From Here to There

A few years ago, I was Chairperson of the Southwest Nova Biosphere Reserve Association (SNBRA). I have kept in touch with the Bras D’Or Lake Biosphere Reserve Association. This Saturday, I received their quarterly newsletter. I was struck by three contributions.

1) Nature’s Calendar by Annamarie Hatcher
2) The Old Woollen Mill by Corrine Cash
3) Cape Breton Weather Mesonet by Jonathan Buffett

Annamarie Hatcher links the changes in Nature to the Mi’kmaq calendar. Corrine Cash describes the long history of the mills at Irish Cove. Jonathan Buffett is the founder of Cape Breton Mesonet, a network of community-owned Weather stations in Cape Breton and the eastern mainland.

Their solstice newsletter under the slogan ‘Msit No’Kmaq — People and Nature; Better Together — offers a model for SNBRA.

In Southwest Nova, David Colville at COGS has maintained a weather network for over a decade. In this time of climate change, perhaps it is time to consider a ‘community-owned weather station network for Southwest Nova?

 

As in Cape Breton, we should embrace the slogan: Msit No’Kmaq.

Can we take community ideas from there to here?

This week, Michael Bond’s book From Here to There arrived at the Inside Story. Bond has been Senior Editor at the New Scientist in England.

His book explores ‘the art and science of finding and losing our way’. He reviews the work of Claudio Aporta, Dalhousie University, on Inuit geographic knowledge in the Canadian Arctic. Bond describes the importance of exploration, spatial awareness and self-directed learning. He investigates the latest research from psychologists, neuroscientists.

“ The hippocampus and it’s neighbouring regions seem to have evolved specifically to help us build mental representations of the outside world that we can use to get around and orientate ourselves.” p.71.

In Chapter 8 Bond tells the story of Gerry Largay who is lost and dies on the Appalachian Trail. It includes the Search and Rescue process.

In the final Chapter (10) he looks at Alzheimer’s disease.

The discovery that Alzheimer’s disease disrupts the brain’s spatial system long before the disease takes hold has raised the prospect of using spatial tests to diagnose it.  p.203.

Postscript

Reading the book by Michael Bond made me pull from the bookshelf, the writing of Rebecca Solnit, in particular, A Field Guide to Getting Lost.

Never to get lost is not to live, not to know how to get lost brings you to destruction, and somewhere in the terra incognita in between lies a life of discovery.  p.14.

Acknowledgements
Edward added the graphics. Heather provided useful feedback.

References

Michael Bond, 2020. From Here to There: the art and science of finding and losing our way: . Belknap Harvard.
Rebecca Solnit, 2005. A Field Guide to Getting Lost. Penguin Books.