The bird stepped off the safety of the median curb, just as I turned from the highway and into the multi-acre parking lot of Walmart. I stopped my car to let the bird pass. He was tall, white, majestic, and moved with an elegance that could only be attributed to a type of egret. The bird took his time strutting across the pavement. He paused in front of my car between the headlights and for a long moment, he did not move. Look at me, he seemed to say. He acted like he owned the place, which of course he did. This place, this land, was his territory first. He could take his damn sweet time, as far as I was concerned. In my rearview mirror, a line of cars queued up behind me. Someone honked. My eyes moved back to the bird, and we locked into a moment of timeless understanding. The bird was the wild part of me reflecting my own divine nature. Remember? he challenged. Remember your true freedom?
Eventually, the bird made his way across. I drove the car forward to find a parking spot in the bleak, asphalted area that used to be wild.
Used to be wild. Isn’t there some sadness in that statement? Joni Mitchell’s lyrics still haunt me: They paved paradise, put up a parking lot. Easily recitable, the song, “Big Yellow Taxi,” from which Mitchell wrote these lyrics was released in 1970. Fifty-two years ago. And we’re still paving paradise for parking lots, doing more of the same old stuff. Isn’t that the definition of insanity?
Newsflash: Nature does not need us. It is more powerful than us, truly, but lets us believe that we are the most powerful. It allows us to cut down trees, fill in wetlands and pave through them. Nature allows us to use pesticides and insecticides with abandon. Wildlife suffers, and still we seem hellbent on dominating.
Oh, but we’re suffering too—we just don’t fully understand it quite yet. The Earth herself knows how to heal, to repair, to rebuild, to regrow. Do we know how to heal ourselves? How many of us treat our own bodies as the most sacred vessels that they are? If we have no deep reverence for the Earth, how can we expect to have deep reverence for the biology of ourselves?
Part of us knows that we need the wild redeemer.
~Dale Pendell
Seeing the bird at Walmart brought forth more self-inquiry. Before I exited the car, I sat gripping the wheel and asked, what am I doing here? I came armed with a list of household items, but more than likely I would also buy stuff that I didn’t really need. Stuff to use and throw away, stuff that no doubt was cheaply crafted from low-wage factories oversees where people toiled in less-than-ideal conditions. If I saw the factories and the living conditions of the workers and their families, I’d be appalled. We don’t know what we don’t know, yet there is a deep part of us that understands that we chose our own blindness. We can pretend we don’t know the truth and shop on. Or we can be like the bird in the parking lot: grounded in the reality of the situation. We’ve continued to pave paradise.
Now we have choices to make.
Freedom lies in choices. Choice is our power. To begin to live awake is to consciously consider each habit and each choice. We can adopt the mantra Do No Harm and ask: What is the impact of harm because of my habits? How can I lessen the affect? Now is not the time to blame others, or to point fingers. This is a self-inquiry practice and individualized. We take responsibility solely for ourselves. We practice non-judgement and forgiveness of ourselves and others. We’re not perfect. But with intention, we can change and adapt to live more awake in this world.
You must be the change you wish to see in the world. ~Mahatma Gandhi
Adopt the pace of nature, said Ralph Waldo Emerson. Her secret is patience. By changing our habits one by one, we can incur big sweeping changes. I feel these coming. I may not have the answers, but one thing I do have is the awareness. It’s the first step. The bird in the Walmart parking lot was my reminder of this greater awareness. Small habits, big changes. Blessed are the meek for they shall inherit the Earth.
Our own redemption. Can you think of anything more beautiful to live for?
Thank you for these important reminders, Katie. Somehow, they're disturbing and inspiring at the same time -- a testament to the power of your writing.
Katie, your writing is absolutely stunning. Thank you for this story. The questions you ask are very powerful, and I am joining you in asking them. Also, I very much appreciate the wise people you quote. Thank you for this on a day when I've been noticing more parking lots than egrets.