EARTH DAY: A Tribute to the Healing Power of Our Oceans

DARK WATERS

From the little girl fighting a raging undertow,

To a tween by a shaded stream where she'd go with the flow.

Or as she looked for tadpoles; Back Swimmers in the fens,

Water was not her enemy, but a wondrous friend.

~

Skating on forbidden ponds,

As a teenager who felt all sounds

She swam away from angry frowns,

And sought adventure in shadowy places,

Careless minds and unlit spaces.

~

Dimmed lights that spread across a city’s black sky;

Cavernous sewers; wet concrete walls.

Still no fear, no reason to ask why,

Until shadow figures' final cries; towering falls.

~

Refuge found on sands of magic,

But never forgotten: victims, pasts tragic;

Nor all those who lost their lives,

Under an island's blue and sunny skies.

~

Years along she swims in capricious seas,

Though dusted with strands of gray,

Saddled with weakened knees;

A lonely girl has found a lost friend,

The older woman can begin again.

And the poet who sees surface plums atop crystal alters,

Can now embrace the depths of shadow waters.

 ***

Originally written to promote my novel, Shadowwater, 2013. ALL RIGHTS RESERVED.

 For more info about my books, please go to www.shadowwater.net

LINE IN THE SAND

Border between Orleans/Eastham, National Seashore. (Merrily Cassidy, Cape Cod Times, ALL RIGHTS RESERVED)

Grown men and women squabbling over a piece of sand and which town it belongs to, you think I'm kidding? When will people get over themselves and realize, as our indigenous people have for centuries, that we "don't own the land." In the case of two towns in Massachusetts, Orleans and Eastham, old timers wax nostalgic about how they used to go camping on what is now the spit where the ocean has reclaimed its territory.

Forget about the nesting plovers, mention the endangered birds to residents here and many wave their hands in disgust. "They're just birds, for heaven's sake." Yes, god-fearing citizens become rabid about those plovers keeping ATV (all-terrain vehicles) from their human sanctuary.

A well-meaning  supporter recently approached me about asking Eastham to annex a portion of their beach for ATV for Orleans. I heard his proposition and told him: "I'm on the fence about the issue." He sighed with displeasure as if I'd wounded Peter Pan.

Doesn't anyone understand what's going on outside of their own, self-involved disappointments? The ocean is retaking what is rightfully its own. Cape Cod will continue to lose beach, particularly with the escalation of climate change. We are as much at risk here as other low-lying communities are elsewhere. Tom Stone, scientist emeritus, Woods Hole  Research Center, emphasized the acceleration of beach erosion in part due to the changing climate (at a March 2015 talk given at the Cape Cod Museum of Natural History).

Nauset Barrier Spit (Panoramio.com)

As a vacation destination, visitors come here to flee the day-to-day stressors and enjoy all the Cape has to offer. Year-round retirees and other residents must get out of their cocoon. Living here all year means accepting that along with human destruction, outside forces affect this paradise. Yes, promoting tourism is essential, and that includes places to escape to, but not places to escape from. We who live here must put aside "Kodak moments," and see the digital image of what is happening now.

***

Read SHADOWWATER & DARK SEA (Shadowwater II) for more about life on Cape Cod seen through a novelist's eyes. www.shadowwater.net

NOVA CAPE COD

Cape Cod's cold, damp weather, with a sprinkling of warmer, sunnier days, recollect trips to Down East (Maine) and Montreal, Canada when I was a child. The water temperature prohibited our swimming off the coast in Augusta (summer, 1972) and we welcomed the Underground during April snowy days in Montreal. Yet, during that last trip to Montreal (1971) we had occasional warmth making it possible to take a carriage ride, top down, along the cobbled streets of the Old Town. More so, in those days, my father would often pine about traveling to Nova Scotia, but he and my mother eventually elected to go to Old Scotland (the Hebrides) instead.

As some readers/followers know, I live on Cape Cod, home of the four seasons, I mean the three seasons, excuse me two seasons. . .rain and cold; heat and humidity. Wait! Am I writing about weather? No, I'm writing about climate which has changed, a lot.

In the beginning, when my parents used to drive up to Cape Cod for summer vacations or off seasons to stay with friends, we expected the unexpected, especially if we came in June. Rain for days and one or sunny days where we'd traipse off to the beach. July brought more predictable weather. However, since I started living here eight years ago, the weather patterns have changed significantly. Informed residents have little doubt that climate change is the cause.

Still, we have our naysayers. It may be that older generations, for example, recall a Cape Cod that reminded them of the Old World, especially England, Ireland, Scotland or other notorious cold and rainy countries. Since 2007, the onset of winter has been delayed and the welcoming of spring has stretched out to June. Last year, spring came and went like a sudden gale as we all looked around wondering if we'd had a warming at all.

Moreover, the Old World countries like Great Britain and Ireland have had their share of record warm temps as well.

As with other places with historic record-breaking weather events, Boston, and parts of Cape Cod had snowfall totals beyond memory this year. Moreover, the summers no longer sway back and forth between dry, hot days with cool evenings or rainy, damp days and nights. No, increasing humidity has mold growing in places some didn't believe possible. Where's a dehumidifier when you need one?

Sadly, only misery gets attention. Local fish is getting more expensive and limited.The amount of fresh fish, especially cod (cod, as in Cape Cod for landlubbers) is disappearing at such a rapid rate--not just overfishing but also the warming waters--that commercial fishermen have found an alternative dogfish that they are exporting to other countries, but that market has become saturated and the percentage return is low.

For the first time in weeks, we finally had a sunny day, today, a high of @48 degrees. One fellow I met wore shorts, a t-shirt and flip-flops. The forecast for tonight? Rain, changing to snow. And, with the holidays coming, I'm not holding my breath that we'll have a significant shift in temperature, conditions.

For climate change-deniers, I wouldn't hold your breath that the world's major climate shift, including the one we've seen in the U.S., will go away--otherwise you may turn blue, even die of oxygen depletion. Oh, without trees, with increasing carbon dioxide gas and a slow reaction to reducing pollution, you may actually succumb to asphyxiation.

Okay, at the moment we're breathing (please read my earlier blog on "Health, Pollution and Climate Change."), cough, cough, and the prospects for cleaner air on Cape Cod are hopeful, but the Cape I and others grew up with,  a living organism that changes with the wind (including the peninsula's distinctive elbow shape) may well become a figment of our collective imagination if we don't face reality.

WHY MY BOOKS MATTER: DARK SEA (Shadowwater II) & SHADOWWATER (1st in series)

“As our physical world is destroyed, our spiritual one is becoming more and more essential. People of all faiths, even atheists, have to have something to believe in. Indigenous ones are particularly vulnerable to this massive shift in our world’s culture: overpopulation, oligarchies, climate change…” (Excerpted from Dark Sea, Shadowwater II; All Rights Reserved)

If you react strongly to the above statement, you will connect with my latest book, Dark Sea (Shadowwater II). My stories include rapid changes to Cape Cod's environment, the indigenous population and corporate greed. Characters grapple with their personal faith and the dark and light of nature.

Characters include often strong, independent men and women, based in reality, but transported, changed by preternatural or outside forces. Is the villain a hero to you or the hero a villain? Contradiction, layers, delving deeper along with action that keep moving, like scenes from a motion picture. 

"In many ways the entire novel feels like reading a movie script and except for the places where the author shows off her prose skills. . .the way the scenes are contrived, planned and executed, and the way each scene cuts away smoothly to draft into a new one, all reminds you of a cinematic experience." (Kevin Peter, www.moterwriter.com/Midwest Book Review).

A recurring theme is how Cape Cod has ever-increasing man-made threats to its environment and people. Whether you're an artist, biologist, entrepreneur, teacher or writer you will recognize familiar challenges stemming from unexpected events.

You will be happily surprised by this unique adventure.

Wendy Shreve's first book in the series, SHADOWWATER, is also available on Amazon, Barnes & Noble (Kindle/Nook) and your local bookstore. Go to www.shadowwater.net for reviews, upcoming events, author bio and an excerpt from SHADOWWATER. 

LIFE WITH PI (3/14/15): WHY SHOULD WE CELEBRATE?

All week the media has promoted today's date and π. Other than a reverence for the mathematical symbol or the movie, Life of Pi, what makes this day worth noting? First, the date occurs approximately every 100 years. Five digits 3.1415 (and more digits once we include time with seconds later in day).

According to the Washington Post, meteorologists use  π in weather system models, such as the European global predictor. We're also reminded pi is used to calculate the ratio of a circle's circumference to its diameter. (Jason Samenow, 3/13/15).  Moreover, mathematicians and scientists are extolling how pi as a basic building block. Why does it matter to the world at large?

You don't have to be a nerd to understand that via cyberspace, science has lifted its secretive cloaking device to reveal to the world mathematical operations which have a direct effect on our lives. Living scientists have become superstars Neil DeGrasse Tyson, Stephen Hawking and Michio Kaku  (also in part due to their appearances on television). Mathematicians have less notoriety. Scientists need to have an advanced understanding of advanced math to theorize and then apply their hypotheses.Earlier figures such as Kepler and Doppler may also be familiar. However, can the average reader name a famous mathematician in recent memory?

If you saw, The Imitation Game, you'd know about Alan Turing who broke the Enigma code during World War II. How about Benoit Mandelbrot? I learned about him as I did my research for this blog. If I wrote that Arthur C. Clarke said Mandelbrot (1924-2010) had been responsible for finding "one of the most beautiful and astonishing discoveries {a set of numbers that bear Mandelbrot's name} in the entire history of mathematics," would I get your attention? Or that he uncovered fractal geometry? Don't blame the lyricist for children learning the word "fractals" in "Let It Go," from Frozen. Instead, thank Mandelbrot for discovering formulas based on fractals that created the cellphone and computer chips. (Shea Gunther, MNN)

Yes, I loved math but I have to admit I loathed geometry (I recently learned that I have a learning disability which made learning that branch of math more than challenging. If I'd only known. . .), and therefore was advised not to study physics. Over the years I have read as much as I could about physicists, scientists, but few mathematicians. Without math there would be no science. Maybe a celebration of π, should be heralded, if only to remember those mathematical geniuses I've mentioned today.

Wendy Shreve is the author of Shadowwater and Dark Sea (Shadowwater II). Go to www.shadowwater.net for more information.

MAKING NOTHING OUT OF SOMETHING

Ferguson (MSNBC/Google Images)

Take an issue, any issue: dissect and inspect it, make observations, postulate theories, until there is nothing left but debris. That's the world as I see it. Parsing has become an obsession without providing substantive, proactive solutions. Solutions, how close the word is to resolutions. We can resolve to find a solution, but how often do we?

All right, I'll get to my point. People present a problem, e.g. on Twitter, but how often do they go out and try to fix it? For example, dismissiveness has become the norm in conversations. Person A might me driving their car when a truck suddenly pulls out in front of her/him. Person A reacts with: "Someone should take that driver off the road!" The truck has an 800 number on the back, but does Person A stop to call to file a complaint? No, instead when Person B the passenger in the car suggests calling, Person A replies: "You call them. I'm driving."

Already the incident of the reckless truck driver has been diffused as Person A passes the responsibility off to Person B. Person B resents being saddled with Person A's problem and says, "You're the one who's angry." And so on, until nothing happens.

"Better to concentrate on their driving" would be a typical reaction. But what if that truck driver were to go on and make a reckless left turn, ripping the passenger side off of a woman's car (with two children in the back seat) with the victim's car at a stop light? And the offender left the scene of the accident? (This paragraph example is a true story, no one was hurt).

A great story, Pay It Forward, by Catherine Ryan Hyde (published in 1999) shows us the wonder of how helping one person without expecting anything in return could change a community. I'd argue that people should also help prevent others from becoming victims by speaking out before one or more persons is hurt.

Not long ago, "Just do it!" became a familiar phrase to enable an individual to not hesitate, to be proactive. Oprah then Nike delivered the powerful message. How many actually listened? Unknown. It's true self-motivation helps. Nevertheless, helping your community by preventing crime (reasonably), abuse, near-fatal accidents, suicides, and other tragic events makes the world a better place for everyone.

The next step needs to be to stop the whining and make it happen. "Black Lives Matter," and the Climate Change Marches showed the world the huge obstacles that must be overcome regarding social justice and environmentalism. However, many have been daunted by the enormity of activism. They needn't be. All one man, woman, teenager or child needs to do is see or listen and act.

DARK SEA, SHADOWWATER II - EXCERPT

Cape Cod. June. One year later.

Auto-pilot OFF. Until this moment, he’d replayed in his head the running battle with his father about working this summer. Only nineteen. He wasn't an adult in most states yet. Sure, working with the professor was an honor. And his father had paid good money to secure his son’s job as a lab assistant, but … the warming sun and cooling blue water of Cape Cod Bay, the girls in their micro-bikinis...A familiar voice bellowed inside the pilot’s head, FOCUS!

Remembering his cargo, the teenager sat up, determined to land his Cessna in Hyannis before his 5:00 pm pick-up. He banked west to head back to the airport when he spotted a gaggle of geese above an inlet. They had been flying their usual V-formation until they dove, like Spitfires heading toward their target. Beneath them was a small cottage. A woman with blazing strawberry-blonde hair and wearing a long, white cover-up which revealed her figure and ivory skin, stood outside her screened-in porch. The pilot followed the geese, spreading them everywhere, when the woman’s arms rose as if she were praying, and a light so powerful … BUMP. The pilot’s cockpit window was doused with streams of blood intermixed with sticky black, brown, and white feathers—he had no idea how many geese he’d hit, startled. 

Now his hands on the yoke began to shake and perspiration ran down his forehead. He wiped his brow and tried to breathe as he noticed the windshield had patches left uncovered, he wasn't flying completely blind, when a red light flashed and a dissonant noise warned that the plane was in trouble. The young man pulled his wheel with all his upper-body strength, and then spotted a field. Not my destination, but it’ll do. As the kid got closer and closer to the ground, Here goes nothing, he grabbed the wheel tighter and pulled. And then there was—nothing.

E-book available on Kindle.

COPYRIGHT 2014 Wendy Shreve ALL RIGHTS RESERVED