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Diary: Sean Hill, (2) This Land Is My Land

Diary: Sean Hill, (2) This Land Is My Land

Jan 30, 2023
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Diary: Sean Hill, (2) This Land Is My Land
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Helena National Forest from the east side of MacDonald Pass, Montana. Photograph by the author

Read Part One of this post here

There’s a current and now-shifting understanding of nature and wilderness that views nature as something at a remove from the man-made—it’s primitive, remote, pristine land; untouched land that those with the financial wherewithal, time, and “desire” can access. Going camping. Backpacking. Disappearing into the woods for days on end. I want to posit that I grew up with nature and the idea that the human imposition on the landscape, our built environment, our habitation, is just that: an idea, a perspective, as witnessed by the growth of “weeds,” vegetation that needs to be controlled or cultivated. I think about tall grasses trampled down for bedding or a termite mound or anthill eruption or the way a beaver dam interrupts the flow of a stream, about all the various excavations by animals endeavoring to make a place for themselves, and I wonder if they think of themselves as outside of nature.

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