iguanamountain blog

NATURE IS REALITY

         

Prompt: In the Washington Post today: “New research suggests nature walks are good for your brain.” What do you think about this finding, and do you take nature walks at all?

         
         I have two extremes in my life---To be on a sailboat in the Caribbean surrounded by fluid nature---And to be at the Farm (we call it a farm), which is about twenty acres of pure jungle except where it’s cleared around the house and roads. Every window on all four sides open onto pure green. Palm trees, Banana trees, Papaya, Fan Palms, Coconut Palms, huge flowering trees, little flowering trees, and all filled with dozens of species of birds. I guess I should add there are swarms of mosquitos as well.
         
         On June 19 I blogged: Wind Song House, about the house itself and another part of nature, the trade winds.
         
         I went out yesterday and walked around the square of wild jungle that has been left untouched in the middle of the subdivision. There is just a narrow trail in to the center where the owner maintains a small water drip to keep a birdbath sized tank full of water. When we have weeks of dry weather, that’s the only fresh water for the creatures inside this habitat. Inside the jungle the ground is usually dry with dead wood and brush and leaves, since no sunlight reaches the ground. Overhead the trees soar thirty to fifty feet with everything reaching for the sun into a dense canopy.
         
         I’m sure if one sat still long enough they would see the snakes, lizards, scorpions and maybe an iguana, small deer and different insects. The birds raise a ruckus if you walk too near their nests.
         
         The thing about this subdivision is that it is almost totally overgrown and no other houses. Overgrown cane fields and more jungle surround on three sides with the highway on the other. This environment, like the ocean is excellent for my brain, for anyone’s brain. I also get at least half an hour of sun everyday, unless it’s raining. But then rain in the jungle is different from rain in the city.
         
         Nature is not a concept that should be separate from humans. Being isolated in a man made city is not totally correct, especially if there is no contact with the natural world. There are rhythms and cycles that are part of this Earth, and we as humans are part of that, even if sometimes we pretend we are not.
         
         Be happy, take a walk! (or a boat) >>>iggy