BUT HOW?

February 1, 2010

Now that I’ve got your attention, what?  How soon we forget.

Last week I wrote about dinosaurs, the fact that we either resemble them or have become one.

At any rate, there was a point to that discussion. We as an aging (or aged) community have a depth of experience and knowledge which will be lost when we die. In some ways that is just dandy, all things come to an end, but it does seem a shame to lose the corporate awareness not just of the world around us, but the knowledge of what the natural world contribute to our lives.

I use the ‘natural world’ to differentiate between the electronic and computer world we live in.

I’m sure you are aware of how you feel when you stand in a stream somewhere fishing. It is a disconnect from the everyday work world we live in. That disconnect serves to not just reinvigorate us, it actually has real physical benefits. Those who do not have that disconnect do suffer - a type of depression caused by stress of living in today’s world. A Stanford University study showed that as the Internet grows, Americans spend less time with friends and family. Have you noticed that at all?

As our world becomes more and more electronic and plugged in, the young people spend less and less time in outdoor play. Play as we knew it is pretty much gone. Today’s play is computer driven and usually includes competition and some amount of violence. I recently read a fascinating story about a mother who was concerned her kids weren’t getting outdoors and were just too involved with everything computer. On a lovely day she took the kids to a local park with some woods and encouraged them to just ‘play’. And so they did, ran around and had a wonderful time. A couple of days later she suggested they repeat the little trip and all the fun they had.  The kids looked at her and said, “Thanks mom, but we just did that a couple of days ago.”
They had no frame of reference which allowed them to think this was a normal accepted thing they could do any time they wanted.

The plugged in computer world has other drawbacks. Speaking from a personal point, I had been spending at least ten hours a day on the computer, and sometimes more. I suffered some physical problems, the shoulders being the worse, and being on computer wasn’t helping that - and - I put on a bunch of weight. I’d like to say that was because I quit smoking, but to be honest it wasn’t.

It was because I just wasn’t getting any regular exercise. I’m still not smoking, but I’m not spending the kind on time of the computer I was, and I’m walking. Walking enough (a mile or two almost every day) that I’ve dropped 35 pounds. Almost down to fighting weight. The shoulder still gives me grief, but over all I just feel a lot better.

The government released a batch of figures on obesity revealing that the number of overweight Americans increased 60 percent between 1991 and 2000. The number of overweight kids between the ages of two and five increased by 36 percent, and two of ten children are clinically obese. Children six to eleven spend 30 hours a week looking at a TV or computer monitor.

Here’s the odd one. Over the same time period we had the greatest increase in organized sports for kids. What are kids missing that soccer and Little League cannot provide? It is the hour-to-hour physical activity and emotional exercise kids (and adults) enjoy when they play in nature.

And without that activity, kids also get depressed.

I know this is hard to believe, but the rate at which American children are prescribed antidepressants almost doubled in PRESCHOOL children. I don’t want to sound like an alarmist here, but it just throws me that we have what appears to be a very large numbers of children on drugs at all. And why? In fact more money is spent on antidepressants for children than is spent on antibiotics for them. Does that sound right to you?

It certainly appears that a good deal of it is related to the lack of outdoor activity which we all have been able to enjoy most of our lives. You know you feel better when you’ve been out and about fishing. You can see the physical results of it just by looking at the various photographs of people on this web site. So it should not be a surprise that people who fish have less stress-related problems than the general population. You knew that right?

Did you know we also live longer? Well, not including my late husband who wouldn’t quit smoking and wouldn’t do what the doctors told him and eventually had a massive heart attack. Smokers increase the chances of kicking the bucket substantially. So if you are still smoking you should work on your “Bucket List” now. I’ve mentioned it before, I didn’t want to quit smoking and only did so because I had a very painful shoulder and my surgeon would not operate on it if I was still smoking. Seems the shoulder is one of the places with poor blood circulation making it harder to heal. Smoking messes up the oxygen carrying capability of the blood, so you increase the problems even more. I quit. My doctor recommended Chantix to aid quitting and it worked, it worked so well I did not miss it at all. That’s a hint.

If you have children, grandchildren, or are involved with them, I highly recommend you read Last Child in the Woods by Richard Louv, subtitled Saving Our Children from Nature-Deficit Disorder. There are questions which need answers.  i.e., between 2000 and 2003, spending on ADHD for preschoolers increased 369 percent. What? 

Did you know eighty percent of Americans live in metropolitan areas? I’m surprised our natural outdoor world gets any public support at all! Since inventiveness and imagination are rooted in early experience in nature, where are the creators and inventors going to come from? Sitting in front of either a TV or computer monitor? I don’t think so.

We have had the great advantage of having a life spent for the most part either in the outdoors or planning or thinking or remembering it. This is wonderful stuff. It gives life meaning and allows us to appreciate the gifts and joys of our creation. We are blessed with the knowledge those experiences have given us.

Now comes the big one.  How do we pass it on? 

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