Fireflies - The Extinction Of Place

When I was a child, I spent summers at my grandmother’s house in Atlantic City, New Jersey. There were no tall buildings back then, no casinos, no popular culture -- just a sleepy out-of-touch beachside community, longing for the nostalgia of its heyday. It was possible back then to see the sky at night and hear the sound of insects. We would walk to the nearby ice cream stand, two miles away, skipping, laughing, taking our time. There was no rushing; there was just the moment. The sweet smell of Honeysuckle bushes set against the warm salt ocean breeze, lined the streets along the way. We would pull the string and touch our tongues to the drop of sweet nectar and giggle with delight at nature’s hidden surprise. At dusk, the bushes surrounding our house came alive with twinkling lights, darting and weaving, dancing in the grass to a symphony of crickets. Blinking lights darting, sprinting past our outstretched fingers longing to claim one for our own—but we never did. There were no televisions, video games, Internet, cell phones, ATM machines, cyber-environmentalism or traffic back then. We were wired to nature. Connected to something greater than ourselves and we knew it. We understood our place as part of this glorious universe. I mourn the loss of innocence, the lack of connection and extinction of place, my place, my fireflies. I am afraid they will never return. I KNOW they will never return—at least not to me, in MY backyard.