august round up

I realized in the middle of September that I never wrote an August round up. The month began and ended with me out of the state of Illinois. This lately has been a good thing, because the 2.8 million people here have been getting a little annoying. At the beginning of the month I was in Lake Geneva, Wisconsin. At the end of the month I was in Michigan.

View of the city from the ball field

Tigers and Sox


I also got to see the Tigers play the Sox. The Tigers lost, but it was still fun. In the middle of the month, my life changed yet again in a very exciting way!

Camping in Lake Geneva, WI

In Michigan catching turtles

A closer view

An early morning fog on the lake

seven years to the day +1

It’s hard to reflect on 9/11. Not because there is not a lot to say about it, but because it is still one of those moments that is stuck in my head as if it happened today or yesterday. I still remember the look of my Pre-Calc professor when a student came in to tell him the news that seconds later he told us. I still remember the prayer vigil that night. I remember the next spring being in New York City at ground zero and it being silent in a city that does not know how to be silent.

Everything is in an era of post 9/11. There is no going back. The effects from that day are obvious. War for one. In Afghanistan, and in Iraq. Homeland security was boosted, making it one of the top priorities of the government. And of course it has created longer lines at airports. I didn’t fly for a couple years after 9/11. Not because I was afraid, but because I didn’t have any reason to. Therefore, I didn’t notice much of the changes in airports. I did however notice one change - the surge in racism against people of Middle East descent as well as those of Muslim faith. On my college campus I could feel the effects.

Seven years later there is still a huge “get them out” mentality. More stereotypes have been created and discrimination has gotten worse. Tolerance and love need to be expressed on days like this. In a country that idealized freedom more than any other place it doesn’t always allow it for everyone living there.

and they call disneyworld the most magical place on earth?

Over the weekend I went up to Michigan to watch a University of Michigan football game with my awesome fiance. The game started at noon EST so it was an early start from my Chicago apartment. On our way through Indiana I had another Illinois driver pass me. I looked at the back of their car and saw a Michigan Football decal. I couldn?t help but think they were probably going to the game, too.

Not too long after passing into Michigan did I begin to see Michigan decals, car flags, and people in cars with Michigan gear everywhere. I began to point them out one by one. They were all headed in one direction - Ann Arbor.

Big Ten football has been overshadowed over the past few years by the dominance of the SEC and Big 12 in college football. On this Saturday morning, I couldn't tell why. After parking the car and walking to the stadium it was as if everyone in town was going to the game. That's almost possible, too. Ann Arbor's population is about 115,000. Michigan Stadium holds around 107,000. As we got closer to the stadium it was pointed out to me that it looked like a fair. It did kind of look like a fair. There were hundreds of tents set up in blue and maize colors, flags hanging high in the air, and people cheering and throwing footballs around.

The game was awesome and everything I imagined it would be. Michigan beat Miami, OH, 16-6. It is quite possibly the last game I get to see there. It will leave me with lasting memories forever.

reflections on Great Lakes Journey by William Ashworth

I’m not quite done with the book, actually. Though I am close enough to the end to get the basic premise of Ashworth’s book. I would do a review of the book, but I have to say I am not as impressed by the book as its predecessor: The Late Great Lakes, a book I commonly rave about on this blog. In Ashworth’s first book he travels along the great lakes to talk about the environmental history of the lakes. The book really goes into great detail about the history of the region and its impact on the environment. Ashworth’s second book, during which he also travels along the Great Lakes, does not have the same impact. A lot of it is good and I will get into that in the reflection, but unfortunately most of the book gets into the author being irritated by sprawl (for good reason) and him testing out local breakfast places.

The basic reason Ashworth wrote the book was to have a follow-up on how the Great Lakes region has improved environmentally since he last wrote his book. Most of the book is a written conversation with various environmentalists about those changes. Besides the ranting of sprawl, the underlining theme was the public’s knowledge of the ecosystem of which they live in. What does this mean?

I was born in Michigan. Now I live in Chicago, Illinois. They are two different states that do their own business, economy, etc. separately. The problem with this is that Michigan and Illinois are in the same ‘ecosystem’ that is the Great Lakes. So, the people in Chicago live in the same ecological system as people in Detroit, Rochester, Green Bay, and other cities that are spotted along the great lakes. Me, a Chicagoan, has more in common with someone in Rochester, New York, than with someone say in downstate Illinois or Des Moines, Iowa. It is a psychological move from thinking ‘Midwest’ region to ‘Great Lakes’ region. So, why the shift?
In the book, Ashworth describes Chicago’s water centerpiece as…the Grant Park water fountain. The fountain is separated by Lake Michigan by a mere street. Yet, when people are so close to one of the world’s largest freshwater lakes they have their back turned to it and are instead taking pictures in front of the fountain. And apathy has set in.

We don’t know as humans what we are doing to the lakes and its inhabitants. What about the rivers that are so polluted that we are afraid to go in them? What about the bottom-feeding ducks that eat from polluted sediments of the river? Often we destroy wetlands and swamps because as humans they are an unlivable place, but they are vital to a working ecosystem. An imbalance is created in the ecosystem when they are taken out. Wetlands are often places for runoff and floods from local lakes and rivers. When they are taken out, flood then proceed to rush into towns and destroy homes and businesses that have been built over those wetlands. This same idea can also be transferred to the sandy beaches we create and maintain unnaturally, the plains, and the forests. Each has its own use and the land, water, and its residents depend upon it that way.