I’ve spent much of my life living close to and being surrounded by the wild, from the lake country of northern Minnesota to the mountain wilderness of western Montana, and now for the past decade or so here in the wild desert of southern California. To be sure, I’ve lived in cities too, out of necessity, and I’ve survived, but my inner compass keeps leading me back to wild places. It’s been the biggest influence on the person I am now. Maybe they both have. Maybe the contrast between the city and the wild has been the real shaping force. Whatever…

I restarted this blog some time back but it’s been in mothballs for a while again. I intended it to be a celebration of wild places, and maybe occasionally a voice for their protection. That’s still my intention, but it didn’t take me long to start drifting more and more into everyday politics, so I shut it down for awhile.

I’m gonna see if I can bring it back closer to what I intended it to be. I have a lifetime of experiences from time spent in the wilds. I’ll see if I can dredge up some recollections and tidbits from all those years and see if I have the necessary skills to put them into words in a coherent way. I want this to be more memoir than polemic. That could well be more valuable. We all know what’s going on in our world – we’re bombarded with it constantly. I don’t need to add to the racket. My biggest obstacle will likely be my own native and chronic sloth. We’ll see if anything comes of this. In the meantime, for what it’s worth, ‘buzztail’ is back on the air. Stay tuned…

There’s a lot wrong these days. For me the biggest battles are environmental, and that’s where I put most of my effort. Not just attacks on public lands, but also clean air. Clean water. The wild. Worldwide. And I put what money I can into those who are fighting for it. Mostly in the courts.

Yeah I know. There is much to stand up to – the dismantling what there is of access to healthcare, income inequality, racial and ethnic inequality and the fear and hatred that drives it, the attempted power grabs and the sending of troops into American cities to try to quell dissent. All that, and more, is happening and accelerating, and resistance is growing. People are fighting on those fronts and I am grateful for that.

To my mind though if we continue to trash our home, if we continue to unravel the web of wild that holds life as we know it together, if we make this planet unlivable simply to accumulate mere money and temporary dominance, the rest of it isn’t gonna matter. All that money and power isn’t gonna buy it back.

How long can a corrupt and illegitimate government, built on the ignorance and fear and vileness of one man (and the ignorance and fear of his legions of followers and supporters) stand? How long will a house of cards stand before it collapses under its own weight? Or before it gets knocked down and destroyed? Time will tell…

Resistance is growing. People, in large numbers, are taking to the streets. They see grave threats to human rights, to the rights given under the Constitution, to the principles this country was founded on, to the rule of the laws of the land.

They see threats to the environment. To our public lands. To our wild and sacred places. They see threats to the very health of this planet that is our home. Our only home, and they are standing in opposition to these threats.

To my mind these people are the true and real patriots. Resist where you can.

(My apologies to Paul Simon for borrowing the title, but what the hell…)

You hear a lot about the silence of the wild. I’m thinking particularly of the desert where I roam. It’s not really silent though. Yes, compared to the frantic hustling, the racket and ruckus and noise of our towns and highways it’s quiet. But it’s not silent.

There are sounds. The cry of a hawk. The scrawk of a raven. The whistle of a phainopepla, which sounds like somebody whistling from behind a bush trying to get your attention. Sometimes you hear the yap of a coyote or the buzz of a diamondback. You hear the wind. You can hear the roar of the almighty sun as it pounds on your brainpan. Natural sounds.

They’re there for us. If we can pry ourselves loose from the clutches of our every day rat race, from the constant barrage of noise, from the constant chatter in our own heads we might hear them. Maybe. If we learn to listen closely enough. They’re there. We need them.