A new month and a delightfully cool morning after the heat of yesterday. The forsythia leaves are still wet from the overnight rain as I brush against them to fill the bird feeder. The birds chirp anxiously waiting for their morning treat. Every once in a while I wonder what this patch of land was like two hundred years ago before the land was cleared to construct this house.
The small brooks and rivers ran free through the towns that now exist, down to the bogs and peatlands. We may only think of the Pinelands or the old cranberry bogs as we consider peatlands in New Jersey, but they ran all the way down the interior of the coast south into North Carolina and north into New Hampshire and Vermont.
Repositories of regenerating life, they also hold down carbon emission and are essential to our survival as a planet. We used to buy sphagnum peat at garden centers and still can but there are better moisture retainers which are healthier for the planet. Peatlands hold a third of the world’s carbon and the practice of harvesting releases that carbon, so at the local garden center I consider the life in a bog as I look for alternatives.
Prayer for the Day
Feeling the light of the morning sun, we enter a new day,
Touching leaves still wet with last night’s rain;
Listening to the sounds of the early morning,
We wait for your Spirit to enter our hearts.
Bestow on us, O God, a renewed commitment,
One that leads to action for the good of the earth.
In the name of the One who walks with us,
Even Christ Jesus our Lord, Amen.
Thoughts for the Day
Landscape is more than land covered by floodwater. The seeping of peat bogs, the river of liquid pewter viewed from a sentry tower, it’s what a person values, what she is willing to sacrifice or argue for.
- Susan Vreeland, American writer (1946-2017)
Our evolutionary psychology preconditions us not to respond to threats which can be postponed to later.
- Mark Lynas, British environmental writer
The Lord created wisdom at the beginning of time the first of God’s acts long ago.
Ages ago, I wisdom was set up at the first m, before the beginning of the earth.
When there were no depths I was brought forth, when there were no springs with water.
Proverbs 9: 22-24