It’s cold here in Chicago and just as easy to stay inside soaking up as much documentary’s as I can find without becoming to much of the indoor prune.  I’m getting restless in the cold months.  I live for the outdoors. I was in my snow gear running around Humboldt Park the park of beauty and depth. With out this park I don’t think I could survive the winters or the summers and I think I speak for majority of the neighborhood.  Come rain or shine people are in this park. Walking, jogging, biking, fishing, slacklining. You name it it’s probably happening. Right now it’s oviously snowy and full with remnants of the valentines vendors from last weeks Valentine’s Day.  My partner and I go ice skating late nights on the lagoon.  I love it.  It’s quiet amongst the trees and brush.  I can only hear my breathing and my heartbeat.  There’s the tree in The middle of the lagoon and the only time I can touch it. My ritual I guess you can say, I breath in deep and say thank you I needed this. 10 years ago I wouldn’t be doing this.

The oppression in the neighborhood spread and devastated the park years ago.  For a long time no one went there.  The community was really hurting.  It was hurting from the economy and the city didn’t care.  It was rough when the neighbors didn’t have the money to really survive.  It took a lot of special people helping the park get better.  The place is now being looked after by the Puerto Rican communities, as they lead other communities started to take it back.  A month from now the earth in Humboldt will unthaw and the people will emerge to embrace its greatness. The great sycamores that live there along with the might oak.  We need this park here in our urban settings to stay connected. It reminded me of Barbara Kingsolver’s book “Knowing Our Place”.

“It’s a privilege to live any part of one’s life in proximity to nature. It is a privilege, apparently, even to know that nature is out there at all. In the summer of 1996 human habitation on earth made a subtle, uncelebrated passage from being mostly rural to being mostly urban. More than half of all humans now live in cities. The natural habitat of our species, then, officially, is steel, pavement, streetlights, architecture, and enterprise — the hominid agenda.”  Kingsolver

I see this quote and forget how blessed and privileged we can be if we just look up and hug a tree.

Several years back there was a festival planned in Humboldt Park called “Riot Fest”.  It made huge headline with big name bands coming through and it brought a lot of people.   This festival had a lot of outsiders who didn’t care for the neighborhood they were in.  This created a lot of tension in the community.  Thousands of people came and by the end after the storm of Riot fest Humboldt Park was destroyed,  peoples yards were destroyed.  All from others not caring about other people’s places.

The bid went in for riot fest and the community banded together to say no.  The Alderman used it as a ploy for money in the neighborhood to boost moral and his own self esteem, but forgot about the damage it cost to the part and its ecosystem. Trees were damages along with natural indigenous species of flowers destroyed. Other communities banded together for the conservation of Humboldt Park. The festival was seen as oppressive and and uncaring of the community and its park.  

This is just one photo of the devastation of one festival.

The survival and conservation of these tiny urban parks of Chicago is just as important as the survival and conservation of the southwest.  It is important to know your roots and stay connected to nature. Terry Temptest William’s talks about the devastation of the Glen Canyon Dam In 1950’s shunting the flow of water from the Colorado River to the Grand Canyon.  When things are clouded by wealth and greed life takes fewer breaths to extinction. “The lands have been here for millions of years and they will certainly outlast us by another million years or more. But they will not remain ecologically intact without our vigilance, without our willingness to protect the wild.”  (Willams). I remember as a little girl when my love for birds of prey began. I drew them all the time. I researched al the different kinds. The year I found out of the eagle being on the endangered species list In 2nd grade. I remember I was so furious and upset that something so dear to me could be gone tomorrow.  I was about 6 or 7. I remember asking my mother about it and crying and asking her if I would ever see one again. As my mom consoled me she talked to me about nature and our need to protect it and to not take too much. My mom took me to a bird sanctuary a couple weeks later to make sure I saw a bald eagle. I thought to my little self about the things I may never see again in this world.   What things had been extinct because of man’s hunger to destroy and conquer instead of coexistence? My young heart and mind held great wisdom through these years. Connecting myself to my roots. The places from my beginning filled with stories of nature and how we are connected. That we must live in balance and not take to mucH.

Forty years ago, our national symbol was in danger of extinction throughout most of its range. Habitat destruction and degradation, illegal shooting, and the contamination of its food source, largely as a consequence of DDT, decimated the eagle population.

Bald Eagle Fact Sheet – U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service

Ecofeminist philosophy can help bring to light different thinking for the ecosystem and the environment. It is our responsibility to raise awareness to the source.  If we are destroying the habitats of animals and of the waterways them are destroying ours.