Cityscapes and Landscapes

Here we are: my first post to the On Earth blog. Doug and Laura, two of my editors, recently asked me to post, and post regularly here. Could I blog? Sure, I said, no problem.

But then, as I walked past the open office doors here at NRDC's New York headquarters, where OnEarth magazine's editorial offices are housed -- past the policy experts, the scientists, and lobbyists who have been fighting on behalf of the environment as long as I've been alive -- I paused. What could I possibly blog about?

For many of us -- my friends, my coworkers -- our lives are drawn between the city and the country. We labor in the city so we might afford to play outside of it. So busy are our schedules that we're lucky if we can call ourselves weekend warriors.

Adventure, environment -- ideas that, in the 20th century, have been associated with our wildest, most remote landscapes. You know, the places man never goes. But if you're anything like me, you find these associations to be limited; our cities are ripe for exploration, too.

And so we try to recreate a sense of adventure in the city. What we seek are enclaves of the quiet and the communal in a large, and crowded place. What we bring is a new sense that the values and aesthetic of the country can be relevant to our lives here. We want to live a green life in a city built of concrete.

What it comes down to is a question: How do we live in balance in a world, and in a city, that so often feels off kilter?

If nothing else, the narrative of the environment is a slow study in optimization -- of small gains towards a staggering ideal. Finding a balance will involve sacrifices, to be sure, but opportunities as well. I hope to cover both.

Where precisely it will take me is hard to say: to farmers markets and restaurants, certainly, but also to new outdoor gear fit for the helter-skelter of Union Square, and to the front pages of magazines.

Part of the fun will be the exploration. To quote a favorite song of mine, "On a journey to anywhere, you can draw your own map."

Here, then, is to cityscapes and landscapes.