The soft, deep sadness of E.C. Manning Park, British Columbia

Still on our first day of vacation in Canada, we drove east headed toward wine country in Kelowna and passed through the over 300 square miles occupied by E.C. Manning Provincial Park. The park is unofficially recognized as the end of the Pacific Crest Trail which stretches over 2500 miles from Mexico to Canada (which is definitely outside of my hiking range and patience).   

Driving through the park, there is no possible way to be underwhelmed by the millions of trees that cover the landscape on both sides of the Trans-Canada highway.  As we pass through these dense forests, I am both awed by the sheer beauty of the dense coverage of these conifers and lost in thought as to how these trees absorb massive amounts of carbon dioxide simply by standing still and photosynthesizing all day long.  As we pull off the road to find a trail map of this massive park, my reflections grow much darker as we view the first of many helicopters that are gathering in the roadside clearing to fight the forest fires that began late in the season this year but are nevertheless wreaking havoc in the ecosystem.  

As these trees burn, they will release all of the carbon dioxide that they have so diligently absorbed over their lifespan.  As we venture further into the park, the air quality and visibility continue to decline, making it impossible to ignore the tragedy of what is burning in the mountains above us.   At the eastern edge of the park, the Manning Resort is largely deserted as the winds are expected to shift tomorrow and shift air quality and visibility from unhealthy to intolerable.

Lightning Lake, normally a massive camping and day use recreation area, will remain deserted as helicopters tap the water to quench the fires. 

I am grateful for all the firefighters who engage in the struggle to contain the fires and the destruction every year during drought season.   But it is impossible to escape the sadness that the smoke and flames bring into my open heart. They trigger the kind of sadness that unlike most grief is not sharp and aching. Instead, it is softer, permeating thoughts, feelings, and fibers of being.  Despite the softness, it still runs deep... and is therefore impossible to ignore.   

While forest fires are part of the natural cycle to refresh, reboot, and nourish a healthy ecosystem, they still break my heart.  And this epidemic of fire that we see and smell year after year in the recent past of the North American West is not natural at all, but part of a global shift in climate that we seem to lack the will and care to mitigate.  

This unnatural shift in the natural world infects the sadness within.  The infection all but guarantees that the feelings won't fall away when fire season comes to an end in the upcoming Fall but will linger over the wet winter months to come.