Scar

One of the things I love most about hiking up a mountain on the Appalachian Trail is the anticipation of the view from the top.  In Virginia I tackled a stretch of the trail that begins at lower elevation near the ancient and misnamed New River.  The path took me over rocks and through streams, and turned upward from the valley, zig-zagging gently on switchbacks designed to moderate the steepest parts.  I’m not getting any younger, and was glad no one was around to see me several times clutching my knees and gasping for air.   I gradually gained elevation and eventually could see the tops of trees with only sky above them, which told me I had nearly reached the peak.  Over the last mile the trail vaulted precipitously upward for the final push to an overlook called Angel’s Rest, where I finally witnessed my reward.  And indeed, there it was—a quiet river snaking through the gorgeous valley far below, the tree-covered mountains rising up above it.But imagine, in place of that soul-nourishing view, there was instead atop those distant mountains an ugly and jagged scar; a clear-cut half the width of a football field running for 600 miles through the forest.This scar will result from the construction of a natural gas pipeline from West Virginia to North Carolina, a 3.5 foot diameter pipe buried 8 feet deep.  The pipeline path follows mountain ridges along most of its route, but the steeper ridgetops will have to be blasted down by as much as 20 feet.  A legal battle is brewing to decide whether contractors will be allowed to bury the pipe 600 feet beneath the Appalachian Trail.  The project will have “substantial impacts on scenery,” according to the overseeing government agency.  When the pipeline is finished, the view from Angel’s Rest will include the swath cut through the forest.Several years ago I met a man in Guatemala named Jorge Luis.  Much like the town below Angel’s Rest, his village is surrounded by steep mountains, once green and lush and blanketed by forests, but now deeply scarred from years of poor villagers stripping away the trees in their desperate need of shelter and fuel.  When heavy tropical rains bombarded the exposed hillsides, the earth literally melted away, washing tons of soil downward, smothering fields, roads and houses in tons of deep mud. Every night for several years Jorge Luis had ridden his motorcycle on pitch black dirt roads to a nearby city to study environmental engineering.  He earned his degree and began working for an organization that plants tree seeds in nurseries, tending the saplings until they are sturdy enough for transplantation onto the bare mountain slopes.  His hope is that the trees will grow and flourish, sinking roots deep into the mountain to hold back what’s left of the land, restoring the hillsides to the way they were.The skill and passion that Jorge Luis brought to his work greatly impressed me, and I asked him, “What motivates you to do this?”  He knew the Bible, and understood from Genesis 1 how God had delighted in each day of the unfolding creation.  Jorge Luis answered, “God-made the world, and each day looked at it and said it was good.  Six times God repeated --it was good.  But when I looked out at my beautiful country, I saw las cicatrices”-the scars- “on our mountains.  I mourned the way we have treated God's creation.  I saw that it was not good.  That’s why I do what I do.”The psalmist says, “I will lift up mine eyes unto the hills, from whence cometh my help.”  Like Jose Luis, many of us mourn the way we have treated our hills.  We may carry a bit of a scar inside of us as well.  [Author’s note:  After writing this reflection, the United States Supreme Court issued a decision allowing the pipeline project to proceed, including burrowing under the Appalachian Trail.  Remarkably, however, in less than a month,  the pipeline contractor abandoned the project, citing delays, costs and economic and legal uncertainty.]    _____________________________________________________________________About the Author: David Root is a Partner at Copeland, Stair, Kingma, & Lovell and specializes in civil defense litigation. He is an elder at North Decatur Presbyterian Church and a former GIPL Board member.