The weather affects everyone. Those of us who live out in the environment, or as we used to call it, "the country," pay close attention to the weather, as it affects our comings and goings as well as the outdoor chores that every rural household requires. My father was a farmer for much of his life and as such lived by the weather, a habit he maintained through his years as a self-styled country gentleman; the only time he would look at television was in the morning to see the weather forecast.
There have been some significant weather events we Americans have dealt with in recent months. Hurricane Helene's victims are still struggling, as are the people of Southern California who have lost homes and businesses in the fires that were sparked by dry, hot weather and high winds and spread largely due to government incompetence. And on Saturday night and Sunday, here in the Matanuska-Susitna Borough and the Anchorage area of Alaska, we dealt with a severe windstorm that had, at one point, 15,000 households without power. Our power lines are all still on poles, you see, and severe winds bring down lines and drop trees across them. I would be remiss if I didn't thank the dedicated crews of the Matanuska Electric Association - the MEA - for their tireless work under terrible conditions. We were without power here for 24 hours, but we are back up now thanks to their efforts.
Now, I told you that so I could tell you this.
One of my favorite quotes comes from a personal hero, nature writer Hal Borland:
“There are no limits to either time or distance, except as Man himself may make them. I have but to touch the wind to know these things.”
The wind is, of course, a purely physical phenomenon, the movement of the atmosphere from an area of high pressure to an area of low pressure. The sun’s heat drives the wind. So does heat moving in ocean currents and the Coriolis Effect. A myriad of local and global influences move the wind and shape it. In our history, we have harnessed the wind to grind grain, pump water, move ships, to generate electricity. Plants use it to spread pollen and seeds, birds use it to soar in the sky, and mammals seek or avoid it to improve their own comfort in their environment.
That is not what Hal Borland had in mind. I think I have a good handle on what Mr. Borland meant when he encouraged us to touch the wind.
See Related: Weather Warning: Baby It's (Going to Be) Cold Outside
I once spent part of a morning out on the end of a long fishing pier at Ventura, California, that now-troubled state, looking over the Pacific Ocean towards Santa Cruz Island and using my big twenty-power binoculars to look for whales. I did not see any whales, although I enjoyed seeing sea ducks, and grebes, and watching pelicans diving for fish. The constant that morning was the wind, blowing in from the west. It was not a harsh wind that sunny California morning, but a warm wind, just enough to ruffle hair.
Where else had that wind been? Where did it come from? From what unknown shore did that wind journey to visit me there on that California pier? What mountain valleys did it travel, what plains, what forests did it traverse to get to where I was standing? If the wind could talk, what stories would it have to tell?
I wonder these things because I have always been afflicted with wanderlust. Bright, breezy spring days in particular fill me with the urge to go walkabout. The wind suffers from no restrictions on its movements; no job, no travel expenses, and no duties or obligations. It crosses mountain ranges, continents, oceans, and borders as easily as it crosses the street. The wind is my constant companion when I am out of doors.
When I was a boy in Iowa, the wind brought winter blizzards and summer thunderstorms, the smell of corn pollen in the summer, and burning leaves in autumn. In the years I lived in Colorado, the winds brought the smell of pine and spruce in the mountains, the smell of sage on the flats, winter storms, and summer rains. Now, here in the Great Land, the wind blends the scent of the endless forests of spruce and birch.
The Swiss have the Foehn, the Californians the Santa Ana, the French the Mistral, the Hawaiians the Pali, and Alaska the Williwaws. In much of the western United States, the Chinook comes with the spring, that warm, brisk spring wind that melts snow and dries the ground for the first spring wildflowers. The wind has as many names as it does variations.
Some warm summer afternoon, take a moment and look closely at a dandelion that has gone to seed. Dandelions are a favorite of children in summer – to pick them, to blow the silky seeds away, to watch the breeze carry them off to start another patch of dandelions on some homeowner’s manicured lawn. Dandelions depend on the wind to live, to spread. Some homeowners swear at dandelions, but I like them – they are great survivors. Counting on the wind is always a safe bet.
Stand outside in a stiff breeze sometimes. Raise your arms high and spread your fingers. Touch the wind.
For all its variations, the wind is one of the Earth’s few constants. Even when it deprives us of electricity for a few hours.
