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I lived in Portland, OR up until 1983. During the 1970's I shared an apartment with a guy who was a member of the Sierra Club. There was then, as now, a lot of discussion about just how the National Forests should be used, with the Sierra Club advocating "Leave 'em alone" and the local loggers advocating "Cut 'em down". The Forest Service did a study called RARE II to make a decision. Among the areas hotly contested were substantial parts of the Gifford Pinchot National Forest in southern Washington State. In 1980, non-human forces took a hand and made the whole issue moot. Mount St. Helens blew up and leveled the whole area under discussion. In the book "Life on the Mississippi" (absolutely fantastic; if you haven't read it, you should) Mark Twain talks about how he'd been told of some money which was hidden in a building in a certain town. Later in life he returned to that town to retrieve it, only to find that the Mississippi River had shifted and washed the entire town away. The world doesn't care about humans. Beaches change and erode. The fact that you're stupid enough to put a building right on the shoreline doesn't mean that the ocean has to leave you alone. Ultimately, the ocean will win. We don't rule the earth; we merely live on it. (discuss) |
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