My Own Private Lupine Festival

 

My Own Private Lupine Festival

The pandemic may have canceled the Sugar Hill festival, but no one told the flowers.

I love spring in the White Mountains.

Witnessing the landscape come to life is spiritually transformative. Given the state of the world between Russia’s heartless invasion of Ukraine to mass shootings in Buffalo and Texas we could all use some spiritual transformation.

This past weekend, while Kodi and I were on an early morning walk I had the urge to head for Sugar Hill, New Hampshire. 

Before the pandemic, Sugar Hill and Franconia joined, annually, with their surrounding towns to hold a month-long festival celebrating the blooming of the lupine. While the range of lupine on the continent is quite broad, for some reason the area around these small towns in New Hampshire’s Northcountry is legendary for the fields of lupine that dominate the scenery in June. In some cases they are naturally occurring, in others, they are cultivated or simply encouraged by the aesthetics who choose to call these towns home.

One of those aesthetics back in the last century was Robert Frost whose storied walks were surely through June fields of lupine. Frost lived for several years in Franconia, the geographic center of these small towns. His home, and mailbox are preserved in a small museum appropriately hidden off the more traveled way.  I can’t walk these woods, roadsides, and fields without my thoughts turning to Frost and how these vistas must have fired his imagination, though he only seems to mention the lupine by name in a few of his poems. Throughout a life lived during equally difficult times, Frost, like the lupines through which he walked, helped to lead us toward a more peaceful place in our hearts. 

So we still turn to his poetry to find solace and hope - though more recent crises portend even greater challenges than those faced in Frost’s day.

Highland Storm 4 - Glow in the Lupine

Lost in all of the seemingly more immediate crises is the existential Climate Emergency, even though if we were smart enough to tie it to the various challenges we could take active steps to address the emergency. A few months ago Bill McKibben suggested that President Biden should use the Defense Production Act to help Americans and Europeans convert their heating systems to carbon-neutral heat pump technology combined with solar to dramatically reduce the cost of heat and the use of fossil fuels that complicate our ability to increase the pressure on Russia after its incursion into Ukraine. It was a brilliant suggestion that would have dramatically reduced the burning of carbon but his suggestion was swallowed up by Jamie Dimon’s self-dealing call to drill more oil so that JPMorgan Chase could buy a few more fat years for the oil industry and exacerbate the Climate Emergency. McKibben’s suggestion is still out there but it’s just too easy for Biden to go with the folks who own congress. 

Meanwhile, the Climate Crisis accelerates. The far right ignores and denies the crisis and the naive left implores us to save the planet. 

But the lupines growing in June along the roads of Sugar Hill, Franconia, Bethlehem, Littleton, Bath, Benton, Easton, and Lisbon send us a different message. Deny all you want, your presence is not required. The planet is NOT in peril. Come war, pandemic, global warming, the planet will be just fine. 

We are the ones in trouble, along with several hundred thousand other species that we may take down with us.

Mother earth, Esheheman, or grandmother to my Cheyenne brothers and sisters, will go on whether we inhabit the planet or not. She will purify herself, she will still send the lupine every spring - a sign that beauty abides despite the evil, famine and pestilence that comes with the presence of humans. 

As Pete Seeger and Joe Hickerson wrote in their timeless classic Where Have All the Flowers Gone?:  “When will we ever learn?”

In the darkest moments, there is a light toward which we can still walk: A place of hope, a place of peace, a place of beauty, a place of wisdom, if only we open our hearts and minds to it. 

Chapel in the Blue Lupine

Notes & Links

The Lupine Festival will surely return in years to come but the good folks at the festival have placed a self-guiding tour map on their Web page here: https://www.lupinefestival.com/

Frost Museum: The Museum remains closed - probably until the fall of 2022 but here is their website:  https://frostplace.org/index.php/museum/

A Celebration of the Lupine: https://www.waynedking.com/collections/143534

Wayne King is an author, podcaster, artist, activist and recovering politician. A three-term State Senator, he was the 1994 Democratic nominee for Governor and the CEO of MOP Environmental Solutions Inc., a public company in the environmental cleanup space. His art (WayneDKing.com) is exhibited nationally in galleries and he has published four books of his images, most recently, "New Hampshire - a Love Story”. His novel "Sacred Trust" a vicarious, high voltage adventure to stop a private powerline as well as the photographic books are available at most local bookstores or on Amazon. He lives in Thornton, between Rattlesnake Ridge and the Waterville Range. He proudly flies the American, Iroquois and Abenaki Flags. His website is: http://bit.ly/WayneDKing

The Corner of the Lupine Field

Storm Over Lupine

An Island of Lupine in a Sea of Gold

A Firestorm is Brewing: The Supreme Court Prepares to Pull the Pin on Democracy

The View from Rattlesnake Ridge Wayne D. King

A Firestorm is Brewing

The Supreme Court Prepares to Pull the Pin on Democracy

Flying into a Gathering Storm

If it wasn’t bad enough that Russia has attacked the peaceful, democratic country of Ukraine and now threatens the world with the deployment of chemical and nuclear weapons, here in the good ol’ USA the Supreme Court is threatening a pseudo-nuclear attack of its own on our democracy.

The Right, having unleashed one attack on our democracy on January 6 of 2021 is now watching in an almost giddy state for their Supreme Court to foment the same response from the other side. There is nothing they would love more than all-out holy war.

If you think that watching them lose their minds over mask mandates in the middle of the pandemic was bad, think of what they would be doing if this were directed toward them.  Let's face it: if this were being done to men in this country, they’d be blowing shit up.  

Fortunately, women and the men who support them in their bodily autonomy are far more rational. But do not mistake this for complacency. It would not take a lot for things to turn very ugly.

Now I am not advocating violence. I am saying that the Supreme Court is about to invite it. Furthermore, the broader they cast the net, the more they invite it.  What happens when they broaden their target to birth control - as some are already proposing. What happens when marriage equality is undone and LGBTQ rights are undone because that is surely on the agenda of the religious right.  

Don’t tell me that there is precedent for this and then go back to Brown vs. Kansas (Board of Ed) or Plessy. When the Supreme Court ruled on these things and overturned precedent, each time it was to grant greater freedom and equality to citizens, consistent with the vision of the Declaration of Independence and the Constitution. Overturning Roe will have exactly the opposite effect. It would be a statist powerplay against half the population, but we would all pay for it in the long run because when we allow such basic control over our bodies to be dictated by the state it will not be long before they cast the net wider and wider. 

Leave aside the fact that as many as 80% of Americans believe women should control their own reproductive choices, and the theft of at least one member of the Supreme Court has placed us in the path of this oncoming train.

Leave aside that the majority on the Supreme Court has sprung from two elections where the conservative, anti-choice, candidate lost the popular vote, only to become president because of an arcane electoral college system.

Leave aside the fact that most of these judges who are poised to overturn Roe outright lied - under oath -when they testified before the Senate in their confirmation hearings.

Trashing the fundamental right to privacy reinforced by the Roe decision is the final nail in the coffin for the personal privacy of American citizens, male or female, black, brown, white, and native. All of this led by a cabal of lawyers at the Federalist Society, spending hundreds of millions of dark money dollars to remake the Supreme Court with the specific intent of  “transforming the foundational understanding of rights in America”.

Yet, as bad as the attack on privacy is, Americans should also be aware that the First Amendment, the most basic freedom granted by our constitution, is also be on the chopping block. In a nation where religious freedom is considered a hallmark, a handfull of fundamentalist christians are now intent on deciding what freedoms are to be accorded to which Americans. They have decided that their chosen religious dictates give them the right to tell every other American, irrespective of religious beliefs, or non-beliefs, how to live their lives. If they are allowed to do this freedom of and from religion will become a thing of the past and Americans will no longer be bound together by a grand idea, still unfolding, but by the celestial dictator concocted by a small minority and we will be no better than Iran or North Korea.

Why am I - a male with all of the privileges already attached to that - speaking out about this?. My Alice, who was my north star, would never forgive me if I stayed silent. Alice and I endured the heartache of 5 miscarriages. Each one a long personal journey into darkness and grief. The thought of us having to also endure an authoritarian-driven government investigation into the question of whether it was actually a miscarriage is unthinkable. Alice is no longer with us to speak for herself, I feel compelled to speak for her and for my sisters, and for every woman in America, including those who oppose abortion. Freedom is only found in the right to search our hearts and minds to determine what decision is best for ourselves and our families and to exercise our own bodily autonomy. The fight for Choice is the only position that respects the rights of all religions including atheists and agnostics, by allowing that choice to be made by those most directly affected, individuals.    

Notes and links:

Frank Schaeffer once produced propaganda films that helped launch the Christian right. Now he feels regret for what he calls an 'anti-family' movement.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=25JyC5Whhvc

Schaeffer interview with Terry Gross

https://www.npr.org/transcripts/97998654

Wayne King is an author, podcaster, artist, activist and recovering politician. A three-term State Senator, he was the 1994 Democratic nominee for Governor and the CEO of MOP Environmental Solutions Inc., a public company in the environmental cleanup space. His art (WayneDKing.com) is exhibited nationally in galleries and he has published four books of his images, most recently, "New Hampshire - a Love Story”. His novel "Sacred Trust" a vicarious, high voltage adventure to stop a private powerline as well as the photographic books are available at most local bookstores or on Amazon. He lives in Thornton, between Rattlesnake Ridge and the Waterville Range. He proudly flies both the American, Iroquois and Abenaki Flags. His website is: http://bit.ly/WayneDKing

Highland Storm 4 - Glow in the Lupine

Winter Clouds Over Cannon 

Clouds Over Crawford

Reflection of a Chapel in Autumn Water

Chapel of the Woods, Camp Mowglis

Chapel in the Blue Lupine

Carry On

Bending Light

Golden Calves

Tom Wessels and Wayne King, noted environmentalists, speak out for “Scenic” Protection of Lake Tarleton Watershed

News Release
For Immediate Release
For more information: 603-530-4460




Tom Wessels and Wayne King, noted environmentalists, speak out for “Scenic” Protection of Lake Tarleton Watershed

In Mid-2000, after years of fundraising work, a gathering of political leaders, community leaders, environmental activists, and citizens came together to celebrate what they believed was the final step in protecting Lake Tarleton and its surrounding watershed from threatened development and logging. Together they had raised more than 7.5 million dollars to protect more than 5000 acres in perpetuity. Today they find themselves fighting to protect that public investment once again.

Lake Tarleton is the largest and purest lake in the White Mountain National Forest. It is one of a very few lakes that local activists have succeeded in protecting from the scourge of aquatic invasive species such as Eurasian Milfoil. Its largely-forested watershed is also a rich cultural resource containing an early colonial settlement, Charleston, and two other unnamed settlement areas as well as evidence of active and regular Abenaki presence dating back thousands of years - most of which still remains shrouded in mystery because it has yet to undergo any serious study.

Tom Wessels, an internationally celebrated environmental educator, terrestrial ecologist and author of 6 ecology books, whose ability to read the natural landscape is legendary, has joined together with former White Mountain guide, State Senator and Gubernatorial nominee, author and columnist, Wayne King who represented the area that includes Tarleton in the Senate.

Wessels is a long-time professor, now emeritus, at Antioch University New England in the Department of Environmental Studies, where he founded their Master's program in conservation biology. He is often compared with such national environmental leaders as John Muir, and Edward Abbey. King, who has Abenaki and Iroquois roots, has written extensively on environmental issues and is considered a leader in the Climate Emergency movement.

Both concur that the Lake Tarleton watershed deserves special status as a Scenic Area, providing it with additional protective measures that recognize the early colonial and indigenous cultural history as well as the particularly pristine natural environment of Tarleton and its sister lakes in the area.

Wessels and King urge interested citizens to make their voices heard by contacting Pemigewasset District Brooke Brown at the address below before the May 11 deadline of adding their names to the letter and sending it to Ms Brooke Brown Pemigewasset District Ranger before a May 11 deadline..

More information can be found at the website of the Lake Tarleton Coalition:

https://www.laketarletoncoalition.org/






Brooke M. Brown
Pemigewasset District Ranger
71 White Mountain Drive Campton, NH 03223
brooke.brown@usda.gov

RE: Tarleton Integrated Resource Project
56394


Tom Wessels is an acclaimed American terrestrial ecologist, now emeritus professor at Antioch University New England in the Department of Environmental Studies. He founded the Master's program in conservation biology. He is the author of five books and is an active environmentalist.

Wayne King was District 2 Senator in NH which includes the Lake Tarleton area. He was the 1994 Democratic nominee for Governor of New Hampshire. King was a guide in the White Mountains as a young man and today is an author, columnist, podcaster, artist, and active environmentalist.









Professor Emeritus Tom Wessels
The Honorable Wayne D. King


To: 

Brooke M. Brown
Pemigewasset District Ranger
71 White Mountain Drive Campton, NH 03223
brooke.brown@usda.gov

RE: Tarleton Integrated Resource Project
56394

Dear Ms. Brown:

We write this letter to express our concern over the Pemigewasset District’s recommendations for the Lake Tarleton region.

We fully understand the general multi-use mission of the White Mountain National Forest and the National Forest generally. Furthermore, while we are in agreement with the recent Presidential Executive order calling for a more accurate inventory of “Old Growth” forests to help address the Climate Emergency, we are not opposed to responsible and carefully managed logging within the national forest generally.

However, there is a well-established tradition within the National Forest of identifying certain areas that have significant cultural and environmental value and protecting them with a higher level “Scenic Area” status. We believe that the area around Lakes Tarleton, Armington, Katherine stretching along the Appalachian Trail corridor north to Webster Slide, and Wachipauka Pond warrant such treatment. Furthermore, any logging in this region may pose a threat to important, and still unexamined, cultural resources including Abenaki hunting villages and the early colonial settlement of the now-extinct town of Charleston, as well as the unspoiled and pristine nature of its lakes.

In keeping with the intent of the original land acquisition, the White Mountain National Forest should remove this and all future threats to Lake Tarleton’s surrounding forest by amending the 2005 White Mountain National Forest Plan and designating a Scenic Area in the landscape surrounding Lake Tarleton, Lake Katherine, Lake Armington, and stretching along the Appalachian Trail corridor north to Webster Slide, and Wachipauka Pond. This contiguous landscape is among the most scenic in the Granite State. And yet, despite designating nine (9) unique Scenic Areas in the eastern portion of the WMNF, the White Mountain National Forest has not designated any Scenic Areas west of I-93. For the benefit of the local tourism and recreation economy, and for the integrity of this treasured landscape, including Abenaki and early colonial historical resources, it would be both environmentally and culturally short-sighted to allow logging in these areas - which only constitute a very small portion of the western WMNF and less than ¼ of the land protected through the millions of dollars invested in the Tarleton watershed area in 2000. We respectfully request that you amend the White Mountain National Forest management plan and designate this area a Scenic Area to permanently remove the threat of logging and development.

This designation would satisfy the concerns of the donors who helped purchase the land and those who have been advocating for its protection and avoid the need for a costly Environmental Impact Assessment that, arguably, should be engaged if the current plan is to move forward.

Given the environmental and cultural uniqueness of the Lake Tarleton watershed, issuing a DRAFT “Finding of No Significant Impact“ (FONSI) may avoid the need to do a full EIS but leaves the communities who contributed more than 7.5 million dollars to preserve the land feeling that their investment expectations have been ignored. It may also open the WMNF to litigation over the DRAFT FONSI finding in favor of a full-blown Environmental Impact Analysis.

All this could be avoided with a Scenic Designation allowing for better protection of the cultural resources and conservative management of the apple orchards and areas where invasive species require control without logging and clearcutting in the immediate Lake Tarleton Watershed. We urge you to take this route.


Sincerely,


Tom Wessels

Wayne King





CC

Derek Ibarguen

Forest Supervisor

Pemigewasset District Ranger Station

71 White Mountain Drive Campton, NH 03223

Derek.Ibarguen@usda.gov




Honorable Jeanne Shaheen

506 Hart Senate Office Bldg, Washington, DC 20510




Honorable Maggie Hassan- United States Senator

330 Hart Senate Office Building, Washington, DC




Honorable Ann McLane Kuster - United States Congresswoman

320 Cannon HOB

Washington, DC 20515

Phone: (202) 225-5206




Honorable Chris Pappas

319 Cannon HOB

Washington, DC 20515

Phone: (202) 225-5456




Chief of the Forest Service: Randy Moore

1400 Independence Ave., SW

Washington, D.C.

20250-0003 (202) 205-8439




Honorable Thomas Vilsack



Secretary of Agriculture