Last night, I had a dream. I was in a desert called Cyberland.
(Coincidentally, I was listening to the Cranberry’s “Dreams” as I typed those two sentences.)

Side comments aside, no – I didn’t have such a dream. For the unfamiliar, those were the first lines of Jonathan Larson’s “Over the Moon” – Idina Menzel’s signature piece from the musical “Rent”. It did, however, brought to mind the anger and frustration of the writer and his character at the negative effects of “industrialization”. I haven’t seen “An Inconvenient Truth” yet but the searing heat and shaky weather deems it unnecessary to sit through two hours or so of the Oscar-winning documentary. Mankind has obviously brought on its own destruction.

Here’s where I invite you to read between the lines as “Rent” and “An Inconvenient Truth” would seem like neither had anything to do with the succeeding story.

A few weeks ago, while taking a break at the office, I noticed a line of marching ants doing what ants do – back and forth in two files from the colony to wherever source of food they found. I was huffing and puffing a stick of sunshine – Winston Lights – and an evil thought entered my mind. Thought became action and countless ants in the line from the hole in the wall to a hole in the floor died from nth degree burns. Like all damage to nature, it’s not the decimation of innocent ants that was the tragedy – it was the effect. I noticed that more ants crept out of their colony in the wall and they seemed… well… confused. Another confused throng emerged from the floor carrying their burdens.

And elementary biology hit me – the ants maintain the files so they don’t get lost between the colony and the food source. Having massacred the in-betweeners, the colony ants have no way to the food source and the ants carrying the food can’t return to the colony. My heedless disregard for these simple creatures had cost them not lives but balance. Eventually, the wound I inflicted found a way to heal – without any help from me. The ants rebuilt the line by sending scouts and rejoining the separated factions.

What does it say when nature finds a way to rebuild what man has carelessly destroyed? Also, what does it say when nature can’t even bring itself to grieve for those fallen in man’s conquest? I know it seems silly but it was one of the thoughts that entered my mind as I watched the colony repair itself – the survivors didn’t even bother to check on those I slaughtered.

This morning, I was in a similar situation. A break. A line of ants. A stick of Marlboro Lights. “Similar” and not “the same” because these is a difference. In Larson’s words: There is a way out - A leap of faith.

Friday, August 10, 2007, 12:17pm