When one hears of a dinosaur one generally thinks of the giant reptiles of the Mesozoic Era. The word, however, is also used to describe someone or something that is obsolete or out of date. Since I'm not from the Mesozoic Era, if I am a dinosaur it must mean that I'm obsolete and/or out of date. Actually, I can live with that. There are many times that not being identified with the modern world and western society is quite a compliment. I will take this as one such time. I accept that I am a dinosaur without apology or regret.
Of course the question arises 'what makes one a dinosaur?' I guess you could use simple deductive reasoning. Perhaps modus ponens logic. I'm all in favor of people using their brains to figure things out instead of just going to Google and believing whatever pops up. If you think, act and believe like me, and I am a dinosaur, then it follows that you must either be me or like me and therefore be a dinosaur. I took some logic classes in college about fifty-three years ago. The first thing I learned was that if you accept the other person's premises you are stuck with their conclusion. In this case, if you don't want to conclude that you are a dinosaur, then all you have to do is either deny that I'm a dinosaur or deny that you are like me. That's easy enough.
As much as I love to play with classic logic, what popped into my mind as I got into this blog was Jeff Foxworthy. Remember? "You might be a redneck if . . . ." He didn't say that you are a redneck if, so you could laugh hysterically. I'm going to copy Mr. Foxworthy's style. I hope it isn't considered plagiarism!
Let's give it a try.
I totally dislike the use of the highly abbreviated, pseudo-English that is used on the internet today. I prefer to use proper grammar and full sentences while developing an idea and expressing myself with a vocabulary beyond fourth grade. Our culture has become so lax in its use of language that the language is almost unintelligible. One pro-grammar post I saw was rather crude but effective. Consider the following sentence. "I helped my uncle, Jack, off the horse." Now remove the punctuation and capitalization, which is a common habit today, and see what you get. It's an entirely different sentence. The current President of the United States is incapable of forming a complete single, properly constructed, grammatically correct sentence. I could write an entire blog about the abuse of our language. I know that Winston Churchill once said "the Americans stole everything from us except our language," but what passes for American English today is a disgrace. If you too prefer to use proper grammar, full sentences and punctuation, YOU MIGHT BE a dinosaur too.
Hey, that worked pretty well! Let's try some more.
If you would rather watch a tree growth than watch television, you might be a dinosaur. There is no place I'd rather be than in the wilderness. Forested mountains are probably my favorite but I also love the desert. I didn't even see a television until I was seven years old and I didn't own one until 1977. I was thirty-one years old. Today Pamela and I have a television which we use as a means to watch DVD movies. We're usually too far out in the wilderness to get a television signal. When we are staying somewhere where television is available, we elect not to watch. I've never had much of an interest in television. As a result there is no contest between sitting silently in a forest and watching a tree grow and sitting in a stuffy room looking at what my Father always called "the boob tube". Guess I know how I became this way. What about you?
If you talk to more wild animals each day than you do people, you might be a dinosaur. I must be honest. Between believing that homo sapiens have dramatically over-populated the planet and not particularly being a fan of my own species I don't like cities. or even large towns. I much prefer to be in the wilderness far away from people and urban sprawl. This, of course, naturally sets me up to talk to more wild animals than people because I see a lot more wild animals. Actually little conversation passes between us, but I do love encountering and watching other animals. I had to be careful of how I said that. I didn't want to leave out animals that have become domesticated or are used by humans. I do enjoy walking or riding a bike down a country lane and visiting with cows, horses, sheep and other farm animals. Meeting a new dog is enjoyable, and cats are a hoot. Because we spend so much of our time in the wilderness, my encounters tend to be more with bears, deer, mountain goats and other creatures of the wild. I must be honest in wondering whether or not this really qualifies as an indicator of a dinosaur, but it definitely defines me.
If you believe that if you can see your neighbors dwelling they're too close, then you might be an dinosaur. This was often the criteria for some of our country's early pioneers to push further into the unknown. With modern suburban sprawl and housing developments with giant lots the size of a small state, being able to see your neighbor might no longer be the criteria to move. For me I believe that this goes back to my point about over-population and an aversion to cities or large towns.
If you can identify more trees and wildflowers than movie, television or sports personalities, then you might be a dinosaur. I'm a bona fide tree-hugger. I want to be among the trees, plants and animals. I have never been enamored with movie stars or sports heroes. Of course I don't watch television, rarely go to a movie, and the last time I attended a professional sporting event was in 1972. I had only gone to one before that. I'm a great fan of John Muir, Edward Abbey, Steve Irwin, Teddy Roosevelt (even if he was a politician as well as a hunter), George Grinnell, Ansel Adams and the like, but that's because we share a common bond; viz. our love of nature. What makes me remember these people is the same reason that drives me to know about the trees and plants around me.
If adventure is defined as a good hike, animal encounters or finding a good trail and not just surviving rush hour traffic, then you might be a dinosaur. I spent over fifty years working, so I know all about survival. Sadly, the only way you qualify as a dinosaur in this scenario is if you are retired and, like me, spend your life as a nomad in the wilderness, or you work for the National Park Service, National Forest Service, Bureau of Land Management, Corp of Engineers or similar employer working in the wilderness. That's not extremely likely. Glacier National Park, where we have worked as volunteer campground hosts for six years, has a staff of about 1,200 people. Of that number approximately 125 are full-time paid rangers and 250 are seasonal paid rangers. The rest are volunteers like us. I included this category in the dinosaur list because I see that so many people consider going to Disney World or the beach as high adventure. There's nothing wrong with going to Disney World or the beach. I really like Disney, but if I go to the beach I'm most likely going scuba diving. I guess my concern is that I don't see modern definitions of adventure including being outside or participating in nature.
If you avoid and/or rarely, if ever, eat processed food, you might be a dinosaur. This is really hard. Unless you eat nothing but fresh foods from your own garden, which is an automatic dinosaur qualifier, you are probably going to end up, from time to time, with processed foods. It is almost impossible to find truly fresh and/or unprocessed foods. We spend much of our winter in southwestern Arizona near California and spent several weeks this past year exploring southern California. When you see farm workers wearing hazmat suits you begin to worry. I knew that we are getting a lot of chemicals in our food but I wanted to believe that the amount was a bit exaggerated and that the government wouldn't allow it to get dangerous. I was totally wrong on both counts. Giant agriculture companies are using tons of dangerous chemicals and millions of gallons of precious water just so they can raise crops year around and make a bigger profit. All we have to do as the consumer is pay the price and die.
If you eat out less than twice a month, you might be a dinosaur. We almost never eat out because we are usually living many miles from the nearest restaurant. The thing is that, when we are near restaurants, we still don't elect to eat out. Many of our family and friends rarely eat at home. When you don't eat out because you are a long way from a restaurant, I would have to admit that doesn't qualify one as a dinosaur. However, it qualifies when not eating out is a choice. There are at least four types of restaurants: (1) fast food restaurants that just want to make a buck selling you the cheapest, poorest food and do it as quickly as possible. (2) The lower-end sit-down restaurant is the modern version of the old diners and cafes where you can get good tasting food, probably higher quality than a fasts-food restaurant, and a preferable atmosphere but the food is actually unhealthy because they're more concerned about it tasting good. (3) Fine dining restaurants provide you with elegant foods. They are generally quite pricey, and, though perfectly prepared and taste marvelous, they really aren't very good for you because of fats, salts, sugars, carbs, etc. (4) There are a few health conscious restaurants. Most of us can't afford them. I believe that statistics will show that the vast majority of American eat out regularly and eat almost exclusively at fast food restaurants with the occasional low-end sit-down. Of course there's a price to be paid. According to the Journal of the American Medical Assn, confirmed by the Center for Disease Control (www.cdc.gov), 32.5% of men and 35.5% of women in the US today are obese. We're not talking about chunky or over-weight or even fat. We're talking obese.
If you know more animals than corporate logos, you might be a dinosaur. This is obviously similar to the plants and trees versus public personalities scenario above. It speaks to our indoctrination that nature is something 'out there' which is dangerous and often contrary to human comfort or enjoyment and/or has nothing to do with us. I was mortified when my youngest child once identified a cow as a pig. I saw a very sad post recently. It came from an article posted by
www.thesolutionsjournal.com which found that young children are able to recognize up to a thousand corporate logos but can't recognize the trees and plants around them. We actually have visitors to the national park ask questions like 'at what altitude do deer turn into elk?' Animals are the balancing agents of nature. Each indigenous animal in an ecosystem is an important part of the life-vs-death balance of the system. The only animal that could totally disappear from the earth without making a negative impact is the homo sapiens.
I'm sure there are other criteria that define a dinosaur. In fact, I'm sure that there are other criteria which people would much prefer. My own opinion is that, using the above definitions, we need a lot more dinosaurs.
Over the years of my life I have become more and more aware of how human beings are moving ever faster away from the reality of nature. My own species has become the most treacherous invasive species. Those of us who desire to live in peace, harmony and cooperation with all of nature have become the dinosaur. We are considered to be outdated, obsolete and, in truth, bothersome to those who see the future of the world only in terms of human profit. When I retired I began to pull away from the prescribed model which, against my personal desire and better judgment, I had dutifully maintained. After I retired I did not have to worry about risking others. My life actually physically moved away from so-called civilization. I found peace in the wilderness. I seek enlightenment in solitude. I grow as a member of nature as I encounter other animals and am challenged by forest, mountains and deserts. I realize that my attempt to escape our deteriorating society and find my way back to a right relationship with our world is not dissimilar to Henry David Thoreau's move to Walden Pond. "I went to the woods because I wished to live deliberately, to front only the essential facts of life, and see if I could not learn what it had to teach, and not, when I came to die, discover that I had not lived."
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