There is a wonderful op-ed in the LA Times that Nadine Clark sent me last night. It is written by a Pulitzer prize winning author. She asks the question — Do humans really need access to every place on earth? She asks this after we lost 150’ of highway into the ocean. She uses Heath Johnston’s now famous photograph to headline this op-ed piece. It is short, but a fine piece of writing.

“Sometimes I wonder if people even belong in the world’s most fragile and beautiful places. The other day, my cousin, who lives in St. Louis, told me we should leave California — that I should be wary of the fires, the earthquakes, the mudslides. He told me that living in the state is becoming too risky because of overpopulation and climate change. And then I went out and looked at the glen above our house, at the deer trotting through, pausing to glance at me, at the ground squirrels, the sparrows, and the hawks floating on the breeze.

Why don’t I leave? What am I waiting for? Well, the daffodils that are blooming and the lupine soon to come. I have never lived anywhere like this.”

She lives on the Monterey Peninsula, I would guess from her writing. You can find the rest of her op-ed piece here: https://www.latimes.com/opinion/story/2021-02-07/pacific-coast-highway-california