The Outblog blog, No. 57 for the week starting January 25, 2004.
CR 411 to SR 32 to Silver Creek Road
CR 411 to SR 32 to Silver Creek Road
Boondocks is about farms, rural life, and power toys.
Energy looks at high energy prices and our future.
Enviroman looks at man and the environment.
Hayseeds looks at politics and life in our nation.
Individual looks at myself and how I'm changing
Transit looks at the changing ways we get around.
Truck gives you stories and trips in my Ford Ranger.
Although, it was pretty cold out there today (in the teens or single digits), I decided I wanted to go on my early-afternoon break to the Pine Bush, just to take a look around before we got the heavy snow on Tuesday/Wenesday.
Going up there, to the place on the blue trail, with the great overlook, kind of amazed me by the beauty of this area in the snow—the last time I was at the Pine Bush was in November, and I've long since kind of forgotten what a truly great area this is.
It was bitterly cold up there with a chilling breeze blowing, but I didn't really care. I saw a hawk or turkey vulture flying around. It was an escape, and even though I could hear (and to a lesser extent) here the traffic on the roads around and in the landfill, it still was great.
Really, though the beauty of the Pine Bush is beyond words, the sand dunes with snow were great, as were the views of the Catskills with a haze of snow around them, and the Heldebergs—be it Pinacle, Thatcher Park, or all the other areas—if only because it reminds me of the wonderous (maybe even promise lands to the yeomen farmers of yesterday) Berne and Knox.
But at the same time, within all this beauty there was so much evil, so many problems of mass society right in front of my nose. There was the noise of cars, the ugly SEFCU building and other suburban sprawl, the ugly Guilderland and Colonie water towers, and obviously the Rapp Road Landfill.
If anything, the Pine Bush is a statement of the crisis and at the same time failure of modernity. I'd never be there, if it weren't for the car, but at the same time it makes so much noise. I like the cheap stuff I've gotten from Walmart, but the suburban sprawl is so evil. And people deserve to live, and to choose where they want to live: it's a real conundrum of sorts.
It makes me question the deeper life, the reality of the world we live in. I have no solution—but I do like what the Pine Bush preserve represents as a whole, even if the city around it seems so destructive.
It finally got warm enough, and I was able to make enough time to go out for a hike (and even document it too). Unfortunetly, I didn't get out to nearly 4:15 PM, as I was busy doing school work. Nice evening, although it started to cool down after the sun started setting, and I got increasingly in the shade. Saw a couple of deer on Silver Creek Road.
On Route 32, I saw a pickup truck with an ATV in it's back, with a state pig tailing it—somebody must be in trouble. Also saw a bunch of snowmobiles go by. It got cold very quickly, and I was glad when I finally got back.
It finally got warm enough, and I was able to make enough time to go out for a hike (and even document it too). Unfortunetly, I didn't get out to nearly 4:15 PM, as I was busy doing school work. Nice evening, although it started to cool down after the sun started setting, and I got increasingly in the shade. Saw a couple of deer on Silver Creek Road.
On Route 32, I saw a pickup truck with an ATV in it's back, with a state pig tailing it—somebody must be in trouble. Also saw a bunch of snowmobiles go by. It got cold very quickly, and I was glad when I finally got back.
