When I was a kid, this place was a dump.
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1/
I mean… it was literally a dump.
Back before we realized we were poisoning the absolute shit out of the ecosystem, any place unsuitable for easy development was treated as worthless.
This was a pristine wetland.
They turned it into a garbage dump. A landfill.
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Back before we realized we were poisoning the absolute shit out of the ecosystem, any place unsuitable for easy development was treated as worthless.
This was a pristine wetland.
They turned it into a garbage dump. A landfill.
2/
Every Sunday, my father would drive me home from New York City to suburban New Jersey.
We’d travel down the Turnpike off in the distance to the left.
Where I stood taking these pictures was a massive, sprawling dump. An endless line of garbage trucks rolling in to unload.
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We’d travel down the Turnpike off in the distance to the left.
Where I stood taking these pictures was a massive, sprawling dump. An endless line of garbage trucks rolling in to unload.
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The water you see all around is a tidal marsh.
Whatever seeps into the water flows both upstream and down.
Pollution travels in both directions.
The damage to the estuary is irreparable. The mud is an up to 60-foot thick toxic marshmallow.
It will never again be clean.
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Whatever seeps into the water flows both upstream and down.
Pollution travels in both directions.
The damage to the estuary is irreparable. The mud is an up to 60-foot thick toxic marshmallow.
It will never again be clean.
4/
But the landfills themselves have long been closed, capped, and remediated.
Were you to merely walk around in these high grasslands, you’d never know these were once a vulgar blight of human consumption and waste and disregard for earth and nature.
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Were you to merely walk around in these high grasslands, you’d never know these were once a vulgar blight of human consumption and waste and disregard for earth and nature.
5/
Most of these remediated former landfills are closed to the public.
They are uninhabited rolling plains sweeping out over low wetlands leading out to the sea.
They are home to deer, coyote, fox, and muskrats.
They are hunting grounds for eagles, hawks, owls and falcons.
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They are uninhabited rolling plains sweeping out over low wetlands leading out to the sea.
They are home to deer, coyote, fox, and muskrats.
They are hunting grounds for eagles, hawks, owls and falcons.
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I kinda love them.
They are metaphors.
They are our failures - permanent and irreparable - offset against the forgiveness of time.
I do a fair amount of trespassing to spend time in these quiet little plains.
I probably shouldn’t admit that.
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They are metaphors.
They are our failures - permanent and irreparable - offset against the forgiveness of time.
I do a fair amount of trespassing to spend time in these quiet little plains.
I probably shouldn’t admit that.
7/
They are oddly serene.
In late fall/early winter, it is just me in the high grass, bundled up against the whistling of a bracing wind, alone in a place disrespected and now overlooked.
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In late fall/early winter, it is just me in the high grass, bundled up against the whistling of a bracing wind, alone in a place disrespected and now overlooked.
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And down below me is the estuary which fills and empties with the rhythm of the tides.
At high tide, it is a bayou of connected lagoons with everything from white perch to 25-pound striped bass.
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At high tide, it is a bayou of connected lagoons with everything from white perch to 25-pound striped bass.
9/
At low tide, it is a vast and sweeping mudflat suddenly crowded with gulls and wading birds.
It is a body scarred but not dead. Injured but not broken.
And in an irony of destruction and survival, it is home to bald eagles.
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It is a body scarred but not dead. Injured but not broken.
And in an irony of destruction and survival, it is home to bald eagles.
10/
Only five miles up that tidal watershed, Diamond Alkali had a riverside factory.
In it, they manufactured Agent Orange.
They literally manufactured an agent designed to destroy nature on the banks of the most vital tidal waterway in the country’s densest state.
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In it, they manufactured Agent Orange.
They literally manufactured an agent designed to destroy nature on the banks of the most vital tidal waterway in the country’s densest state.
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Diamond Alkali pumped all manner of toxic runoff directly into the waterway.
The pollutants aggregated upwards in the food pyramid until they reached apex predators like bald eagles.
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The pollutants aggregated upwards in the food pyramid until they reached apex predators like bald eagles.
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Between food chain pollution and, specifically, the impact of DDT, we nearly extinguished bald eagles from earth.
And yet, now, even here in the very center of our reckless and negligent blast radius, eagles have returned and are thriving.
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And yet, now, even here in the very center of our reckless and negligent blast radius, eagles have returned and are thriving.
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These places are metaphors. They really are.
They are our sins and excesses. And they are our redemption - partial and incomplete, slow in coming though it is.
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They are our sins and excesses. And they are our redemption - partial and incomplete, slow in coming though it is.
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Within a ten-mile radius of where I took these pictures, there are five million human beings.
Hidden in plain sight is this imperfect little suburban treasure.
I love this place.
When I was a kid, it was a dump.
//
Hidden in plain sight is this imperfect little suburban treasure.
I love this place.
When I was a kid, it was a dump.
//
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