All the Little Wild Places

One problem with the rhetoric of wilderness and civilization is that it too neatly divides the world into "pure" and "tainted," "unruly" and "tidy," "wild" and "tame," "out there" and "in here." Life is not so tidy as that.

Currently, I have several unclassified places under observation. By the traditional lights of both wilderness afficianados and urbanites, they do not exist, let alone merit attention.

My favorite for now is a left-side freeway on-ramp. More accurately, it's the space to either side of it, a rumply mass of trees, straggly grasses, colorful patches of iceplant and freeway daisies, and abandoned chapparal. The trees rise just high enough on either side of the ramp to wave their leaves over the guardrail, and the grass covers a steep hill below apartments. As best I can tell, there is no way to approach this space except by parking on the left-side shoulder of a four-lane freeway and walking to it. This undoubtedly accounts for its untended appearance, its lovely disorder. I've seen a hawk perched on a light above the ramp's curve, staring right at the on-coming cars with a haughty disdain. I've seen the plants go from autumnal dryness, to winter tangles, to spring lushness. Not bad for a place that doesn't conceptually exist.

Perhaps it is appropriate that I can only see this space as I whiz by at 45 mph, unable to stop, on a ramp between freeways. Perhaps this is why I like it so much, besides its simple messy beauty -- it reminds me that we are all speeding by in the larger scheme of things. It only seems ephemeral and fleeting as it lives and changes and grows and dies, in a rhythm out of sync with the rush of traffic. We hasten on, but the world remains, regardless of the names we slap on it.

Comments

[susan]

Great entry! I think you've just invented a new genre. And I like your rejection of the simplistic (if appealing) dichotomies that often get reduced to "good" vesus "bad."

[Rana]

A new genre, eh? I rather like that. I'd love to see more writings in this vein. :)

(hint hint)

[pericat]

By golly, susan's right. You have defined a entirely orginal kind of place. Good on you!

[qB]

Wonderful. A transitional space? Because only accessible when in transit? We have such spaces alongside railwaylines in urban areas... stretches of land which might merely be seen as "between" but force their own identities. Unattainable and free.

[Prestbury]

Sort of makes me think of no-man's land during wartime.

[ann]

I love this entry and will now start noticing these types of spaces during my day!!

[dale]

I love these kinds of spaces. Interstices.

[Rana]

Liminal spaces
Betwixt and between
Bold upon the threshhold
Neither outside nor in

Self-defining spaces
Watch them overflow
The fine and tidy lines
Of the world we claim to know

Whirling through life
Sometimes a glance
Of ecotones and transit zones
Reveals reality's complex dance

[LiL]

Beautiful post. Two different unvierses almost, meeting up at that moment you spend time and again, driving onto the freeway. So suggestive that, too: this time-shifted other place is right at the entrance to the freeway.

[Rana]

Actually, it's between two freeways -- it's on either side of a transfer ramp -- but that just adds to the point you're making.