At a Seattle conference in September of 1969, US Senator Gaylord Nelson announced a nationwide grassroots demonstration for the following April. It would be a day of protest to put the environment on the national political agenda.

Every morning at 8 a.m. I circle our house with our dog Toby, and then we circle through the floodplain along Lawson's Fork Creek. In 15 minutes we've made about a quarter-mile figure eight that doubles back on itself a time or two. I use it as a opportunity to note weather, water levels, tracks of wildlife from the night before, bird movements.

Someone forwarded an e-mail my way with the heading "River Falls Rattler." The embedded picture showed a monster rattlesnake being held toward the camera on the tip of a stick. The body of the e-mail sounded official and stated that the snake had been found on the local golf course, and to be careful when retrieving balls from the rough.