“Restless- Pt 1”

“Our cherub transforms into an instrument

Of four cords, the greatest tool ever forged

Our traitor will be hands that perpetually play each note

Without rest, together they are but just one song

Omega and its companion musician of the cords”

The last few verses, a translation of the poem “Incendio en el Cielo” (“Fire in the Heavens”, the closest translation I could think of) which I wrote about a year and a half ago, is a piece of a series of poems that have the theme of incorporating interactions between wind and fire, and its eventual conclusion  “La Arrasada”  (“The Scorching”). I believe it makes a fitting introduction for my first real blog entry. 

Truth be told I’ve been feeling sort of depressed lately, and when these feelings invade an individual, they tend to seek isolation.  From these days of being by myself I have had the time to rethink many things, restate and reorganize my priorities.  You see, there exist a group of people in our world that are just born with a curiosity to learn more about the environment that surrounds us. These curiosities can range from volcanoes to oceans to the vast ranges of weather phenomena that our planet has. If you haven’t realized it yet, we live in a beautiful, unique planet (or, statistically, one that has very low probability of having a nearly identical twin somewhere in the universe., even though, truth be told, there is an estimate of about 10^50 stars in our universe, so who knows?  … oh physics).

So back on topic, there are people that are born with a natural curiosity to learn more about nature, our environment and the things that make out planet so unique. I guess (or at least I have written in many essays) I am one of those people. When I was a little kid, I found it to be so amusing to see a bunch of trade cumulus clouds appear in the sky, at about 10 in the morning. It looked like an ant invasion, so many of them, all of a sudden, looking puffy and white, like cotton candy. Of course, by the time the afternoon came, they’d become a thunderstorm and it would be raining like crazy. No umbrella or poncho could save you from this downpour. If you are not convinced, there was this one time when I was 10 that I got caught in one of these rain events while I was walking home.  The strong winds managed to blow away both my umbrella and my poncho! After that I would just wait until it got clear again. Then at night we would get invaded by those pesky flying ants, but that’s another story!

So I was always looking at the sky, looking at the TV (especially the Weather Channel, loved the tropical update at 10 before the hour) and had my little maps. The internet was not yet as big as it is today for me, for I had no internet or dial up (remember the dial up sound!).  It was very clear that this was the path I wanted in life: the atmosphere! In reality, fulfilling this dream is not as simple as it looked.  It is so complicated that we will probably never be able to completely understand it, and there will probably never be enough computer capacity to model every single detail about it (at least not in this generation, or the next)!

So, why even bother with something that is seemingly impossible to do. Our atmosphere,  as well as all the other components of our Earth, are so important to our everyday life, people don’t even have a clue at times. It pretty much defines our daily activities, and can go as far as defining cultures and communities. Just take two places, say Alaska and Hawaii, see the difference? 

You may not realize it, but we Earth scientists have a responsibility. We are responsible, to some extent, for your life, your safety, and the safety of your loved ones. We want you to be safe and sound in the case of any natural disaster that happens. And we want your future to be even safer than it ever was! That is why there are thousands of scientists around the globe doing constant research. If we were not doing something important for you (you can disagree), we will not be getting the money for it. We are not getting money to make big parties in San Francisco, Cancún or the Maldive Islands (although that would be fun and you’d be invited). I dream that someday my family could be as safe from any dangers as possible, and I really want to contribute for a safer tomorrow.  In the last few years I have seen so many natural disasters, from earthquakes, to hurricanes, to tornado outbreaks, just waning away the candles of so many lives. Witnessing each event comes with a feeling of guilt, of anguish, of being powerless. I feel that we could always do something to lessen all this, but losses always come, be it our fault or not. We do seem to always get the short end of the stick though. 

It is not just our task to keep you safe, but yours as well. I know your new SONY flat-screen is great and all, but I am sure that SONY can make a new one for you if you lost it. They cannot, however, make a new you.  Our mother Earth can be as brutal and unforgiving as we, at times, can be. Even though she has cared for all life in her precious womb, people need to realize that our planet is just as fine in taking away our lives as she is giving it to us. In other words, we need to be aware, and prepared about all the things that can happen. 

This has been my strife, my life, pretty much my everything. It runs in my blood like the DNA of every single event that lead to the creation of our latino (Puertorrican) community, and to who I am today. It is a raging firestorm, yet an instrument, both fused together into this harmonious melody, just like the poem I described above. I am not alone in this, we are many. Some are seeking the lost tune of thunder, others the song of earth. But just like fire can be, restless and fierce, it can be choked down as well. I live my day to day giving it my all, to reach the things that I want without much rest. Every once in a while I stop and can’t go any further and am forced to take a breather. After some time of neglecting most of the things I should not, I came to the realization that this is what I want. I want to write, everything from poems to stories to just plain thoughts! I love to do this, and I love that people can take their time to read it. It is fun, and we all learn!  It nothing less than a pleasure to be at your service, to be a tool of exchanging the things we know (hence the blog title), to extend my hand to everyone.  Like my fictional character above, I hope to also be an instrument, but not a musical one, but at least one of entertainment!