Making a mess of our own nest

Glenn Melancon/Contributing writer

Several years ago, we had a surprise visitor set up house on our porch.  It was a barn swallow.  We were excited to watch it create a new home out of mud.

Our boys were still out home at the time, and they had a front row seat to watching nature in action.  The bright blue bird swooped back and forth to bring building material, slowly shaping a small nest.  

At dusk it would patrol my yard.  I always imagined it eating mosquitos.  I hate mosquitos.  They would drain every ounce of my blood if I stayed outside during the summer nights.

I saw barn swallows as a good neighbor.  Then the babies came.

My friend, Eric Weisberg, always like to use birds to contrast with humans.  Eric would say, “Do you know birds don’t poop in their own nest. Humans do. We’re constantly polluting the earth, our nest.”

Baby barn swallows proved Eric right.  At an early age, they learned to put their little bottoms over the side of the nest.  I never imagined baby birds could make so much poop.  They were a mess.

I have to say though, Eric was only half right.  I think we are more like barn swallows than his original statement implied. 

I don’t think either human or barn swallows poop in their own nest.  They both poop on their neighbors’ porch.  We both project our pollution in our neighbors’ direction.  Neither of us thinks about our neighbor.

In the 1970s we made a big push to reduce pollution and clean the environment in the United States.  This effort went a long way to improve our quality of life.  

One of the biggest changes was removing an unseen enemy: lead. Lead made its way into a wide variety of products from gasoline to paint to shotgun shells.

The impact was devastating.  Lead killed bald eagles.  Lead created mental disabilities.  Lead increased crime rates.  Government mandates removed lead and life improved.

The next big frontier is petroleum products.  Can we reduce our dependence on them?  Plastic waste is everywhere from the road side to the oceans.  Carbon dioxide is trapping heat in the atmosphere. 

Like lead, CO2 is invisible.  It has big money protecting it.  It has big money lying to make us ignore the poop in our nest.  The damage from CO2, however, is all too visible.  

Wild Fires.  Draughts. Tropical Storms.  Melting glaciers.  The earth seems to be treating humanity like I treated the barn swallows.  I knocked down the nest and washed the poop away. 

Glenn Melancon is a professor of history at Southeastern Oklahoma State University. He can be reached at glenn@glennmelancon.com. His opinions are his own and do not reflect those of the Jefferson Jimplecute.