, however, was to leave me with a feeling of isolation from the rest of the country. It was an easy jump to collegiate "anti-American" in the seventies, and an even easier jump to anti-corporate-America now.

I am crazy about the parts of this country, but I do not love the "whole" via patriotism. Though most would be quick to point out that I would not have that choice in many countries, I can say that patriotism would be an alien concept to me in any location. But the U.S. is the place where I am a citizen, with all the concurrent rights & responsibilities---it is neither the template for nor the manifestation of my personal morality. Hmm, though a bit more of the latter wouldn't be a bad thing.

We are not the moral giants we claim to be, and we revise, rewrite, or simply delete historical facts that we don't like, as if our national persona is so weak it cannot survive the light of day. We ought to be stronger than that. We ought to be able to look at what we've done wrong and admit that we have put criminals into our highest offices and vow to never do so again---but we don't.

more to follow....

Like it or not, these are all of my flags.

p.s. and so not fair co-opting the bald eagle into a political stance. At least it can claim to mate for life, raise it's offspring responsibly, and kill only what it needs to survive.

Dixie: Old Times there are not forgotten.

I'm not here to give a history lesson, though most of this nation could use one.


Three days a week, I drive nine miles beyond my beloved prairie to the "other" half of my job; a lush, beautiful road with mysterious creeks and even more mysterious people. Around the last bend is a normal-looking house with a flagpole impossible to miss. American flag on top, Confederate flag waving in the wind underneath.


Let me explain that though my political stance is way-left-of-progressive-liberal now, I was born in the south, and grew up under kind, honest, but politically conservative parents. (In their defense if they need one, a Barry Goldwaterian, Bill Buckley kind, not a Dubya kind.) "Respect" for the Confederate flag was a given as a child, and I remember even as late as high school, there was a Confederate flag painted upon the sidewalk, and everyone dutifully walked the edges, careful not to step upon it. Of course, in my graduating year, we may have had 3-5 black students. All very low key and unnoticeable except for the great football player.


Then things changed as they damn well should have. It was high time we faced the inequities of our own history, and lay to rest its symbols. Now it seems as if those college years were rarefied air, and I often see the totally irritating phrase "heritage, not hate." You can be as eloquent as you want to be in describing slavery, even thinking it was not hateful at all...but you would be wrong. It was hateful and barbarous and unacceptable no matter what era or what nation or why. Is it unfortunate that the Confederate flag has become synonymous with racism? How could it not? It was a symbol for people who were not willing to see their history change.


It doesn't make every southerner or dead confederate or white man evil, as we all have had our governments act outside of our control. What it does do is give the South a second chance to face some of the very same problems and deal with them differently. A start would be for this supposed citizen of a united states to take down that symbol of a lost and unjust cause, and to let go of an anger that only inspires an equal but opposing anger.

am I bugging you yet?

It's still BUG WEEK...

Teenager discards broken eyeshadow container without a second thought at prairie picnic area, where I find the next morning the tiniest of tiny winged things, stuck in the sticky stuff, feet up. It's so very little and I worry while I shakily put a thin reed next to his legs. He grasps but cannot pull out of the goo. Long story short, I did succeed and put him on a clean leaf, but who knows if he will survive with eyeshadow still on his wings? A possible death simply because a stupid girl cannot walk ten steps to the garbage pail.

Getting in my car one morning, something flutters in a diagonal line in front of my face---a captive mosquito or moth? No, it's The Fantastic Flying Green Spider! Not quite sure how she does it, but there she was, as delicate as a butterfly, as nimble and accurate as a trapeze artist, fluttering past my ear and landing upon my steering wheel. What a delight. I spoke to her, saying she must be still, then climb upon my offered piece of blue paper or be forever lost within the confines of my car...she did so, walking casually, and remained still until I pulled over and showed her a leafy new home. Okay, okay, I will admit I might not have been so charmed had it been a much larger variety and landed in my hair ;)

I hope our local famous naturalist does not mind my posting his marvelous homage:











A Nod to the Crawlies

If you ever find yourself wondering where all the wildlife is, I suggest you make a change - not in location, but in your mindset. Instead of looking for animals you hope to see, take a moment to consider the amazing little critters that are always close at hand, buzzing your head, crawling up your pant leg or merely hitching a ride on the front of your boat. With the help of a good insect field guide (preferably one which describes behaviors and life cycles, not just identification) your exploration will take on a new dimension.
Every month of the year, and on every river we explore, the alert paddler will see; dragonflies and damselflies redefining flight, often in tandem as the male clasps the females neck, flying her around until they mate and sometimes hovering low over the water while she deposits eggs in the water; whirligig beetles, whose two sets of eyes allow them to seek prey underwater, while watching the skies for predators, fishing spiders that dangle a leg in the water to detect passing fish upon which to pounce.
But a word of caution. Once you've gained an appreciation for your creepy-crawly brethren, you'll be the slowest roach stomper and fly swatter in your home.