Is That an Utopia?
Upon visiting the Santa Rosa Island, this past weekend the two most conceptual themes or concepts I have learned from the faculty and the island itself are a sense of place, community and or person. Although these two concepts were two of the three central themes in which we were suppose to take away from the trip. I do not say these things because I feel like they are “the right answer” I say these, because I have truly learned these lessons from the Island itself. Through both the ideologies of Matt and Cause they had demonstrated their own individual topics within their disciplines that in the end all centered around one main levitating topic.
Matt being an art as well as a geology major had not only used his own perspective through his use of creativity to address the island, but he been the first one for me to bring around my own sense of person. Matt’s two main points that he had tried to engrain into was one “you are your own force” and two all things are shaped a specific way and each way servers a purpose that was formed by the given conditions in which they were given. He has used the examples of both utensils and the trees that were on the island themselves. He explained that the spoon is shaped with the purpose to scoop, and the trees were shaped with a curve formed by the wind.
The second theme was then brought to me by Cause, he used his Environmental knowledge as well as conservation and restoration knowledge to bring a sense of place to not only me but to he rest of the Surf members. He had us do something a bit different from the rest of the groups but both of the activities had led us to the same conclusion and feeling. While other groups worked on the restoration of the island by planting plants our group had counted the organisms within a given area of the beach. Both these activities were not easy work but were a fun and interesting way to get us to connect to the island. Through the demonstration of both activates, they led us or me to feel such a stronger connection to the island that I would have not felt before hand. It left the island feeling like I was actually one with Santa Rosa, that our efforts will contribute to the continuous growth and understanding of the island, that although we may not able to see the full growth of the island to still to say the least, it all gave us a sense of place and community.
Although these two lessons and or themes may seem to be separate isolated topics each address the environment in a specific unique way. To me the over arching meaning behind these whole lessons is taken from an environmentalist point of view. I feel that the meaning the faculty was trying to convey is that the environment is all around us and everything we do effects it to a certain degree, and we just need to take a step back away from everything to fully realize our contribution to it all.
The whole trip was a great experience not only for me but I know for everyone else as well. Santa Rosa has opened my eyes I can honestly say that due to the faculty and speakers such as Cause, Alison and Matt, they have widen my perspective on Lady Rosa. I look forward to going back soon and take on what new lesion she will have to teach me next, maybe I might even be able to do a bit of research on her in the future.
