A Sense of Wonder for the Common

Photo by Jim Richardson, from National Geographic

This semester I’m hosting a graduate seminar on the 50^th anniversary of Rachel Carson’s publication of Silent Spring, a book credited with starting the modern environmental movement.  I read the book in graduate school and was amazed by how relevant the book was decades later, and am interested to see how I feel about the book that I’ve been in science a little longer (and maybe a little more grouchy and cynical).  I’m devoting some time this semester to learn as much as I can about Rachel Carson the person and her work.  Looking for a little inspiration!

I started with A Sense of Wonder.  Have you read it…or do you already have enough of a sense of wonder that it always seemed like an irrelevant read?  I have a sense of wonder, but sometimes I leave it in my back pocket.  Living with a little person helps me pull it out daily, however.  Little people do seem to live in a chronic state of wonder, where everything is new and worth devoting at least a little stare time to.  And this book is definitely about cultivating a young person’s stare time so that they maintain a steady state of wonder throughout her/his lifetime. 

My favorite passage in the book was about Rachel Carson, or Rachel as I prefer as we become intimate friends, and a friend taking a walk to an area by the waters of a bay to watch the night sky.  She says, “I have never seen them more beautiful:  the misty river of the Milky Way flowing across the sky, the patterns of the constellations standing out bright and clear, a blazing planet low on the horizon. “  And then she goes on “It occurred to me that if this were a sight that could be seen only once in a century or even once in a human generation; this little headland would be thronged with spectators.  But it can be seen many scores of nights in any year, and so the lights burned in the cottages and the inhabitants probably gave not a thought to the beauty overhead; and because they could see it almost any night perhaps they will never see it.” 

The beauty of the common.  What is it about our species that we fail to appreciate something until it is rare or scarce?  We are a strange beast and as much as we all benefit and love technology, it does seem to isolate us from the natural world.  I hope you see something common and beautiful today…I hope you stop and notice.  On my walk this morning I saw three fawns (three!) and a doe.  Deer may be common, but it is so lovely to see them carrying themselves on those thin leggy stalks, so lovely to take in for a moment the wild world around us.