30 years ago today, one of my favorite places in the world rose from the ashes...
...of the terrible loss and destruction caused by the eruption of Mount St. Helens.
The Toutle River Valley today is unique beyond words. It is a bizarre landscape of marshlands, canyons, ash and rock more alien than any science fiction author could dream up.
When the smoke cleared on that day 30 years ago, it was beyond a desert, for a desert still holds the seeds of billions of wildflowers and other plants laying dormant, waiting sometimes for years for the next rain. There were no seeds here, at least none that could penetrate the massive lava deposit that buried everything in sight.
Yet now the valley teems with life. Marshes, wetland, greenery and massive beaver dams abound, and Roosevelt Elk graze contentedly. All of this, every part of it, is new. So many of our landscapes are the result of thousands or millions of years of geological forces. This is an environment, a landscape, an entire ecosystem that is younger than many of us.
John Muir said that the world, though made, is yet being made, that this is still the morning of Creation. Visitors to Mount St. Helens and the valley below it are witness to the very first rays of light piercing above the horizon of that morning. To stand in this wonderful place is to be present as Mother Nature gives birth to new life.
The Toutle River Valley today is unique beyond words. It is a bizarre landscape of marshlands, canyons, ash and rock more alien than any science fiction author could dream up.
When the smoke cleared on that day 30 years ago, it was beyond a desert, for a desert still holds the seeds of billions of wildflowers and other plants laying dormant, waiting sometimes for years for the next rain. There were no seeds here, at least none that could penetrate the massive lava deposit that buried everything in sight.
Yet now the valley teems with life. Marshes, wetland, greenery and massive beaver dams abound, and Roosevelt Elk graze contentedly. All of this, every part of it, is new. So many of our landscapes are the result of thousands or millions of years of geological forces. This is an environment, a landscape, an entire ecosystem that is younger than many of us.
John Muir said that the world, though made, is yet being made, that this is still the morning of Creation. Visitors to Mount St. Helens and the valley below it are witness to the very first rays of light piercing above the horizon of that morning. To stand in this wonderful place is to be present as Mother Nature gives birth to new life.