Waveny.net

There’s a lot of garbage in Waveny these days. From piles of construction debris to tires to common roadside litter. Never before, in the long history of the Lapham Estate, has the property degraded more in one year than it had in 2008. Under the guise of beneficial development we have turned walking trails into paved roadways, turned fields once abundant with flowers, grasses and wildlife into toxic wastelands and altered the woodland to accommodate an endless convoy of diesel spewing dumptrucks and machinery. Since there is nothing any one of us can do to stop ‘progress’ from devouring our extremely limited and, now more than ever, quickly fleeting resources, i.e., Nature, I have come to a sense of desolation and exasperation. So be it. I give up. Who cares what we leave for our children? At least we can look back at the archives of this website and show them pictures of a time when animals had a habitat and Nature lovers could walk along thin dirt covered trails through the woods without standing to the side while a giant dumptruck blast by…

I spent my Valentine’s Day alone this year. During the day I took a walk through Waveny Park. A walk through my favorite woods gives me a chance to escape my small world for a moment and think a bit more clearly. Being immersed in Nature gives meaning to my existence and lends a perspective on my mortality and my significance in the Grand Scheme of things. It is a place where I am in Love.

I am glad to have a perspective which allows me to see the garbage as Art and the changes taking place as yours, not mine. I am not one with just the bent steel rusting in the puddle but rather, I am one with all of it; The puddle, the metal, the damage and the persistence of Nature to overcome the greed-fueled abuses of mankind. Am I separate from those that litter and spit upon the landscape without regard? I relate to the grass growing around coffee cups and discarded 5-gallon pails. I relate to the animals large and small pushed away onto increasingly smaller islands of safety and sustenance.
Anyway, I’m sure this is all quite boring to you. Go bury a tire so you can earn your five dollars and buy more plastic plates to throw away. Go drive your car and look out the window at the pretty trees lining the Waveny property…  Maybe, just maybe, you will remember these pictures of the garbage that is eating away at the backside of those trees when they are all that is left of what was once Waveny’s Forest.