This early spring births an awaking in the land and its inhabitants. It also raises issues of how place and our relationship to it are becoming more crucial in understanding ourselves. Transitory lives, global migrations, environmental degradation seems to be having a fundamental impact on our ability to function personally and collectively. Talk about lack of ‘community’, once considered a time/space phenomena is now a cyber-space phenomena and changing by the milli-second, but basically our relationship to the Earth, the matrix of our existence is in a tenuous state and distressing humans unconsciously around the world according to some.
A recent NY Times article on this very topic discussed the topic of ‘solastalgia’, a pathological term that describes the human distress a result of our dislocation from the Earth, our ‘home’ place. This begs the questions: When the relationship between humans and nature is so ruptured, will there be any remnants of remembrance? Or just a vague feeling that something is missing, but we are not sure what it is? With no foundational experience on which to build a network of sens-orial data that links us to the natural world, how can we know it or ourselves? In other words, our connection with our mother will be lost and we won’t know it, nor have any way of knowing it.
These questions and concerns, engender more commitment to stewarding a place of harmony with the natural world and sustainability upon it.
Once again, gratitude for this little piece of paradise. Find yours.
