Christian's Nature Blog

I have been thinking about Thomas Merton’s passage “Rain and the Rhinoceros.”   While I do not feel as if I am an outsider in the city as he does, I think he reflects on some important concepts that evade most people. His initial quip about the rain becoming sold as a commodity one day started his argument that some believe that “what has no price has no value.”   I have always been fascinated by the relationship between price and value when considering products or services.   Often, people are terrible at determining the value of something without considering its price. We have been taught to understand that “you get with you pay for” so an expensive item must be more valuable than its cheaper counterpart. With that said, how do we determine the value of the land without a price tag? Is it even fair to put a monetary value on something that existed far before us? I was thinking about these questions when Michelle was talking on Wednesday about how F...

Blue is a pleasant color and, evidently, I am not the only one who thinks it, too. In fact, a survey study conducted by sociologist Philip Cohen at the University of Maryland concluded that blue is most people’s favorite color. Luckily for me and these favorite color friends, I believe it is the color that we are exposed to most. After all, the sky alone fills nearly half of our vision when we are outdoors.   Right now, I am staring at the pale blue sky lit above my head. Fluffy, deformed clouds dot the atmosphere but barely cover the vast canvas behind them. On clear days, the blue appears to continue forever. In addition to blue skies, humans surround themselves with more blues: lakes, rivers, waterfalls, and oceans. We gravitate toward blue and I cannot help but think that an underlying programing exists in our being that causes us to enjoy the color. Maybe the fact that it is one of the colors we are exposed to most makes it our favorite, but I argue that we a...

It is interesting how some trees have these nodules in their trunk. I call them nodules only because I do not know what else to say and a nodule is the best description I can provide.   Nonetheless, the nodules have this peculiar appearance of an eye. It has different texture and coloring than the surrounding bark. Slightly darker and raised. Round of course, and a shade heavier on the inside to resemble the pupil. Perhaps it serves as a reminder that the tree too is living, breathing, interacting with us and the other animals. It is obvious the squirrels and foxes are alive because they can communicate. While this communication rarely occurs through voice, we still interpret their movements and do not need to be reminded that they are filled with life. By contrast, the trees and plants are silent except for the sounds made through their interaction with an outside force. While unmoving, the “eye nodule” of a tree gives us an avenue to connect through some...