Jim Korsschell’s book, One Man’s Maine, is both thoughtful and provocative. Published by Green Writers Press, a Vermont based publisher whose mission is to spread a message of hope and renewal, the book is all of that.
Jim’s “from away” with a home in Owls Head, and he’s a very strong environmentalist. I most enjoyed his chapters on Maine’s wild critters, from moose and deer to yellow finches and crabs. While he is critical of moose hunters, I forgive him for that. Having never hunted, he doesn’t really understand that hunting is not all about killing.
Jim has a unique way of expressing his appreciation for our state, from moss and lichen on a mountaintop to rockweed in the ocean, and he has strong feelings for our wild places.
Here’s a good example from his chapter titled “Human Natures.”
“Land (and sea) is not just a vast therapist’s couch. We crave wild land. Wildness is a mother, the original gene pool. We attempt to co-opt wild experiences – RVs, zip lines, parasailing, glam-camping – at our peril; Mother Nature sees right through these propitiations. Only in preserving and feeling wilderness are we stating that we understand the worst of human nature, and embrace it.”
And later, at the end of that chapter, is this: “How desperately important it is, then, to bring together people and nature, to take a kid to a vernal pool deep in the woods where she learns what a frog is and must be, let alone how it feels to hold one in her hand, in her wild, untamed, and mortal heart.”
Boy, he got that right.
I also appreciated his chapter on trash. Like me, Jim picks up roadside trash. I’ve written a lot about road slobs, and helped create a new project called Keep Maine Clean, at the Department of Inland Fisheries and Wildlife and the Resource Recovery Association. The Association is about to launch its project, which will build an army of those of us who pick up roadside trash, and encourage others to join us.
I expect Jim Korsschell will be joining us, because he describes our motivation very well: “He does it mostly in gratitude to the place, to keep it good looking, to remove evidence of disrespect, to belong to it, and if a passerby notices and nods, or feels shame and doesn’t litter the next time, then that’s a bonus. Besides, a trash-picker would surely be considered an integral part of the community.”
You got that right too Jim! Perhaps you’ll allow us to include your Trash story in one of our Keep Maine Clean newsletters.