Category: Norm Reynolds

What warms my heart on this cold/windy/rainy day is a Leo Tolstoy story What Men Live By that I recently revisited from that assortment of already read, but might want to revisit books I call a bookcase. It was Wednesday, my respite, reading, ukuleleing, resting day off at the “beachhouse”—a small waterfront cabin that a most generous friend allows me to use for my weekly day of regeneration.

For whatever else COVID 19 has taught us, it has, most powerfully, compelled us to recognize that our well being is not a solitary struggle; we are, our existence, our well being, inextricably connected to the lives and well being of all those with whom we share this beautiful and endangered planet.

The thing about Planet of the Humans that is so terrifying is that it doesn’t just point to one group or one action, it, very blatantly, says there are limits to how much of us and our greedy ways that Planet Earth will take—no matter how you colour it–we need much less of it. We need to reenvision what we do, how we do AND how much can our beleaguered Earth endure without succumbing rather than just painting over the old ways with a thin green veneer.

When the recovery from the Coved 19 pandemic comes, I hope/pray that it does not come as a misguided return to the dead end unlimited growth way it was. Mother Nature(Gaia) is speaking very pointedly to humanity: what we are doing is not sustainable and will not sustain human civilization on Earth. Indeed, it is imperative that all of us recognize that Coved 19 may well be Nature’s last warning to a deluded and all-too-arrogant humanity.