Seeds of Change
Six and 1/2 years ago, a family/personal decision was agreed upon that put me on the most beautiful spot imaginable. And I live in a house that keeps me in touch with nature everyday.
Part of this property is a flat spot along side a seldom-traveled dirt road. Folks could have seen the flat spot as a place to park and look at the light show over the Continental Divide. Instead, they had been using it as a place to dump tree limbs. My neighbor would stop folks from dumping when he saw them but the tree limbs continued to accumulate.
This was convenience vs foresight. Dry tree limbs attract lightening. Moving the tree limbs off their personal property would not necessarily protect them from the natural disaster that sometimes happens in the mountains. Looking at the bigger picture would better protect all of the houses along this road as a fire does not have boundaries except for water or another counteracting fire.
One day, my son was approached to give the fire department an easement to bury a 20,000-gallon water tank on that flat piece of property. He thought about it for a moment and said they could have the easement if they would get rid of the dry tree limbs.
Within days, earthmovers came and buried the limbs in a huge hole. The land was disturbed for a few years but no limbs were dropped off—there wasn’t an example to follow. And I saw folks parking there and eating their lunch, the nose of their vehicle pointing toward the Continental Divide.
Last year, the water tank was dropped into another hole and covered over. All that could be seen, at first, were the pipes necessary for loading water onto the fire trucks. Then boulders appeared around the pipes to give as much of a natural look as possible. Then mesh covered the ground to protect the wildflower seeds from birds and other seed-eating animals.
Today, there are flowers of every color beginning to spring up with little effort. Nature provides afternoon rain showers most days and life replaces what was.
Same land, different function.
