Artist at Exit 0 Riverblog

I am always photographing the junk I find at the Falls of the Ohio.  Looking through my newer images I was amazed by all the toys I have come across recently.  Now these are just the tip of the proverbial iceberg.  All time, this would be an immense category on its own.  When I’m doing my usual posts, I’ll throw in an odd find if I think it contributes to the story.  Otherwise, this stuff just gets buried in my computer.  Maybe when I’m an old man, I’ll come back and revisit this stuff.  By then, a lot of this junk will appear dated and nostalgic.  I’ll probably look that way too!

All the stuff I’m about to present is made of plastic, which is made from resins derived mostly from crude oil.  I remember seeing a picture of a middle class American home with all its plastic contents arranged in the front yard.  It looked like just about everything this house contained was made from plastic and it was shocking!

I have been following the news lately about that oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico and it has me feeling very anxious.  I don’t know why more people aren’t getting freaked out about this?  Essentially, you have a hole drilled deep into the ocean’s floor that’s hemorrhaging oil and the attempts to plug this hole haven’t worked.  The slick is already hundreds of miles long and will soon come into contact with the Gulf Coast’s rich estuaries.  A couple of years a go, my family vacationed in Gulf Shores, Alabama and it was fun and beautiful.  I don’t want to imagine those white beaches fouled with oil.

I debate with myself about whether something like this event can be considered a “natural disaster”?  Granted it probably doesn’t fit the usual definition, however, haven’t we (as a species of animal) that originated here make us “natural” as well?  Isn’t a big part of the problem that we have successfully convinced ourselves that we are on some other plane and that life’s rules don’t apply to us?  Aren’t all man-made disasters in effect natural disasters?

Often it seems more convenient to bury our heads in the sand and pretend events like this oil spill have no long-term effects.  Where is the outrage and our will to do the right thing?

Life is interconnected to life and it is ridiculous to think our mistakes don’t affect other organisms that have a right to exist in their own right.

Everywhere life is under pressure from the global scale of our activities.

The sad truth is unless we find ways to reconnect and revere nature…we will eventually will be  hammered by it.  One thing I see over and over at the Falls is that life is indifferent and doesn’t play favorites.  Will we be the architects of our own undoing?

If crude oil is a disappearing resource, doesn’t it make sense to use it for things that really matter?  Do we truly need to lock so much of it up in uses that are this disposable and forgettable?

Often it seems to me that we are in a big rush to go nowhere as fast as we can.  Why the big hurry?  Life is short enough and consuming everything we come into contact with isn’t going to make the experience more meaningful.  It’s past time to slow down and rearrange our priorities.