How many of us take the time to look beyond the beauty strip? How many of us really want to? Aren’t many of us, much of time, content to avert our eyes? After all, what you find around and beyond the strip of natural beauty can be painful. If you ride a bike on our public roads, hike the trails, walk to do your shopping and pick up mail, or paddle on public waterways, then maybe you’re less likely to look the other way.

I’d like to encourage everyone to look around them and see beyond the beauty strip. Why? Without an awareness of what’s hidden in plain sight, our countryside will continue to be the garbage tip it’s become. So, the third Monday of every month I’ll publish a new “Beyond the Beauty Strip” feature. Here’s the first.

 
A productive roadside wetland and wooded hillside with a ducky stillwater in the distance would be a prime spot to stop and reflect on the area’s natural beauty. Yet this rural town’s beautification campaign is limited to decorating utility poles with plastic wreaths and banners displaying the artistic equivalent of Muzak. Here’s what you’d see from a car when slowing for the reduced speed limit:

 

 
Even at 30 mph, you can tell that come spring this cattail marsh will be alive with red-winged blackbirds, returning waterfowl, and migrating songbirds. You might notice the discarded soda sale sign which was thrown into the swamp by the road crews who put up the banner—it’s in the lower right corner above. On the other hand, if you were walking or riding a bike, you’d almost certainly notice it, and you’d also see the depressing number of cans, broken beer bottles, cigarette packages, and plastic bags interwoven into the marsh vegetation.

 

 
Do you have a photo or two which depicts the contradictions, the contrasts, and even the sheer filth that laps up against a beautiful landscape? Want to share it? Then drop me a line.