Broken Forests

Rain is not a stranger to Oregon, nor is wind. We expect and even welcome our winter rains. They bring the green, lush beauty we so treausre here. The winds have blown for eons in the Pacific Northwest and will continue long after we are all gone. But also all gone are too many of our forests to the insatiable, unsustainable greed of the logging industry. Clear cuts abound until our beautiful woods appear to have contracted a bad case of mange. The scabs appear unbroken except for the tender and fragile growth of newly planted and very young "tree farms." This winter our land and our people began to pay the price for this insatiable "need" to harvest our forests. The rain had nothing to stop its flow long enough to soak into the soil. It could do nothing but bring the loose mud down the slopes and into the towns and homes in its path. The wind had nothing to sway and slow its terrible force until that force broke the forest into little shards and pieces to fall sadly on the soil that had nurtered it and given it height and breadth. Our forests are broken along with our hearts as we look at the damage.

It will be many years before this damage will no longer be so obvious. Storms have always been a part of this land and they have always been destructive. A mentor of mine had a saying that applied to another subject, but I think it applies here as well. She used to say "It's not nice to mess with Mother Nature." I think we have messed with Mother Nature a little too much here. We need to rethink what our needs really are and not continue to destroy everything in our path.