New River Journal
On the last perfect day, a glorious autumn sun shone through leaf-dappled forests, vivid shadows painted traffic-free leaf-flecked country roads.
I was smarting at the time from what I perceived as a snub. The town of Blacksburg, in conjunction with Virginia Tech, was organizing a Sustainability Week. I had offered to present a lecture about the threat of peak oil, the point where the world's wells can no longer keep pace with our insatiable demand and go into permanent decline.
After being repeatedly told I would provide a valuable addition to the mix of viewpoints, I had been informed there was no slot available for me. My friend Dave Roper attended the meeting where this was decided. His e-mail said, "The feeling was that we are trying to get people to do what they can do to reduce global warming and that the peak oil truth might discourage them from trying."
Some time later, the situation would change, and I did give my presentation. But that particular day, as I often do when disappointed, I sought the refuge of the road, the soothing passing of asphalt under my motorcycle tires. My wife, Jane, came along, and we rode the brilliant Honda VFR Interceptor sport bike to Peppers Ferry Road, Fairlawn and Dublin.
The day had crystalline air and a luminous sun; Draper Mountain stood in bold definition. The trees were beginning to shed their summer cloak of green, allowing Hokie orange and maroon to burst forth. Over Cloyds Mountain, we left the upright riding of the improved highways for a state route and entered the natural habitat of the VFR, the sinuous roads that used the fringes of its rounded tires.
We stopped on the bridge over the New River in Eggleston to soak in the view, one of Jane's favorites. With the persistent drought, the river was low, eschewing its former banks. An unnatural green pool of subsurface plants gleamed in the sunlight. The cliffs were bold, framed in autumn's colors.
Riding along Sinking Creek Road, I pondered the notions of permanence and sustainability. In much of this tight, shaded valley, Sinking Creek is sunken, drought or no. There's a jumble of rocks where the stream belongs, but the water is subterranean.
We typically think of sustainability with regards to a particular resource; using it so as to not deplete or permanently damage it. But in a grander way, unsustainability means an activity or a lifestyle that has no future. If something is unsustainable, someday we'll have to stop doing it, and we're doing lots of unsustainable things.
The day was becoming unnaturally hot for early October; 86 degrees on the VFR's dashboard thermometer. I purposefully aimed to Doe Creek Road, often called the "Backside of Mountain Lake Road," to escape the valley heat. I've bicycled this road once, its steepness unrelenting, excruciating. The VFR, even with a passenger, climbs briskly and effortlessly, its efficient V-4 engine turning the concentrated energy of gasoline into motive force.
The hypocrisy in our actions was not by any means lost on me. Here we were, avidly wasting gasoline for purely recreational purposes, riding a high-powered motorcycle through Appalachian hill and dale. The motorcycles of even a generation ago were incapable of the power and grace of the VFR. If peak oil theorists prove prescient, the energy produced by petroleum won't be matched by any other source once the wells run dry. The era of sport bike riding may prove to be a short one. By consuming these two gallons of gasoline to propel us these 80 miles, we rob our progeny the chance to a similar thrill.
As we pass Mountain Lake, I notice that it is a ghost of its former self, its clear waters in recent years retreating into the limestone bowels of the earth. I envisioned the metaphor of the Earth's waters as its blood, its vital fluid carrying its nutrients to the living cells of natural flora and fauna. The water of the earth's hillsides, streams and aquifers is the liquid of our blood. With our rivers and lakes evanescing, it seemed as if the Earth were reclaiming it, siphoning it from we the living.
The effects of global warming are being felt the world over. Polar bear numbers are plummeting, as are various songbirds such as evening grosbeaks, pintail and scaup ducks and shrikes. But all changes in the environment produce winners and losers. Global warming winners may include mosquitoes, poison oak and wasps.
We began our descent into the summerlike heat of the valley below. Both the preceding months had been near the record for the warmest ever, and we were sweltering now in October. "Even though I like warm weather," Jane said, "It's time for fall."
A half-mile from the Lake I brushed away from my neck what I thought was a fallen leaf. Instead, it was evidently a wasp, which stung me painfully. It hurt to distraction the remainder of the ride.
Michael Abraham lives in Blacksburg.
Source : http://www.roanoke.com/news/nrv/columns/journal/wb/140440
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