Access To Nature Is A Human Right - Tumblr Posts

It is such a relief that I am not the only creature with these thoughts.

I agree with the idea that a lot of humans nowadays have a severe lack of curiosity about the world, but I think there has to be a solution other than shame.

I think about this every day because the fate of our world hangs on curiosity: either we will rediscover the importance and wonders of the soil and bugs and flowers and water and finally with the whole natural world, or this way will be forgotten.

People raised in the great wasteland of the suburbs and roads and buildings have never seen most of the plants and creatures that are supposed to fill every field and meadow. So many humans have never seen with their own eyes more than a scant few of the most common of hundreds of wildflowers that are supposed to surround them. Some live in biomes designated forest and have never witnessed truly mature trees. They do not know what the birds sound like. When they see an ordinary deer, they are awed and amazed by it or even afraid of it. They have never eaten any of the delicious wild fruits that grow in their homeland; all birds except starlings and robins and sparrows are so strange and beautiful that they stare in wonder. They confront insects like people on an alien planet encountering an unknown life form: What is this? Will it hurt me?

I cannot even describe the grief I feel on behalf of humans that grow up and live in the wasteland of pavement and lawn. That we are expected to live in these brutal environments, that we are expected to be content without the right or ability to live alongside living creatures, to walk among wildflowers, to hear birdsong, to feel the plush softness of moss, to see even common bees and butterflies—the fact that we live, work, and raise our children in poisonous wastes where nearly everything has been wiped out, and the simplest and most abundant of natural pleasures are rare privileges—it's cruel. It's a crime against the human spirit. It makes me so angry and sad.

When I started researching plants, I had no idea that I would end up expanding my mind so much that I would be virtually a different person within the year. Before I learned, I could not have imagined the diversity and beauty that exists in the world. My mind did not have the tools to come up with it.

I lived for over twenty years believing that there was only one species of firefly. I lived for over twenty years not knowing that the Southeastern US has native bamboo. I had never tasted the indescribable flavor of a pawpaw or seen the iridescent vibrance of a red-spotted purple butterfly. I had only seen a Pileated Woodpecker out the window of a car. I had never touched true topsoil, the soft, living blanket of rich, sweet-smelling earth full of mycelium, as springy and plush as a mattress. Just one year ago, I knew nothing!

Humans, as creatures, are insatiably curious and hunger for beauty. It is so cruel to deprive a human of relationship with their natural environment.

It is no wonder that we are all addicted to the internet—we have a crucial need that is unfulfilled. Compared with a forest, the world of lawns and buildings is so ridiculously flat and unstimulating. You would expect humans in such a place to feel constantly bored, restless, frustrated, and incurably sad.

I feel that lack of curiosity can be a chosen thing, but it is also a defense mechanism against a world that will feel like sandpaper on the senses of the curious.

But we need curiosity to fix this—we need the ability to notice the living things that have crept in at the edges of the wasteland and be infected and tormented by their beauty. We need to recognize the forest reaching into our cage in the form of tiny saplings. We need to discard the word "weed," not because it is derogatory because it is fundamentally incurious—it designates a plant as needing no identity outside of its unwantedness. We must learn their names. We must wonder what their names are.

My promise to myself and the land this year is to aggressively help native plants reclaim the barren city scapes I have access to. I don’t care if it’s ripped up again six months later. I will try.

listen...Plants Are Free. an acorn will become a tree. Fallen leaves will become rich soil. The wild creatures and plants will come. You don't have to give them money.

I say this, not to deny that land, soil, seeds, and water are all made into commodities, but as a WAY OF RESISTANCE

The plants are your allies. They are fighting back every day, endlessly, clawing to return to the pavement and hard eroded ground, the abandoned lots and gravel piles left behind by the pointless and endless pursuit of profit. They are giving us seeds and nuts and acorns as gifts. The dandelions and blackberries are given to us freely by abandoned and neglected ground. Here, take this fruit and eat. Here, take these acorns and plant them. Here, take these leaves and protect and build the soil. Rest in my shade. Breathe my breath.

What do we do to survive the horrible machine, the wasteland, the all-devouring dragon? Listen to the plants. Observe them closely, learn their ways, and all of us, each of us, do the smallest things we can to be caretakers—grow and distribute the seeds, learn the names of trees and common wildflowers, protect the smallest patches of resistance in neglected corners of our neighborhoods. Take photos of any plant not planted by human hands, honoring the dignity of weeds. In the future, there will be no word for "gardener," because we will all be caretakers to whatever small or great extent we can.

We are so fuckin back

They did it??? They actually fucking did it???

THIS IS AMAZING