Month: June 2005

In the middle of the 5,000-acre wild area, itself surrounded by tens of thousands of acres of state forest, a sturdy footbridge spans a large creek. Twin telephone poles serve for its beams, supporting a four-foot-wide deck of pressure-treated planks and a single railing on the downstream side. It took a National Guard helicopter to airlift the thing in, ten years ago or more. And there it sits in the middle of this mini-wilderness, a tribute to something-or-other. Hikers who would never consider spray-painting a rock or carving a tree – not even a dead one – have scarred the railing with names, dates, even a crude etching of trees and a campfire. I wonder how many of these graffiti artists would have ventured so many miles off the pavement were it not for our country’s draconian drug laws? But then, I suppose we all go out in the wilderness to alter our minds a bit.

I don’t know why this comes to mind now; perhaps it made an appearance in one of last night’s dreams. So often in the dreams that I can remember I have found myself suddenly on a bridge, staring at the water. Living where I do at the head of a small stream, and having grown up here, I have never felt threatened by floodwaters, though they’ve cut off our access to the outside world more than once. But a river marks the physical end of this hollow and the ridges that enclose it. When I was a kid, the school bus always dropped us off on the far side of the river, and our mile-and-a-half walk home began by crossing the one-lane county bridge. The first time I did this, as a five-year-old kid returning from a highly traumatic first day of public schooling, I was terrified. The bridge has open metal decking, a grid with three-inch-wide squares. Twenty feet below, the river ran brown and gave off a peculiar odor. It was all my big brother could do to coax me across.

During last autumn’s flood – the result of two hurricanes a week apart – my dad and I made our way down the hollow with some trepidation about whether the bridge would still be there. It was. The roiling, chocolate-colored waters were barely a foot below the deck of the bridge, and a massive pile of logs and debris against the upstream railing showed that the river had crested several feet above that. The highway beyond was still flooded; only an occasional pickup truck ventured through. We stepped gingerly out onto the bridge, venturing maybe a third of the way across. The bridge shook with the force of water thundering against its single, stone pier; once or twice a minute something large would strike against it with a hollow boom. We quickly retreated, remembering stories of how the previous bridge had been taken out by a floating oil tank back in the flood of ’36.

It seems a little odd, even to myself, that I’ve never run a river – not in an inner tube, a raft, a kayak or a canoe. On the one hand, it does seem like fun. On the other, I don’t relish the thought of spending all that time sitting, and in the hot sun to boot. I’d rather be walking in the woods, thank you very much. It has nothing to do with any fear of water, the fact that I’m a poor swimmer or that I almost drowned once while swimming in the ocean. No, sir.

I do enjoy walking beside streams and rivers, and I imagine I’d enjoy fishing if I ever got into it. There is something undeniably refreshing about running water, even in a small stream like Plummer’s Hollow Run. Not only Baptists, but Cherokees with their “going to water” rite and Hindus bathing in the Ganges are all convinced of the curative powers of streams and rivers. I’m not too well-versed in the science of this, but a Google search of “ions” and “flowing water” brings up a commercial website for some purveyor of home water fountains called – I kid you not – Holy Mountain.

The air all around us is electrically charged with positive and negative ions. Positive ions are emitted by computers, microwaves, air conditioners, heaters, televisions and other conveniences of modern-day life. These positive ions in the air we breathe can result in feelings of mental or physical exhaustion and affect overall health.

It has been said that the movement of water releases negative ions which in turn make you feel refreshed, and bring peace to your heart and mind. This is because these negative ions naturally attract airborne particles, such as pollutants and dust. A waterfall or water fountain acts like a magnet to pull these particles out of the air. As a result, the air is purfied [sic], humidified and noticeably fresher.

So “troubled water” – as in “a bridge over” – may be far less troubling than we think. A little more web searching reveals that, as one might expect, these claims are regarded with some skepticism in the scientific community. But then, scientists are supposed to be skeptical. Given the title of this blog, I am intrigued by the notion that something referred to as negative can be regarded so positively.

Another site, peddling high-tech negative ion generators, summarizes a couple of experiments that seem to bear out some of the claims of mental health benefits. I was interested by the suggestion that long periods of negative ion depletion – caused by, say, sitting in front of a computer monitor – can lead to “an increase in serotonin and its attendant drowsiness and relaxation.” Serotonin, eh? No wonder blogging is so addictive!

Does this mean that if we want to be properly productive Americans we should all be rushing outside to stand beside waterfalls, or installing miniature waterfalls from HolyMountain.com in a corner of the office? Well, not necessarily. Apparently, far simpler options are literally right at hand.

Josh Backon, a member of the Department of Cardiology, The Hebrew University of Jerusalem, writes in an Internet posting that in order to increase left-hemisphere activity (linear, language, logical), one can block the left nostril and engage in “forced unilateral nostril breathing.” Likewise, to increase right-hemisphere activity (creative, holistic, emotional), the right nostril should be blocked. This practice increases the supply of negative ions to a specific hemisphere.

So the astounding mental agility you’ve come to expect from Via Negativa probably owes something to the fact that I am an inveterate nose-picker. Whenever I pause to think – which is more often than the evidence might suggest – either one nostril or the other is getting blocked, you can count on it. And while the thumb goes diving, the index finger leans comfortably against the bridge of my nose, high and dry.

Thanks to everyone who joined the discussion in the comment thread to Via negativa and the road to hell. I was reminded once again why it’s a good idea to keep writing even when one isn’t feeling especially inspired, as was the case last Wednesday (and almost every other day last week – summertime humidity is setting in). Sometimes the best ideas do emerge from dialogue. And judging from people’s reactions, it’s gratifying to think that some of my wilder and woollier notions may not be entirely half-baked. There’s still a part of me that believes that an idea has to be obscure to be of any real value. But another, louder voice says, on the contrary, that ideas only gain value as they approach the vatic or poetic; anything else amounts simply to rearrangement of semantic furniture. Which, to the extent that it allows us to reconceptualize the symbolic spaces where we live and work, is no empty exercise either. And which does not begin to account for the power of mathematical ideas… (Aaagh, here I go again! Somebody hose me down!)

1. Eastern fence lizard

The male eastern fence lizard moves his body to show off bright blue skin on his throat and stomach. If the female is not ready to mate, she arches her back, raises herself off the ground, and jumps away sideways.

2. Blue-footed booby

The male begins by lifting up his enormous clown-feet one-by-one, and then stops in a distinctive pose, beak raised skyward, announcing his manhood with a loud whistle, pointing out his tail, and opening his wings. This is accompanied by a love-offering of sticks and twigs. Females join in the mating dance, following the same movements, but respond with a guttural honk.

3. Brook lamprey eel

The females would laboriously construct nesting hollows in the gravel bed of the stream. Moving one tiny piece of gravel a time in their suckers it would take hours but eventually the tiny creature would have made a depression about the size of a computer mouse. Exhausted she would fasten her sucker to the largest stone in the wall of her nest and wait.

Within half an hour the little nest would be a seething mass of lampreys! I never found out whether it was just males from other parts of the stream or whether there were other females there that had been too lazy to build a nest. Unlikely, I think, because sometimes one would even see two or more females collaborating on a nesting hollow that would be correspondingly larger.

The mating frenzy would go on for hours, in an orgiastic scenario which would have doubtlessly provided scope for any aspiring producer of piscine pornography. Then, as suddenly as it had begun, the frenzy was over. The exhausted lampreys would drift away and fasten themselves to rocks and just shimmer in the water like seaweed. The next day they would all be dead.

4. Scarlet-bodied wasp moth

As a caterpillar, the insect feeds on a non-toxic plant, climbing hempweed. Then, when it becomes a moth and is ready to mate, the male changes his eating habits. As darkness falls on his big night, he visits the poisonous dogfennel plant. Dogfennel is easy to spot in pastures, says [Prof. William] Conner, because the cows eat all the grass around it, but leave the tall toxic plant standing.

The male moth extracts toxins called “pyrrolizidine alkaloids” from the plant.

“He lands on the plant, regurgitates on the plant to dissolve the alkaloids and then reimbibes the toxin-rich liquid,” says Conner.

The small red and black moth stores the toxins in a special pouch. The pouch, located on his underbelly, is filled with fibers that have a cotton candy consistency.

Once he has ingested the toxin from the plant, the male is no longer tasty to his common predators, particularly spiders and bats. After gathering the poison, the moth goes in search of a female. When he finds his insect bride, they mate for nine hours. But, just before mating, the moth releases the toxin like a cloud of miniature confetti that sticks to the female. The toxin protects her while she is mating and while she lays her eggs. The female moth then passes the toxin to her eggs. The toxin deters egg-eating insects like ants and ladybugs from devouring her young.

5. Crane

Cranes form lifelong monogamous pair bonds.

The mating dance of the crane is spectacular. The birds walk stiffly around each other with quick steps, wings half spread, alternately leaping high in the air. During this, the cranes bow deeply and stretch. Next, the cranes pick up sticks or blades of grass; throw them in the air, and stab at them with their beak as they come down. Both sexes, mature and immature, take part in the dances.

When males and females call in unison, both point their bills to the sky and the male raises part of his wing over his back and joins the female. The two birds call back and forth for about 10 seconds. Scientists believe these calls reinforce the monogamous pair bond and also serve to defend their territory.