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How We Live Today
Florida Summers
How We Live TodayFlorida SummersBy MIKE WALKER I am stuck in oleoresin, both in metaphor and in real life: I am writing about the Floridian naval stores industry for an upcoming article and thus my mind is all atwitter with thoughts of oleoresin and its various and sundry products. I am also aware I have some pine resin stuck to my soccer shorts as I sit here writing in the kitchen: earlier, I removed a small pine branch that the
We get fallen limbs and branches from our pines during windy storms, and it's only godly grace and good fortune perhaps which have spared us a large limb or even whole tree falling and taking out the garage. In 2004, the hurricanes that had never been expected to produce much damage north of Orlando hit Gainesville with force: not the type of force coastal cities know in the wake of hurricanes perhaps, but we lost power for nearly a week and trees were down on Millhopper Road-a route known for its old oaks and tall pines. The bike shop my first mountain bike was purchased from sustained a wicked hole in its roof due to a pine falling in through its attic while a friend's room-mate's girlfriend lost her Honda to a falling tree. These trees, they're serious things, you see. I often ride the trails around Millhopper Road on my mountain bike and like others who live in the area, ride along the road itself. Road cyclists, the lycra-clad folks on sleek and light bikes you see about, are quite fond of Millhopper Road for its twists and turns and beautiful tree canopy. The city of Gainesville and county of Alachua have provided San Felasco County Park-not to be confused with the state park of the same name further westward-just north of the Devil's Millhopper State Geological Site and this facility has a real wealth of trails crossing over its deep woods. Riding out there-despite being often clothed in light-weight lycra like the roadies during these hot summer months and despite riding a very technologically-advanced mountain bike-reminds me much of riding BMX through backtrails during my middle school years, small tears in my camp shorts and T-shirts caused by passing thorns and getting too close to outreaching branches. My summers in middle and high school were, like many Floridian youth of my generation, composed of various adventures on BMX bikes in the woods and under bug-swarmed streetlights in friends' driveways, or skating homemade ramps and railslides. Of course, another constant summertime activity of Florida kids is swimming: Look at a Google Earth overview of Gainesville, Jacksonville, Lake City, or most any other place you have suburban or rural homes in north-central Florida and you'll also see backyards dotted with swimming pools. Swimming with friends far into the night-sometimes after kicking a soccer ball around a recently-cut green front lawn (and remembering to avoid the sprinkler sitting silent by the curb)-was very much a staple of my summers growning up, and I suspect I am not alone in such. I don't exactly worry that all this fun is a thing of the past-for me it's as real as it always was-but I worry that today's youth are missing out. Some time ago I read a great article lamenting the plight of the vacant neighborhood lot where games of baseball and soccer would have been played in summers past but now fails to attract kids due to the consuming pastimes of video games, the Internet, and every other electronic marvel. I'm not against technology at all: this newspaper and my contributions to it are made possible by the Internet, after all. However, I question how kids are growing up now, and I question it a lot: the speed of light, the speed of text, the speed of Myspace is not the speed of a fastball. You've already seen countless articles warning of the dangers of lack of exercise and the fattening of America's youth, but what hits home to me is more the fact that a lot of kids are missing out on the joys of being out in nature. And mind you, I am not some old guy looking back on day long ago as I look at contemporary youth: I am hardly out of my own youth, and yet I see a difference in kids today and it's not altogether a good difference. That concerns me. I like video games too, I really do: I read David Worthington's "Gamer" column in this paper every week and all my friends also know me as a gamer myself. However, we need alternatives to being inside all the time-especially for young people. We need to be outdoors where we can not only appreciate nature but get exercise and stay in shape. I was just thinking tonight about how my generation is perhaps the first generation of Americans to have access to the fully science-backed information on the dangers of poor diets, fatty foods, tobacco and drugs. Yet this has not made the consumption of tobacco, drugs, or even unhealthy foodstuffs fall off the radar of bad habits of American youth. I have written before of my pleasure in seeing High Springs (Alachua County) set up their BMX track and the benefit this facility provides to the local youth in their community. Projects like that BMX track add a lot to a small town for young people as they encourage these kids to get outside and engage in wholesome sports and thus fill up hours that might otherwise trangress towards less-wholesome directions. If you don't have these resources-BMX tracks, skateparks, soccer fields, even a few simple basketball hoops here and there-you are lacking in things for kids to do other than stay inside with their video games and DVDs or to possibly discover the evil paths of drugs. If you don't introduce kids to nature via summer camps, scouting, and other mechanisms for getting them involved in the out-of-doors at an early age, you'll risk having people more prone to living inactive lifestyles and less informed about important issues facing the conservation of wilderness environments and the like. In light of rising oil prices, a national election, and the war in Iraq it seems like a petty and small worry-the plight of kids and the outdoors, but it's really not small at all because serious, dangerous, drugs such as methamphetamine have long been making inroads to rural communities. While better police efforts and targeted joint operations between local and regional law enforcement agencies may in great part help combat drugs in smaller locales, the greatest threat to drug dealers is simply not having a customer base. Think about it: these crooks make their ill-earned money by selling drugs, so if they have no customers buying their wares in small towns, they will go away. They will have to, for their only reason to sell drugs is if someone will buy drugs. When youth stop buying drugs, we won't have a rural drug problem with meth or other drugs. We need nature, we need to share with our young people the joys of the natural world which in northern Florida is so diverse, so wonderous. We need to rejoin with nature whether that means a hike in the woods, swimming in the springs, or riding our bikes down some trails. Trust me, it's good for us all. MIKE WALKER is a writer and journalist based out of Gainesville, Florida. A Republican with often liberal but pragmatic views on social issues and conservative views on fiscal ones, he is also an avid mountian biker and skateboarder. He writes for a variety of local, regional, and national news media on issues regarding nature, Florida, and ecology. Mike can be reached at: cloudrace@prontomail.com |
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