A very sad thing happened yesterday. I saw it on the morning news. A little boy was killed on the beach - a horrible accident - the driver of the truck never saw the child when he darted out in front of him. A life gone in the blink of an eye.
I write this from central Florida. For those of you who live elsewhere, I must offer up a more detailed explanation. Unlike most coastal communities in the country, we have a few areas that allow driving on the beach. It is an old custom dating back to the early days of auto racing at Daytona. Yes...they actually used to race on the beach. Now there is a speedway with lights, pavement and guardrails, but somehow the custom of beach driving remained. Despite what we now know about environmental damage, and terrible tragedies like the one yesterday, the government and the citizens have not yet been willing to give it up. Proposals to eliminate or reduce beach driving fail time and time again. How can this be?
Now I'm certainly not very well educated on this issue. But from a bystander's viewpoint I know that economics play a huge role. These communities are somewhat dependent upon the income stream that flows in from beach goers. If all these folks can no longer park on the beach, where will they go? The cities and counties do not currently have parking areas adequate to contain the number of vehicles that the beach can hold. Bottom line.
Other communities that never allowed beach driving to begin with had to make accomodations and changes along the way as population increased. They made space as the needs grew. The communities that never did will have to play catch up. Playing catch up can seem like a monumental task and so far they haven't had the courage to face it. So something that is an obviously bad practice continues...with no end in sight.
But let's not judge. Take a look at the environmental disaster that happened in the Gulf. It never took a rocket scientist to see that drilling for oil under the sea was a bad idea full of potential for disaster. Rather than investing the time and money needed to find better ways to meet our own needs, we - collectively - have accepted this ongoing practice. We have the technology to receive and use the energy that the Earth and sun give freely. We do not have to rape and pillage the planet. We could have windmills dotting every mile of shoreline collecting energy from sea breezes. We could have solar collectors on every rooftop. But we don't, because we never made a space for that.
What about our personal lives? How many stay in jobs they hate because they "can't afford" to leave them? How many stay in bad relationships for the same reason?
We can't go backwards. We can't undo what is done. We can't reverse tragedy. But we can wake up. We can take a step...any step...to release ourselves from those practices - habits - that are killing us.
Normally, I try not to get on a soapbox. But today I had to. You see, that little boy was the classmate of my friend's 4 year old son. My friend had to find a way to explain death and loss to her sweet child. In the days ahead, she will have to help him through his grief. All for the lack of some parking spaces. My heart breaks for them.
Look around. Make a space for a new choice, a new way.
Please.
WS
RSS Feed