Paddling with the Seals A December kayak trip filled with reflection & new discoveries     The days have shortened and the sun looms lower in the sky. No one is on the water on this December 5th day, except a few flocks of buffleheads close to the shore, winter fowl bobbing in the surf off in the distance, and lucky commercial clammers, including my dear friends Paul and Dave, still able to work the flats during this unseasonably warm weather. Pushing off from the landing at Hemenway Road, Eastham, the first paddle stroke is always the finest of the day, a stroke of balance and release, nature purging the pressures of work. Rounding the bend into Cable Creek the incoming tide pushes progress backwards. One thing about Nauset Marsh, the landings are on the west side and the deep water is east. After fifteen minutes of “treadmill” like paddling, the inlet to the ocean is in sight, the hard part of the paddle will cease to exhaust arms and limps, as the bow catches the incoming tide for the remainder of the paddle. I am out here to count the seals. A couple of weeks ago I was the [...]

Nature Deficit Disorder iPhones, iPads, Kindles and Nooks, flat screen TV’s, gaming systems;  the technology that surrounds us is both exciting and overwhelming.  Kids and adults alike are bombarded on all fronts with the multi billion dollar technology industry that stretches worldwide and is a now a way of life. For adults it is laptops, WIFI, email, iPhones, Blackberrys; a lot of times we ask ourselves “How did we ever survive before ______ (you fill in the blank…)?”  Children growing up with this new technology stimulus see this as a way of life, where we just see it as an alternative to how we used to get the job done or a new means of entertaining ourselves. Here’s the problem though; and we all know it, kids are throwing aside time with family, playing outdoors, playing sports, and just plain being kids so that they can be entertained by the 50 inch plasma with Guitar Hero.  “Nature Deficit Disorder” is what we call it. How do we solve the problem?  Well, we probably can’t entirely, after all – it’s a huge billion dollar industry and money drives the pendulum.   But, I’d like to think that one solution is Camp.  The [...]