The rest of the country...

I have once again visited the lands between the coasts. I know it may seem silly, but the northeast seaboard has an odd effect on its denizens. We have developed a sub-culture. We wonder at polls, we are amazed at discussions of hunting and horseback riding. The media, being centered in large metropolitan areas, adds to our simplistic views. But like any generalization, it is by definition flawed.

So we visit lands where three story buildings are rare and the top 40 radio is not the radio we know. We are reminded of trailer parks and open land. We go to places where one can actually get lost. By the way, if you get lost in the forests of Maryland and have a map, natural selection has chosen you for extinction.

We go camping as recreation. We complain about our drinking water, but it is never a health risk. We basically live in Nirvana. Tornadoes are legends here. Snowstorms are dealt with quickly and efficiently. Our "droughts" require people to water their lawns at dusk.

I am not saying we don't have our own problems, but realistically, these difficulties are caused by human interaction and lack of equity, not by external conditions. A bad crop doesn't really effect us. Pricing for consumer goods are standardized. We actually have a working public transportation system to complain about. In many cases, we don't have to consider septic systems. We talk about "urban sprawl", but in reality we are just discussing a change in the population density of suburban areas. There is no real untouched land for miles around. The "natural" areas around Philadelphia are new forest that was simply leveled long ago.

Now, nothing is ever black-and-white. There are places in the inner city that lack many of the benefits the structure provides. There are areas far from the beaten path that have all the underlying infrastructure.

There have been great strides in constructing homes that allow us to actually live with the land. The technology is close at hand that will allow self-sufficient construction. We aren't quite there yet, but we aren't far off. In the interim, people like myself should stick to urban environments.

What I realized when traveling along the asphalt laid between areas of New Mexico is that my own thoughts and good intentions were dangerous. The areas we passed could be turned into solar and wind farms easily. We could employee many people building infrastructure that would keep the lights on. We could lessen our need for fossil fuel burning plants. We could... destroy some of the only beautiful places we have left. We could redefine an ecosystem that has existed for millennia. We could loosen our belt another notch to encourage more construction. We could worry less about our consumption. We could in a word get a limited reprieve.

I can be a little devious in my views of environmental change. I actually would encourage an increase in gas prices. I would actually encourage taxing of power companies that continue to use coal and oil combustion. Yes, I know what effect this would have on the average American, and yes, I want that to happen. I know it's brutal, but years of yelling from the mountain top about climate change could not have the same effect as months of gasoline at more than $3/gallon.

Regardless of what you may think about environmental consciousness, the fact is that oil is not a renewable resource. We are going to run out of it. If you have any other limited resource, the only viable option is to conserve. Yes, burning less fossil fuel has a dramatic effect on a number of things but the simplest one is that it doesn't run out.

Now, will all the wells suddenly run dry... no. But it doesn't have to. If you burn more than you pump, you will be playing catch up all the time. You will have to ration... globally. Could you imagine the result? How long do you think it would take for a military power to begin seizing oil fields? Openly?

We need to figure out how to live on less than we pump. The oil won't go bad. I will always be opposed to burning it, but compared to warfare, carbon emissions are of little concern. We need to learn to live on the resources that are available to us, not just keep searching for new resources. This planet could be our garden home. We could set up systems that would allow us to be in a condensed space and let the rest of the denizens of this planet have their space. This wouldn't take some new advancement in technology (although those will inevitably help). It would simply take initiative.

If $5/gallon for gasoline generates that initiative, so be it. If rolling brown-outs generates that initiative, so be it. The current path we are on leads to desolation. A perpetual headlong run into a future none of us wants (or at least wants in polite conversation).

We can change direction. We are amazing, beautiful creatures that can respect nature without fearing it. We have been given the gift of stewardship over this planet. We have been poor regents. Earth, fire, sea, and air have all been made to kneel to our whims during our tenure. We have proven our power. It is now time to prove our wisdom.