This post is for my class COMM428, Environmental Communication. We were encouraged to find a creative way of expressing our relationship with the environment besides a paper and I chose to put it here so more than just my professor could read. This comes in three parts - my time in Colorado, Northern New York, and beyond. I hope you enjoy.
ColoradoMy eco-biography began in the Denver Metropolitan area at the foot of the Rocky Mountains in Colorado where I was born. My parents had fewer belongings and less expensive cars than my friends. What they did have were art and outdoor gear centered on the mountains. Living in a mountainous climate that was very dry, I was raised with a respect for my surrounding environment. I grew up with the threat of forest fires and droughts because of how dry the land was. As a result, I still conserve water and carefully monitor fires when outdoors. And living near the mountains made it easy to navigate because the mountains were always to the west. |
I lived in a suburban neighborhood from age 4 to 14 at the foot of a couple of flat-topped mountains we called “mesas”. North and South Table Mountain were within 10 minutes driving and an hour walking. I still have pictures from several ascents to the tops of the mesas and the waterfall that sat at the top of North Table Mountain, the mesa closest to where I lived. Iconic images filled the local news more than 10 years ago when a forest fire broke out on the mesa, scorching the delicate flora and a couple of nearby houses. But what struck me the most was the rate at which the vegetation repaired itself in just a few short years. North Table Mountain repaired itself with little indication of the previously desolated landscape.
Since The Rocky Mountains were basically in our backyard, my family spent a lot of time hiking, biking, and camping. It’s entertaining to describe to friends now that Denver alone was a mile above sea level. Towns such as Leadville and South Park exceeded 2 miles in elevation which I saw on every trip into the Rockies. We always had good hiking boots, waterproof outerwear, and knowledge on what bikes were good in the mountains and how to pitch a tent. Colloquial terms like “Timber Line” (the point at which trees stop growing because of the lack of oxygen) and “fourteener” (hikes that surpassed 14,000 feet in elevation) still echo in my memories of family trips and the surrounding community’s leisurely activities. And while I never learned how to ski or snowboard like a good Coloradoan, I spent enough time in the mountains to claim a permanent home and getaway space in the mountains. |
I traveled not just in the Rockies in my childhood, but in the American Southwest. One of the most iconic trips my family took was through the four “corner states”, Colorado, Utah, Arizona, and New Mexico. Over the course of a week, we visited the natural and cultural landmarks spread across the corner states. After passing through the Rockies on our way to Utah, we visited Arches National Park, a large collection of natural outcroppings in the Utah desert. We of course took pictures in from of the iconic Delicate Arch – carefully because of the fragility of the landscape. Then into Arizona, we camped on the north side of the Grand Canyon. It’s still possible to hike down the bottom of the canyon and see the Colorado River in action, but we chose to stay at the top and admire the view. After camping in the red New Mexican desert, the last leg of the trip took us through Mesa Verde in southern Colorado. We saw the ancient living quarters of Native Americans who carved their small city into the side of a cliff. Growing up near the Ute and Navajo reservations, my family also educated me on the cultural and environmental history of Native Americans. I remember that by the end of the trip, I was so done being around my family and sleeping in the sweltering desert. But looking back now, I wish I had a greater appreciation for the marvels I saw at such a young age.
By the time we moved from Colorado to New York, I had strong attachments to the landscape I grew up in. Still when I go back to visit, I make an effort to visit the mountains and the outdoor landscape. We still go up into Morrison, Colorado where the Red Rocks Amphitheater is to celebrate the Winter Solstice with the local Pagan population. The purpose of celebrating the solstice, a representation of longer days and better harvest, reflects the respect for the land that many Coloradoans have. And of course, drumming up the sun with hundreds of Pagans is a festivity I will always participate in.
Northern New YorkI moved to Morristown, New York at age 14 after my parents separated. My grandparents bought property on Black Lake in the 1970’s and still had a trailer on the land as their vacation spot to this day. We stayed there for a couple weeks until finding a log cabin on the main road in Morristown to rent. Here, I had an entirely new experience with the local environment. New York is obviously more humid and at a lower altitude, but the focus on the local flora and fauna was more evident since they simply had more of it. How people in Northern New York interacted with their environment was very different from what I was used to. |
The prominence of New York’s bodies of water was one of the first characteristics I wasn’t used to. Not just the Saint Lawrence River which Morristown was built on, but the Great Lakes and the hundreds of small streams and rivers leading to the Atlantic Ocean colored local environmental interactions. Having that much water nearby meant more precipitation, more green plants (and more plants in general), and more extreme weather conditions. The humidity made the summers sweltering and the winters excessively cold; for instance, I always refer to Colorado’s cold as something that slowly seeps into your bones while New York’s cold is just a slap in the face when you walk outside. I had never been canoeing or swimming in natural bodies of water except when I almost drowned in a creek in my hometown. I soon got used to it as my friends were constantly swimming in the summer. Ice skating was never my forte since I wasn’t raised figure skating or playing hockey, but I can always enjoy the sport from afar.
I also was surprised by the organisms people discussed, preserved, and monitored in New York. While I feared mountain lions, rattle snakes, and bears in Colorado, New Yorkers had to worry about ticks, zebra mussels, and poison ivy among other things. The threat of wildlife contrasted with conservation efforts in the area and took up much of the local politics. The impact of human life was lesser in New York compared to the Colorado desert because of the resiliency of the local wildlife. However, it was still evident as it is everywhere in recent history as a result of climate change. And this was an issue more obvious to me both because of the local community and because I was growing up and learning more about the world I lived in. Some conservation efforts such as the excessive deer population were things people had to worry about because of their closeness with the wild. |
My biology class at Morristown was pivotal in my eco-education. Not just learning how cells and DNA worked, but how our world came to be after billions of years of evolution was astounding to me. My biology education would greatly increase after coming to Clarkson, but Morristown’s small ecosystem and the influence of Ms. Rascoe made me really love studying the life we are surrounded by. My mom bought a house in Ogdensburg after a year in Morristown so I could attend a bigger high school. There, I took Earth Science and learned all about how earth works in both living and nonliving ecosystems. New York’s geology was far more interesting thanks to its glacial till composition and the surprising youth of the Adirondack Mountains. Learning more about how our earth functions made formerly trivial observations significant to the world around me. By graduation time, my interest in science and global impact had solidified. While I chose to study a field centered on human interaction, global environments have altered the course of history simply by existing. Moving to Northern New York made the world more diverse in my eyes and its future impact more eminent than ever before.
BeyondSince coming to Clarkson University, my knowledge of the global environment has diversified in both the academic and the activist sense. Granted, I’ve always had an eco-activist mentality; I was voted most likely to join Green Peace in sixth grade. But other than my own respect of the environment, my relationship with the environment became somewhat apathetic. I stopped wanting to preserve it. I’ve always been surrounded by eco-activism. My sister is an avid recycler and alternative foods patron. She won’t even let a friend drop a cigarette butt on the ground before finding a trashcan. My aunt and uncle donated to an anti-fracking group in the Hudson Valley. My mother buys specifically local/American-made products because of the social and environmental impact foreign goods have on the regions they come from. My roommate studies ecological behavior and conservation related to birds in her honors thesis. But it wasn’t until I began my secondary education that I began taking both an academic and activist standpoint on environmental issues. |
That is, I didn’t start to really care again and take action until I started taking social science classes. Fulfilling an independent study with Dr. Daniel Bradburd, I learned how the environment affected social conditions more thoroughly. On average, it is low-income populations who receive the short end of the stick so to speak. Companies build factories, farms, and environmentally exhausting processing facilities on cheap land near poor communities and the people who live in the area face bad health and living conditions because of the waste products produced. Not just the organisms going extinct because of human activity, but human beings face ill health because of the global industrial imprint. I'm even constructing my final project for Environmental Communication around the work of eco-activist Vandana Shiva.
Potsdam’s environment is quite similar to Morristown and Ogdensburg, but where my mother lives now and where I go home during vacations is different because of human activity. I live in the mid-Hudson Valley near Poughkeepsie during breaks and witness the effects of human commerce and industry that near New York City. The anti-fracking group my aunt and uncle sponsored often campaigns in this area because it is a real threat to the local population. The Catskills are across the river so I get my rugged terrain and incline when walking. However, the environment is different because of how long people have lived in the Hudson Valley. Some people say that the Catskills are the location of a former canyon worn down to blunt peaks and large rivers and estuaries. I live across from an abandoned cement factory with the new one built right down the river. |
People constantly in cars, ships, and airplanes prevent the landscape from truly quieting down. Not just physical pollution but sound pollution plagues the Hudson Valley. As I grow older, the concentration of environmental hazards seems to grow wherever I go and conversations about climate change seem more relevant than they used to. We live in a changing era.
The activist part is trickier than it used to be. I talk about all of this research and statistical information I’ve witnessed over the years, but what do I do to help the environment? Awareness is always a commendable goal in activism and I try to educate my peers as well as myself in current environmental events. Having lived in so many different places, I have knowledge in how local and global environmental change. In just the past couple of years, there has been flooding in Colorado and increasing temperatures in New York.
The activist part is trickier than it used to be. I talk about all of this research and statistical information I’ve witnessed over the years, but what do I do to help the environment? Awareness is always a commendable goal in activism and I try to educate my peers as well as myself in current environmental events. Having lived in so many different places, I have knowledge in how local and global environmental change. In just the past couple of years, there has been flooding in Colorado and increasing temperatures in New York.
Even my time in Glasgow this past semester, I witnessed warmer weather due to human activity. But what about getting out there and making a change? While writing papers is my usual mode of activism, we need people on the ground. I didn’t go to the Climate March last year. I haven’t been campaigning against fracking. I could say that I haven’t had time, but I’m still sitting in my state of apathy and academia rather than actually doing something. While I pursue my graduate studies, this is something I can think about as I combine my passion for both social sciences and media production. Interdisciplinary communication is integral in the modern age for getting one’s point across. Preserving such a beautiful planet matters more now that I’ve seen so much of it. |