Earth Speak Sunday #2

A Sense of Place by Alan Gussow

There is a great deal of talk these days about saving the environment. We must, for the environment sustains our bodies. But as humans we also support for our spirits, and that is what certain kinds of places provide. The catalyst that converts any physical location - any environment if you will - into a place, is the process of experiencing deeply. A place is a piece of the whole environment that has been claimed by feelings. Viewed simply as a life-support system, the earth is an environment. Viewed as a resource that sustains our humanity, the earth is a collection of places. We never speak, for example, of an environment we have known; it is always places we have known - and recall. We are homesick for places, we are reminded of places, it is the sounds and smells and sights of places which haunt us and against which we often measure our planet.

Sea stacks near Bandon, Oregon