Earth Day and a full moon

A few thoughts, a few photographs

I didn’t want to let this Earth Day slide past without at least a mention, a vote of confidence, a rousing voice from the cheering section.

Here in the South of France, we’ve had some perfect weather lately: warm during the day, cooler at night, with clear, crisp, fresh air. Air so clear that we’ve had several days with great views of the distant Pyrenees, still snow-capped. Yesterday I walked with my friends Maryse and Claude, all of us harvesting some thyme to dry and cook with during the coming year.

Today I celebrated Earth Day with a nice walk in the garrigue, the scrubby foothills just uphill from my house. There are a few photographs of Mother Nature’s handiwork, along with thoughts about this planet we call home.

“Within twenty to sixty seconds of exposure to nature, our heart rate slows, our blood pressure drops, our breathing becomes more regular, and our brain activity becomes more relaxed… Exposure to nature grants us a more expansive sense of time, and a more generous attitude toward the future… Time spent in nature relieves stress, restores mental equilibrium and enhances the ability to focus and sustain attention.”
– Annie Murphy Paul, The Extended Mind

“The Eyes of the Future are looking back at us and they are praying for us to see beyond our own time.”
– Terry Tempest Williams, Red: Passion and Patience in the Desert

“I think that we’ve lost our reciprocal relationship with the earth, and poetry has the ability to draw attention to the natural world, even if it’s the tree in your backyard or the pigeon on the street.”
– Ada Limón, current U.S. Poet Laureate and author of You Are Here: Poetry in the Natural World

“If I had influence with the good fairy who is supposed to preside over the christening of all children, I should ask that her gift to each child in the world be a sense of wonder so indestructible that it would last throughout life, as an unfailing antidote against the boredom and disenchantments of later years, the sterile preoccupation with things that are artificial, the alienation from the sources of our strength.

“If a child is to keep alive his inborn sense of wonder without any such gift from the fairies, he needs the companionship of at least one adult who can share it, rediscovering with him the joy, excitement and mystery of the world we live in.”​
– Rachel Carson

This year, the full moon is coming on 23 April, the day after Earth Day. It’s called the Pink Moon, so named because of this season of blooming flowers, especially the creeping phlox that is native to the northeastern U.S., where Native Americans named the full moon of this season the Pink Moon. April’s full moon has other names, too, including the Passover Moon; the Jewish holiday begins this year on 22 April, Earth Day.

I’m quite pleased that my little village has begun a new policy of turning off the street lights at night. Now when I step outside to check on the stars, the widespread orange glare is no more, and I can see countless stars glittering in the night sky.

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