Diane Lewis - The Great Healthy Yard Project

Copyright 2014 by Diane Lewis, MD

All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, distributed, or transmitted in any form or by any means, including photocopying, recording, digital scanning, or other electronic or mechanical methods, without the prior written permission of the publisher, except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical reviews and certain other noncommercial uses permitted by copyright law. For permission requests, please address She Writes Press.

Published 2014

Printed in the United States of America

ISBN: 978-1-938314-86-5

e-ISBN: 978-1-938314-87-2

Library of Congress Control Number: 2014930750

For information, address:

She Writes Press

1563 Solano Ave #546

Berkeley, CA 94707

Interior design by Tabitha Lahr

TO my husband, Blair, and my friend Susanne, who encouraged me to write this book. To Blair, Mack, and Maggie, for your patience while I worked on it. To my friend Lucy, who understood this before all of the rest of us.

About the age of twelve, I was playing near the river with some friends and we decided to climb the stone wall and imposing wrought-iron fence that surrounded an abandoned estate. We found two beautiful old mansions filled, not with furniture and paintings, but murky fish tanks, fishing nets, and terrifying specimens from the Hudson River. We had stumbled onto the Wave Hill Center for Environmental Studies. Rather than reprimanding us, Wave Hill enlisted our help and not only awakened in me a deep respect for the natural world but also the conviction that what is seemingly insurmountable can be accomplished.

In their work, Wave Hill made small but tangible improvements in the health of the Hudson River, which I had previously believed was irreparably damaged. I went back to the mansion day after day to lend my hand with minor tasks, driven by a feeling of empowermentI was making a difference in a positive way. This sentiment was the foundation of my involvement in the environmental movement. At the time, I was still unaware of the extent to which polluted water affects us. I later learned that the Hudson River harbored PCBsa deadly, invisible, manmade poison that had been discharged into the river during the manufacture of electrical equipment. The effects of this were dormant for years, and people only knew they were sick decades later, when diagnosed with cancer.

I grew up in the era of Silent Spring, Love Canal, and DES. I knew the world was dangerous, but was made to feel that these dangers were containable. I have learned that this is not true. We are inextricably linked with all aspects of the natural world, and because of this, pollution puts us all at risk every day.

When I became a mother, I initially thought feeding my children natural foods and spending time in the wilderness would protect them, but I learned that this, too, wasnt true. Failed exams, broken bones, and bad relationships can be fixed. Exposure to environmental toxins cannot. As a mother I felt the need to take constructive action to protect my children. With this in mind, and because my husband and I wanted our children to develop a strong connection to the natural world, our children grew up spending their vacations, four months a year, on the shores of a river in the Adirondacks, away from the congestion and pollution of New York City and its suburbs.

Floating downriver in small boats, our children were consumed with laughter and mischief as they overturned their kayaks and rushed dangerously close to sharp rocks and protruding tree stubs. I was constantly torn between appreciating their freedom and wanting to shield them from danger. Rocks and boulders in the river had destroyed one of our more fragile canoes; they would not be good for little heads. So I taught my children how to circumvent danger, and how to drift to the oxbow, where the river slowed, to recapture their kayaks.

Far from New York City, I thought my children were safe; I didnt know then that the river carried dangers more difficult to protect against than rocks. The river appeared to be clean, but it wasnt. It had treated sewage that the nearest town released into a river that drained into ours. Storm water runoff laden with fertilizers and pesticides from a golf course also drained into the river. An old dump near the shore leached chemicals upriver, and nearby potato farmers frequently sprayed their crops on the flood plain. Yet the state stocked the river with trout for people to fish and eat. Even after my children climbed out of the river, they were not safe.

As a nephrologist, I understand not only the importance of clean water but also the impact chemicals have on the body. The Clean Water Act was passed in 1972 to preserve clean water and prevent companies from discharging large amounts of toxic waste into waterways. Unregulated industries dont pose the same kind of threat to our health and water they once did. Ironically, we consumers are now one of the primary culprits. Recent research shows that much of the pollution affecting our health and water quality today is due to residential use of chemical pesticides, weed killers, and fertilizers.