Memory Reflections: Summer Trouble

  Today is somewhat cooler than it was this time of yesterday (and during all the last two weeks). The temperature counter in my kitchen said it got up to 96 degrees on my patio. This isn't a good reference to the rest of the town because my patio has a special talent of capturing all day sun. People would be, 'that's great, we don't get to enjoy sun 8 and a half months out of a year'. And it is great when there are cool currents still passing through to ease the blaring temperature fluctuations. However, when the air is stagnant and the sun is intense, everything wilts and it doesn't matter if the general high is 86 degrees, mine will be 98. Plants don't like this, as I mentioned yesterday at the end of my introduction. The first summer at our apartment I tried to garden, and it's fairly easy here, everything is green and grows in the Pacific Northwest... but everything just burned on my patio. It was depressing to say the least... reminding me of my hometown all too much. I couldn't garden there because mountain desert climates are not very forgiving unless you have a garden of cactus and junipers. And that doesn't give you any tomatoes, I'm afraid. *sigh* I found a way to remedy that! Well, my mother did when she came out to visit last summer. She got me some small simple bamboo shades to put up, and they filter out some of the sunlight so it's not as intense or hot to my plants, and this year my garden is flourishing! I'm excited to be a  proud plant momma, everything is green and lovely and I would never have been able to do it without those bamboo shades my mom got me. I'm beyond thankful for them.

So now that's the introduction to my patio. I think about it so often when I come out to tend to the plants. And when it is warm and I sit on my little seat here watching the forest like trees behind my apartment building, I'm constantly reminded how, once upon a time my hometown looked so similar to this. Of course it used to actually snow there, and here it simply rains in a constant drizzle. Also, it's not illegal here to barrel rainwater and use it for gardening... and yet it is illegal to do so in Colorado. They state that the rain belongs to the government and not the people even though it lands on your property...and then when arguing that, they go "besides it's not good for the underground aquifers, you're robbing it of its water source!". Well, studies have proven that to be untrue and that redirecting that rain water in a good positive way can actually help the environment.

I have the feeling this is going to turn into a rant about how the bureaucratic system with it's infinite ignorance has been destroying my hometown. And no, this isn't going to be a rant about Global Warming, because that's not the relevant situation to the extreme changes in Colorado's environment. The arguement of Global Warming is that everytime you fart, you destroy the environment, and everyone's carbon emissions for simply breathing is adding to that. So stop breathing and the planet will be saved. "Nope" I say..."I'm going to leave the political stuff at the door and we can pick that up when we leave".

No, the arguments for Colorado specifically are a series of situations that have led to it's progressive undoing. The region I'm most familiar with is the southern region, Fremont county to be exact. And the interesting and difficult thing about arguing and pointing this place out is that the Fremont county encompasses a large amount of different geographical areas. Plateaus deserts, wetlands from the river, plains, and deep canyons cut through rather impressive mountainous landscapes... it's all rather unique and spectacular. Like the entirety of Oregon shoved into a rather small scale model. Now within the ten years of my higher awareness of what's going on outside of myself, things have changed. Within the last five years horrifying fires have been devastating the environment around my little hometown region. The Waldo canyon fire in Colorado Springs, I was there for that one, is just one of the examples of the other 12 that happened all around the state in that summer alone. I was visiting family and the fire itself was roughly 30 minutes away as the crow flies. The winds kept it from coming towards us and instead had it blow to Colorado Springs, burning some rather expensive houses, instead of low income trailer parks with empty lands in between.

side note: 
(There's a little Robin Hood "HA HA" moment in there that I'm sure you can tell I really don't care about the rich people and like to think it's a pretty nasty Karma lesson... There was another Robin Hood "HAHA" moment last summer here when they said that there was some E.Coli poisoning in the water source because that resevoir of water for the town was kept near the Zoo and sometimes shit runs off into the water.... well the people who get that water in their tap are all upscale people who have seven bedroom homes for three people and import FiJi water just to bathe in and probably didn't have any issues with the e.coli except when Fifi the family's show poodle suddenly starts feeling sick because she's given half-ass filtered tap water) .... side ramble, sorry... Back to the fires!

I had an interesting conversation about them, because so many people were upset (as I was too). So many people were stating "mother nature is a powerful bitch" blah blah blah...mother nature can be unforgiving..... well I'm sorry to break it to those people but the fire was not Mother Nature. In fact, they caught a guy who was responsible for setting three of the smaller fires alone. So... Mother nature is responsible for that pyromaniac's intentional fire starting? Mother nature is responding to our meddling. People who started to settle the areas around my hometown many many years ago, were told to plant Russian Olive trees around their homesteads when they cleared out large areas to be used for agricultural. Russian Olive trees are fast growers, and they can handle dry climates, which is what the original settlers wanted from them (interesting thing about the Russian Olive trees, they have long sharp needle spines and if you pluck the leaves and crush them, they smell like citric oranges *something from my childhood*). However, the area wasn't entirely dry climate, and the Russian olive trees found water, exploded to exponential levels and sucked all the water from the native plants, killing them and depleting the top soil of all it's nutrients. These are common characteristics of a dangerous invasive species. That...was man's doing. Not Mother Nature's.  In response, the area is dryer, and harder to cultivate. Leaving it to be a nice kindling box for potential fires.

An Example of a Healthy Colorado pine forest.

Another thing man did as a response to his first mistake was to become deeply conservative about the forest and the remaining native trees there, working to keep it from changing. The intention behind it was rather good, but it was harmful like the Russian Olive trees. If you ever drive through the area between Colorado Springs and Canon City, you'll notice what I'm talking about. The pine trees are rather small like a series of super anorexic 13 year olds, crammed together in a tuna can. You'll notice that as a tree dies in this environment, it doesn't fall to the ground, it merely leans up against it's neighbors and wither into an ugly dry stick. Now, when a tree dies, it falls to the ground and moss and worms and insects and mold come in to decompose it so all the nutrients that the tree borrowed to sustain itself returns to the earth so more trees and plants can use it. It's a natural cycle, the system in which life is supposed to do it's business. That tree leaning against its neighbor isn't decomposing into the earth, it's becoming bleached and petrifying in the sun...the nutrients it took aren't being returned to help future saplings. Do you see the problem? We have the same issue that happens with our food production all the time. We grow produce on a farm, then those plants get harvested and shipped to the supermarkets to be sold. Those nutrients leave the soil with the produce, and if the farmer doesn't do something to replenish the soil, the next season's crop won't be as healthy or as nutritious. Farmers know this now, they had to learn it through the dust bowl of the 1930s. Lessons... that's what they are. The Waldo Canyon fire.... and the other fires around the state... were lessons for us.

An Example of a Sick Colorado Pine Forest outside Co. Springs

 The only way that tree leaning against its neighbor can be returned to the earth is when it burns into ashes. Which, sadly enough, causes the semi healthy trees around it to burn too because the dead one turns into a lovely fire ladder.... and the "healthier neighbors" are not fire resistant at the top of the tree. This is going further into man's meddling.... the pH value is being altered, and not by mr. so-and-so's Diesel truck emissions. Barium and aluminum is creating a poison in the soil that's making the trees sick so they die and then lean up against their neighbors instead of properly decomposing. Barium and aluminum pollution isn't something the common day people can do to the earth. The only thing I'm going to say about this, is this is something that was started as government tests in the southern Colorado region (cause the military are big out there) back in 1965. A project called Geo-Thermal Engineering (basically a form of weather control). I'll refer you to a movie if you want more information about it... called "What in the world are they spraying?" and about chem-trails behind planes and jets and its effects on the natural vegetation. Now it alludes to some conspiracy ideas, and I'm not sure where you stand on them, but I see the evidence in the destruction to my home forests and speculation can only go so far.

Here's the link for that, cause I get the feeling you may not actually put the time into finding it.  ( What In The World Are They Spraying? [full length] )

Doesn't matter the question of why, what their motivation is if it's a negative "New World Order" agenda, or a corporation conspiracy to making money or this is how they control weather from HAARP or if they are sincerely wanting to do good for the environment.... doesn't matter.... the point is, they are spraying intentionally and there are side effects of what they are spraying. Speculate whatever way you want, but don't for God's sake, blame it as Mother Nature because it is man's meddling and these things are coming back to nip us in the butt. And don't bother with you're messages of Global warming because blah blah blah- Southern Colorado is not a good example of the rest of the world's environmental issues. Just like the temperature on my patio is not a good example for the rest of the town's weather.

ugh. I'm tired now... and made myself very angry over this and partially spiteful and bitter. I'm a passionate individual at times, and sometimes I just care too much. It's irrelevant to me now, I don't interact with Colorado except in my memories and the few weeks that I spend there in summer. I've spent 19 years of my life in Colorado, I know it better than anywhere else. And in my hometown alone I see things and make connections others don't and at times it frustrates me to no end. That's the reasoning behind the condescending tone I have at times. I apologize if it got preachy, and I apologize if it was offensive to you and your beliefs. I don't knock anything down because everything is connected in a way. Just find the connection...follow it and understand it. That's all I ask really.

And you just got yourself 20 brownie points if you stuck through and read the whole thing. Congratulations!