WEBVTT

00:00:00.000 --> 00:00:05.120 align:middle line:84%
One of the other sites we were
asked to visit was a clear cut,

00:00:05.120 --> 00:00:07.160 align:middle line:84%
and I really got into
the idea of sampling.

00:00:07.160 --> 00:00:08.660 align:middle line:84%
You walk around in
this forest, it's

00:00:08.660 --> 00:00:10.640 align:middle line:84%
full of all this
geeky, science stuff.

00:00:10.640 --> 00:00:12.980 align:middle line:84%
Plastic buckets and
instruments and measurements,

00:00:12.980 --> 00:00:14.450 align:middle line:90%
and it's not pretty.

00:00:14.450 --> 00:00:17.330 align:middle line:84%
And you get the
wonderful feeling

00:00:17.330 --> 00:00:20.840 align:middle line:84%
of the messiness of doing
science and trying to take

00:00:20.840 --> 00:00:21.950 align:middle line:90%
measurements and samples.

00:00:21.950 --> 00:00:26.330 align:middle line:84%
And so I'm sort of parodying
the idea of collecting

00:00:26.330 --> 00:00:30.350 align:middle line:90%
specimens in this one.

00:00:30.350 --> 00:00:33.080 align:middle line:84%
Specimens Collected
at the Clear Cut.

00:00:33.080 --> 00:00:34.370 align:middle line:90%
"One.

00:00:34.370 --> 00:00:41.240 align:middle line:84%
Wild currant twig flowering with
cluster of rosy microgoblets.

00:00:41.240 --> 00:00:42.170 align:middle line:90%
Two.

00:00:42.170 --> 00:00:46.670 align:middle line:84%
Wild iris, its landing
platforms purple,

00:00:46.670 --> 00:00:51.200 align:middle line:84%
bleeding to white, then
yellow in the honey hollows.

00:00:51.200 --> 00:00:57.260 align:middle line:84%
Purple veins showing the
direction to the sweet spot.

00:00:57.260 --> 00:00:58.190 align:middle line:90%
Three.

00:00:58.190 --> 00:00:59.330 align:middle line:90%
Dogwood.

00:00:59.330 --> 00:01:01.520 align:middle line:84%
Not what I know from
the Northeast woods,

00:01:01.520 --> 00:01:05.330 align:middle line:84%
the white, four-petalled blossom
marked with four rusty holes

00:01:05.330 --> 00:01:08.420 align:middle line:84%
that make its shape
a mnemonic for Christ

00:01:08.420 --> 00:01:09.860 align:middle line:90%
hanging on the cross.

00:01:09.860 --> 00:01:13.490 align:middle line:84%
This one, six-petalled,
larger, wider,

00:01:13.490 --> 00:01:17.660 align:middle line:84%
domed seed house in the
center, no holes on the edges.

00:01:17.660 --> 00:01:21.350 align:middle line:84%
Shameless heathen of
the Northwest Forest

00:01:21.350 --> 00:01:27.500 align:middle line:84%
that flaunts its status as
exhibitionist for today.

00:01:27.500 --> 00:01:28.040 align:middle line:90%
Four.

00:01:28.040 --> 00:01:30.660 align:middle line:90%
Empty tortilla chip bag.

00:01:30.660 --> 00:01:31.160 align:middle line:90%
Five.

00:01:31.160 --> 00:01:33.560 align:middle line:84%
Empty Rolling Rock can,
empty Mountain Dew bottle,

00:01:33.560 --> 00:01:36.890 align:middle line:84%
empty shotgun shell, beer
bottle busted by shotgun shell,

00:01:36.890 --> 00:01:40.730 align:middle line:84%
blasted bullseye hanging
on alder sapling.

00:01:40.730 --> 00:01:41.660 align:middle line:90%
Six.

00:01:41.660 --> 00:01:44.450 align:middle line:84%
One large bruise, four
inches below right knee,

00:01:44.450 --> 00:01:47.900 align:middle line:84%
inflicted by old growth
stump of Western red cedar.

00:01:47.900 --> 00:01:50.360 align:middle line:84%
Ascent attempted
though the relic

00:01:50.360 --> 00:01:54.680 align:middle line:84%
was taller and wider than me,
debris field skirting a meter

00:01:54.680 --> 00:01:58.430 align:middle line:90%
high at its base, wet and punky.

00:01:58.430 --> 00:02:03.110 align:middle line:84%
Nonetheless, I made my try,
eyes on a block of sodden wood,

00:02:03.110 --> 00:02:06.470 align:middle line:84%
reddened by rain, fragrant
as a cedar closet.

00:02:06.470 --> 00:02:10.100 align:middle line:84%
Here in the open air,
the block of my interest

00:02:10.100 --> 00:02:14.030 align:middle line:84%
wormed through, pecked
through with tunnels diameter

00:02:14.030 --> 00:02:15.410 align:middle line:90%
of a pencil.

00:02:15.410 --> 00:02:17.720 align:middle line:84%
How many decades,
how many centuries

00:02:17.720 --> 00:02:22.400 align:middle line:84%
of damage and invasion the tree
had survived, but the stump

00:02:22.400 --> 00:02:23.570 align:middle line:90%
felled me.

00:02:23.570 --> 00:02:26.510 align:middle line:84%
Left me with its
stake on my claim,

00:02:26.510 --> 00:02:32.110 align:middle line:84%
and jubilation to see that
nothing of this ruin was mine.

00:02:32.110 --> 00:02:36.710 align:middle line:84%
Mine only the lesson that
the forest has one rule--

00:02:36.710 --> 00:02:42.420 align:middle line:84%
start over, making
use of what remains.

00:02:42.420 --> 00:02:43.020 align:middle line:90%
Seven.

00:02:43.020 --> 00:02:45.960 align:middle line:84%
Old hunk of dead Douglas
fir, gray as driftwood,

00:02:45.960 --> 00:02:48.390 align:middle line:84%
length of my forearm,
width of my hand.

00:02:48.390 --> 00:02:52.680 align:middle line:84%
Woodgrain deformed into swirls,
eddies, backflows, and cresting

00:02:52.680 --> 00:02:53.340 align:middle line:90%
waves--

00:02:53.340 --> 00:02:56.280 align:middle line:84%
a measure of time,
disturbances that

00:02:56.280 --> 00:03:01.155 align:middle line:84%
interrupted linear growth to
make it liquid as stream flow.

00:03:01.155 --> 00:03:04.200 align:middle line:90%


00:03:04.200 --> 00:03:04.700 align:middle line:90%
Nine.

00:03:04.700 --> 00:03:07.640 align:middle line:90%
Four metaphors for the forest.

00:03:07.640 --> 00:03:11.840 align:middle line:84%
Plantation trees:
herringbone tweed.

00:03:11.840 --> 00:03:16.470 align:middle line:84%
Old growth trees:
medieval brocade.

00:03:16.470 --> 00:03:20.070 align:middle line:90%
Clear cut: the broken loom.

00:03:20.070 --> 00:03:23.640 align:middle line:84%
Clear cut five
years later: patches

00:03:23.640 --> 00:03:28.130 align:middle line:90%
on the torn knees of jeans.

00:03:28.130 --> 00:03:28.700 align:middle line:90%
Ten.

00:03:28.700 --> 00:03:30.170 align:middle line:90%
Skat.

00:03:30.170 --> 00:03:32.360 align:middle line:84%
Pellets the size of
Atomic Fireballs,

00:03:32.360 --> 00:03:34.500 align:middle line:90%
hot candy I loved as a child.

00:03:34.500 --> 00:03:39.080 align:middle line:84%
This, more oval, less
round, not red but brown.

00:03:39.080 --> 00:03:43.940 align:middle line:84%
Specimen dropped by Roosevelt
elk savoring the clear cut's

00:03:43.940 --> 00:03:47.030 align:middle line:90%
menu of mixed baby greens.

00:03:47.030 --> 00:03:52.130 align:middle line:84%
One pellet broken open to
reveal golden particles, light

00:03:52.130 --> 00:03:59.360 align:middle line:84%
that traveled from sun to grass,
to gut, to ground, to mind.

00:03:59.360 --> 00:04:04.760 align:middle line:84%
Forest time makes everything
round, everything broken,

00:04:04.760 --> 00:04:08.960 align:middle line:90%
a story of the whole.

00:04:08.960 --> 00:04:10.750 align:middle line:90%
There's your--

00:04:10.750 --> 00:04:12.000 align:middle line:90%