I want so much to open your eyes...

Sometimes I can't sleep. Not because I'm stressed out or because I hit a second wind. I just can't sleep. Tonight is one of those nights. Its past one in the morning, but I'm laying in my bed with my computer on my stomach watching old Scrubs episodes while I read poetry and look at photos. There is something very eerie about sitting in a dark room with only computer screen light. My skin looks strange and my hands look large.

Earlier tonight I cleaned off the window frames I pulled from the yard my grandma grew up on and hung them on my wall beside my torn blue jeans and straw hat. I like having that kind of history on my wall. Especially when it is so connected to my own. I wonder what those windows have seen. Weathered from hot southern alberta summers and wind, they must have also seen winters packed with snow. In my own 22 years, I've seen winters where the snow in the ditches was so deep and thick you could fall in over your head. But now, I'm more worried about getting snow over the top of my running shoes. Yes, since my grandma was born behind those windows, she has seen the world change dramatically: cultural revolutions, world wars, unbelievable information/communication advances, space exploration. And I've always wondered what I would be witness to. By the time I'm her age, will people be living on the moon? Will all the 1960's science fiction be reality? But while I was home this Christmas, it came to me. I think what I will be witness to, will be much closer to home than the Jetsons. I know I will be witness to the most drastic changes in the environment our world has ever seen. Already I've witnessed longer, hotter growing seasons and dryer winters. I think that all the advancements in technology and luxury that have so far removed us from our environment will crumble as our environment grows more and more aggressive in demanding our attention. I think that's a big part of my desire to travel. I'm afraid that one day, I will be telling the next generation about when there were rainforests and when you could grow crops in southern alberta and play hockey on the ice in the ditches in winter and when ice picks were needed to climb in the Himalayas. I want to experience it before its gone so that if we wait too long to take global action to preserve our environment and allow it to be irreversibly changed/damaged, I will have seen it, experienced it, photographed it, written about it and in some small way it will be able to live on through me.

"Acknowledge that there is more beauty than our eyes can bear, than precious things have been put into our hands and to do nothing to honour them is to do great harm" - Marilynne Robinson

Thats what I think about when I look at these window frames above my bed when i cannot sleep.