"Kritters" and more water thoughts

These are a few of the "kritters" that we ran into while out in the Pacific Northwest. The first shot is of a hoary marmot. It is a groundhog type mammal that lives on the mountain slopes. We had not seen any until we saw a poster at lunch one day and then saw them every day thereafter. This actually is a picture of a mom with two young marmots. On the same day, we saw a fox with her kits (I believe they are called Cascade foxes). They were just playing around. Next is a picture of a male orca fin. It is hard to get pictures of these amazing creatures, because unlike Shamu they don't jump on cue. Finally, some harbor seals are visible in the last picture. The wildlife was abundant and amazing.

On the water front, I have been thinking about our time on Orcas Island. Posted in every room with a faucet at our cabin were signs about conserving water. Here we were surrounded by water on an island (sound familiar????) and there were genuine concerns about running out of fresh water. Especially in the summer, there is little to no rain on Orcas and little freshwater except a lake in the state park. It seemed like a water rich environment - water everywhere (ocean water), lush trees (evergreens with waxy leaves that reduce evaporation), and abundant wildlife - yet in reality we were in a water poor situation for fresh water.

Glacier follow-up

A couple of posts ago, I talked about the power of the frozen water at Mt. Rainier. We were told that Mt. Rainier has the more glaciers than any other mountain in the U.S. I promised some pictures about the glaciers and have finally had a chance to download them. The first picture is of Mt. Rainier. It is hard to get a perspective on this 14,000+ peak, but on a clear day it dominates the southwestern skyline of Seattle some 60+ miles away. The second picture is of the Nisqually glacier. They call it a dirty glacier and you have to look closely to see the ice underneath the dirt. You can see water flowing out underneath the edge of the glacier. This is the beginning of the Nisqually river, which can be seen in the third picture. This particular glacier has been retreating for decades. In fact, in the middle of the third picture you can make out a bridge crossing the river. 150 years ago the glacier actually was below the bridge and has been steadily retreating. The final picture is from the river bed and the rocks are what are left over after the glacier retreats. The power of water, here in frozen form, to shape the land is amazing. More pictures soon.

Garden of Eden - Redux

One of themes that keeps coming to mind as we spend time around water in the Pacific Northwest is an interpretation of the Genesis 3 story of the Garden of Eden about the Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil. The interpretation begins with the idea of wondering, why would God not want humans to know the difference between good and evil? As a matter of fact, this question has been pondered by interpreters and many different answers have been given. Anyway, this particular interpretation suggests that the problem is that without the view of eternity, the other tree in the garden of everlasting life, the knowledge of good and evil is not useful. That is, we are unable to see the consequences of our actions beyond a very short sphere and thus don't know what those consequences could be days later, much less decades later. For instance, while we were watching orca, killer whales, the other day, our guide mentioned that seven had died from starvation as they only eat king salmon. He, and another naturalist, then went on to say how all the rivers of Washington, but two, had human impacts from farming to dams to drinking water. What caught my mind was the enigma of the garden again. Apparent goods (farming, flood protection, clean drinking water) were now impacting the environment in such a way that salmon were unable to reproduce which is bad not only for orcas, but for humans who love to eat salmon and those who fish for it. Most of the action on the rivers is now decades old and they are just beginning to see the long-term effects on the local environment. In response to this connundrum, one of the interesting factoids that I read in editorial out here is that Washington is one of the states leading the way in tearing down dams and restoring rivers to their natural state. As we face some interesting issues around the St. Johns' River in the years to come, what has happened in Washington at least worth pondering, because no matter how hard we try we don't have an ultimate knowlege of good and evil.

Frozen Water

Last week, the Walkers spent time with a form of water that you will not find around the beaches area, glaciers. We spent five days at Mt. Rainier National Park, hiking, climbing, playing in the snow (yes, playing in the snow - one place where we were averages 680 inches of snow a year). Mt. Rainier has 25 glaciers which makes it the largest glacier system in the contiguous United States. All the creeks and rivers that we saw were in the valleys created by glaciers. When I can download pictures, I will post a couple. What I found particularly amazing was the amount of rocks, of all sizes and trees, that have been pushed down the mountain by the glacier and then left as it receded. The shear power of frozen water to grind down, move and basically destroy solid rock is awe inspiring. The landscape of Mt. Rainier has been etched over the centuries by water, frozen and unfrozen.

P.S. - An interesting factoid that I have discovered during my reading on water is that the largest source of fresh water in the world are glaciers. More water is frozen in the water of glaciers than in all the lakes, rivers, etc. combined.

Just finished The Natural History of the Bible. As I noted in the previous blog, this is an interesting book about the impact of geography and topography on Israel as depicted in the scriptures. One of the most interesting arguments that the writer makes is that the Israelites were exposed to a variety of different "water" regions and this exposure prepared them for their theological confession of one god, Yahweh (the hebrew name for God most often translated, the Lord). At one time in their history, the Israelites were nomadic (Abraham, et. al.), at another they were slaves in Egypt and exposed to the the regularity of the Nile river, at yet another they lived in the highlands of Galilee with it's regular, but irregular, rainfall. Each of these regions developed polytheistic religions that helped them account for and explain the presence or lack of water. It is fascinating that in most of these religions creation's beginnings are somehow related to water. Anyway, the writer suggests that the exposure to these different water environs and different religions helped the Israelites refine their understanding of the God who made promises to Abraham and Sarah, delivered the slaves from Egypt and delighted in King David. This particular book makes a convincing case that faith is influenced by geography, and in particular, the availability of water in that region. Thus, the conviction that we at Palms are surrounded by water and this truth impacts our faith has some precendent in understanding the faith of our Israelite ancestors. For instance, the fact that we take for granted the availability of adequate and clean drinking water impacts our faith, either conciously or subconciously. As the Walkers are about to head to another watery environ, the Pacific NW, I look forward to further reflection on this thesis and exploration of the biblical images of water. More later...