Adirondack Chronicles 2016.2

Looks like the Cedar Waxwings were having their own little convention alongside Piercefield Flow near Tupper Lake yesterday…. with their great high tufted crests and ample blond bellies they reminded me of a certain presidential candidate….

So I asked Mr. Waxwing what he thinks of the current state of the campaign, and he replied, “Tweet, Tweet!”  Ok then!  Just keep tweeting…I turned to his partner Mrs. Waxwing to see what she thought of the other candidate and she said, “Chirp, Chirp!”  Hmmm.  How would the FBI interpret that answer?  Seems worthy of more investigation!  So I found another high-crested red-faced fellow all agitated along the Sabbatis Road to Little Tupper Lake:

I asked him what he thought of all the political malarkey going on 500 miles to the south of this beautiful quiet place and his response was very clear: “Squawk, squawk, squawk… screech!”

Once he started squawking at me he wouldn’t stop, I had to drive away!  He kept yelling:

This political season demands that all of us take three giant steps back at least every few weeks and find some quiet, contemplative place to think about the issues — not the immediate headlines, but the larger imperatives of life in a free society.  What values must we act to preserve in the election to come?  What guideposts can we establish to judge the merits of the candidates — not superficial tweets or chirps but truly well-grounded philosophies of politics and society, of justice and the ethics of governance.  Neither candidate is perfect, that is for darn sure.  It’s downright ugly to have one candidate chirping about the merits of escaping indictment for sloppy management of email while the other one tweets hatred in what seems to be an unstoppable torrent.  Yesterday had the high tufted candidate waxing eloquent about the merits of Saddam Hussein and the desirability of banishing Miranda rights, while the chirpier candidate plodded dutifully through campaign appearances while the FBI shredded her credibility.  Eeek. Ugh.  Squawk.  Screech.  This is not good for our nation or the world.

I’m supposed to be relaxing so I went searching for some beautiful things that neither screech nor squawk nor chirp nor tweet.  Especially no tweeting.

Lovely!  The beauty of nature is restorative, and the evidence of life regenerating each spring and summer reminds us that while human politics is temporary (and quite harmful, quite often), the divine plan of creation has more sense and symmetry than any of our human institutions.

One of the great cycles of nature is the hatching of chicks and the care that the parents show for their offspring:

That last photo of the loon and her chick is pretty grainy because I was very far away — loons make sure that their kids don’t mess with people until they’re old enough to fend for themselves.  Wise parents!

My reading thus far has taken me from Walter Isaacson’s Benjamin Franklin biography (audible book on the long drive up here) and Ta-Nehisi Coates‘ Between the World and Me.  Wow.  That’s just about the entire spectrum of American life and culture, and both require a good deal more reflection — I will have more thoughts on this in future Adirondack Chronicles.  But for now, I hear loons calling….