Category Archives: Environment

An Increasingly Common Madness

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By Bill Shein
March 18, 2011

A true non-Christmas miracle occurred here in the Berkshires last Saturday morning.

It began like every other winter morning at my little home: I was gazing out the window, petting my dog, drinking coffee, and silently berating my cold self for not spending the winter in a youth hostel in Rio or camping on a Costa Rican beach.

But on this particular morning I saw something not seen in these parts for months. Was it a “Good Riddance, 2010!” party hat from a New Year’s party? A lonely sprig of winter kale, ready for harvest? A president of the United States who doesn’t instantly cave to the opposition?

No, none of these things. In the pasture behind my home, barely within range of my eyeglass-corrected vision, was a small, two-foot-square patch of grass that had emerged from beneath the months-old snow pack. Right there in my line of sight was a piece of naked, uncovered, snow-free earth.

Much like seeing the sun as a mysterious, unknown yellow orb after weeks of thick cloud cover, I wasn’t sure what it was. I stared, tilting my head to the side like a dog confused by an unknown sound. “Could it be? Could it BE?” I wondered aloud, causing my dog to tilt her head to side, confused.

After binoculars (and a firm pinch of my forearm) confirmed that I was looking at actual soil and not a late-winter mirage, I did what any man in his 40s would do: I wept like a small child. Huge, heaving sobs of joy, with tears flowing like Ricky Schroder’s at the end of “The Champ” – a movie reference so old that only a bawling man in his 40s would cite it.

I ran outside, dog following at a full run, my hands thrust skyward in an open-armed embrace of the natural world, whooping and hollering and singing a Norse folk song that celebrates the pending thaw. I gave the bare spot a close inspection. It was brown and muddy and barely recognizable, but it was definitely dirt and grass and weeds. Foliage! Entirely free of snow and ice!

I fell to my knees, face burning from rivers of salty, super-manly tears. Screaming “Thank you!” to the deities of all religions, I removed my boots and socks and let my bare feet touch the earth – something I hadn’t done for months. I forced my toes deep into the ice-cold mud, letting it fill the gaps between them. I dragged my palms back and forth across the muddy grass, covering my hands with beautiful muck, smearing it on my face with glee.

Time slipped away. I stripped down to near-nakedness, danced and rolled about, and laughed and cried and then laughed some more, my dog’s head permanently tilted sideways in worried confusion. Hours passed.

Later, while in the emergency room receiving treatment for frostbite, the hospital staff was uninterested in my animated ramblings about grass and mud. “What’s wrong with them?” I thought. Surely they endured the same horrific Berkshires winter, yes? The huge storms, biting winds, ice dams, leaking roofs, road-salt-stained shoes? The suspension-busting frost heaves and potholes? The snow banks so tall they nearly blocked out the sun? Their disinterest fueled my madness.

ME (grabbing doctor’s lab coat): Don’t you see? I felt muddy grass on my naked feet! Don’t you know what this means? DON’T YOU? 

DOCTOR (to nurse): Sedate this man. And shackle him to the bed. And get me a clean lab coat; this one’s covered with mud. And schedule a psych consult, because he’s clearly suffering from ––

The sedative was strong. I awoke several days later, feeling oddly calm. A nurse explained that I had suffered a bout of something far more serious than frostbite. It was a good thing, she said, that I came straight to the hospital – naked and muddy and belting out Norse folk songs in the waiting room. She told me that this affliction is spreading rapidly across the Berkshires.

According to the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (Fourth Edition), I had been stricken with a classic case of “weather-related psychosis, complete with temporary mental unsteadiness, loss of good judgment, unexplainable giddiness, totally manly tears of joy, and wholly irrational hope that good things will happen in the very near future.”

Look it up. It’s filed under “Spring Fever.”

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Bill Shein sends out a 1980s-style “high-five” to everyone who toughed out this kooky winter.


A Protest in Monterey

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By Bill Shein
March 8, 2011

“Investigating suspicious activity, Fairview Road. Beaver traps set by town are being cut up and beavers being set loose.” – “Police Matters,” Monterey (Mass.) News, February 2011

(The following statement was found recently at Monterey Town Hall. It was attached to the door with a jagged piece of wire mesh, apparently taken from a beaver trap. The note – carved into a large piece of tree bark – was handwritten, though poorly, suggesting the writer did not have “hands.”)

TO ALL HUMAN RESIDENTS OF MONTEREY, MASSACHUSETTS: We are the Berkshire Evolutionary Army of Veteran Revolutionaries (BEAVR). We speak for all peace-loving beavers in the region, though we count other woodland creatures among our ranks. This is Communique Number One.

To those who block our instinctive desire to nibble on trees, gather up woody detritus, and block waterways with our fantastical creations, hear us clearly: We mean you no harm, but we will not be deterred.

We “beavers,” as you call us, have lived in the Berkshire Hills for thousands of years – long before you arrived in the places you call “Tyringham” and “Monterey.” Places, we should note, through which you have built roads confusingly named Tyringham Road, which travels through Monterey, and Monterey Road, which cuts across Tyringham.  This, we can agree, is quite stupid.

You drove us away in the late 1700s, but we returned 80 years ago. You even helped to restore us to healthy numbers. Today, beavers want only to work hard at our daily tasks and then swim lazily for hours, smack our flat tails against still waters, eat water lilies, and furnish our homes with delicately whittled representations of our favorite beaver celebrities.

A quick look around Berkshire County makes one thing clear: There is room for us all. Put simply, you don’t have to build your (idiotically named) roads, or your absurdly large living quarters, in the same places where we divert waterways into the deep moats that protect our homes.

It is humans, not beavers, who are responsible for your flooded roadways and marshy back yards. Why not set painful traps for yourselves?

Your folk singers look around and joke that humans want to “pave paradise and put up a parking lot.” Ours bark about living in peaceful harmony with all life. You drain aquifers to fill cement “pools” with chemically treated water. We swim in Benedict Pond, bask in the warm sun, and mind our own business.

You spend your time in front of electronic screens and, interestingly, seem to worship a beaver-looking human named “Justin Bieber.” (Or is it “Justin Beaver”?) You kill us for fur and use our glands for perfume. You trap us in metal jaws surely illegal under your Geneva Conventions. Though in recent years, you say, “Geneva Conventions? Hey Bob, have you heard of the ‘Geneva Conventions’? No? Me neither!”)

Despite all this, beavers and humans are quite similar. The human “Frank Gehry” designs buildings that make your critics swoon – as if round, haphazard structures were something new in the world. Ha! You make us laugh our gleeful, slightly mocking beaver laugh. We’ve built Gehry-esque lodges for eons! But where are the photo spreads in Architectural Digest? Just ask, and we’ll let you photograph our secret Beaver Revolutionary Lodge, its walls adorned with pieces of beaver traps turned into rustic metal artwork worthy of your overpriced Sundance catalog. (Your photographer must be blindfolded for the journey, though.)

Alas, we digress.

Our struggle to remain free is nonviolent and peaceful, using only strategic noncooperation. And in the end? We will be your friends and partners. But at present you’d rather trap our elders by the ankle, enmesh our children in wire netting, and shoot us with your guns. This is unacceptable.

So at this very moment, our (unarmed) commandos patrol Monterey, disabling your evil traps and releasing our compatriots. Meanwhile, you warm yourselves by fires that consume otherwise useful wood. Sheesh! Put on a sweater!

Oh dear human friends, the winds of change are blowing from Tunisia to Egypt to the waterways of Monterey, Massachusetts! You are our enemy today, but we still love you. Your species is young and foolish, but at times you demonstrate wisdom and transformation. Let today be one of those times.

P.S. As a gesture of good faith, please provide our pre-teen females with 500 Justin Bieber posters – properly waterproofed, if possible.

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Bill Shein is quietly engaged in secret negotiations between Berkshire County’s humans and beavers.


Pardoning My Tofurky

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By Bill Shein
November 18, 2010

My friends, what follows the upcoming colon is a painful confession: Year after year I’ve consumed my vegan Thanksgiving Tofurky without a second thought about how it arrived on my plate. And for that I am deeply ashamed.

It’s embarrassing to admit that not once have I considered the conditions under which a Tofurky is raised. I don’t know where its organic soybeans are grown, or what it was fed, or how it was cared for during its life. Nor do I know anything about how my Tofurky was slaughtered, processed, frozen, packaged, and shipped to the freezer at my local natural foods store.

Despite considering myself a thoughtful consumer, never have I asked a single question about Tofurky production. For example, does runoff from Tofurky farms despoil local drinking water? Is my annual Tofurky roast full of antibiotics that make humans more vulnerable to antibiotic-resistant disease? Is there a National Tofurky Federation that, like the National Turkey Federation, uses clever public relations to hide inconvenient facts about Tofurky?

While tucking into my annual Thanksgiving meal – my body usually sore from the annual touch-football game – I’ve never wondered if Tofurkys are hatched via incubators like the 250 million turkeys “raised” each year on factory farms, never knowing their mothers and spending their entire life in an overcrowded, windowless, ammonia-filled warehouse.

Are slow-growing Tofurkys killed young so they won’t consume feed better used by the fast-growing ones? Do they have their upper beaks and toenails cut off shortly after birth? (Do they even have beaks and toenails?) Are Tofurkys genetically bred to grow to outlandish, unhealthy proportions like today’s industrial “Broad Breasted White” turkey? I simply don’t know.

The questions keep coming: Are Tofurkys crammed into open cages on trucks that transport them through all weather conditions to the slaughterhouse? Like turkeys, are they specifically excluded from the Humane Slaughter Act, which means nothing has to be done before their throats are cut and feathers burned off?

It is also quite unsettling to ponder whether my Tofurky – when not frozen – might exhibit the unique personality and penchant for affection that many turkeys display when not “produced” on factory farms.

With Thanksgiving just days away, and so many troubling unknowns about my traditional holiday meal, I had no choice but to bow to conscience. And that’s why I pardoned my Tofurky.

How did I get this idea? By watching the president “pardon” a turkey each year before Thanksgiving. (Note: It’s unclear what crimes turkeys commit. Bank robbery? Hacking into government computers? Blowing the cover of CIA agents to punish political opponents? Stay tuned: That’s the subject of my pending Freedom of Information Act request!)

A few days ago, brimming with the pride and confidence that come from doing what’s right, I took my Tofurky from the freezer. I let him (her?) defrost for several hours, and then placed him outside my front door. And then I waited. And waited. And waited.

“You’re free, little guy or girl!” I yelled. “Run away, delicious Tofurky! Go, go, go!”

As I watched from my kitchen window, several squirrels began pecking at him playfully. I smiled, amazed at this budding inter-species friendship, until I realized the squirrels were eating him. I ran outside, shooed them away, and dressed his wounds with soft tofu I had in the fridge.

Then I sat with him awhile, wondering if he might join up with the wild turkeys who stroll past my house most afternoons – the watchful elders in front and back, always on the lookout for predators, hunters, and employees of Butterball, Inc.

After a few hours it became clear that Furky – my name for him – was not leaving.

This raised some new questions. Had an unprecedented human-Tofurky bond been created by my generous act? Could Furky join the brood of animals at my house – without being eaten by them? And – most important of all – might this little tale of pardoning my Tofurky inspire others to consider more thoughtfully what’s on their plate this holiday season?

That’s not a question I can answer. But it’s one that you can.

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Bill Shein’s groundbreaking “Tofurky Petting Zoo” has yet to attract a single visitor.