On Tides

I walked out to the Christopher Street Pier in Manhattan yesterday. You can see the Freedom Tower (1 WTC) being built on the far left and Jersey City, NJ on the far right. You may also be able to make out the Statue of Liberty and the Verrazano Narrows Bridge in the far distance. It's doubtful that you can make it out from the picture, but as I arrived at the pier, the tide was coming in.

I became entranced as I watched water coming from two different directions and meet. The Hudson River flows to the south and empties into New York Harbor. The tide pushes sea water north up the river, sometimes well past the island of Manhattan. Eventually, the clashing water flow gave way to the stronger tidal advance and the river looked as if it was now flowing northward. Closest to the pier, however, you could still see fresh water from the Hudson trying its hardest to flow south.

Maybe it was the warmer-than-usual March air, or maybe it was my recent faith (belief system not religion) change, but the experience became a little of what you could call spiritual to me. I was left starry-eyed as I thought about how this happens everyday, multiple times a day, and has done so for thousands, if not millions of years. The species of the earth go by, but the planet tries its hardest to keep up with its rhythms. Nature is truly a spectacular, if not spiritual, experience.

I know it all sounds so cliché or trite, but for me it was another reminder of why I love this planet, of why I consider it so precious. I wish everyone could have at least one moment in their life where they connect with nature in such a primeval way. And then I wish they could have more of these moments. Honestly, we need many of these moments to realize how connected we are to this planet and to other species. It may sound like I'm spewing New Age love words about nature, and maybe I am, but the reality is this is our only home. This is the only planet we have, so shouldn't we treat it as if it is expendable.

For me, this is why global warming, climate change, loss of biodiversity, deforestation, ocean acidfication, etc. are such important issues that need to addressed. This is why solutions need to be implemented and new solutions need to be continually devised. Yes, I can find the romance in nature, but when it boils down to it, this planet has been around a lot longer than we have, so we shouldn't be the ones to bring it to its knees. It's our home too, so we are only doing our species a huge disservice by continuing to disregard and correct our impacts on it. Tides come and go, but a home never should.