Still Life

Kevin Hernandez - UNT Social Science Major

Today seems to be our world’s spring awakenings from its winter sleep. It’s warm and sunny, so unlike Monday when it was rainy and even this morning when there was thick fog. Now, the weeds of my spot are yellowing and drooping despite the better conditions. The largest weed in my spot, who stands a good two feet tall, has now begun its hunched over walk towards brown, dry death. In all likelihood, he’ll be reincarnated soon. My post oak is showing green but only in patches. I survey the area and come up with nothing. There’s no renewed abundance of life reveling in the new sun. There’s a few new dandelions but that’s all that I find today. Or is it? Life sometimes seems to crawl or even stand still. I notice it here today. But there’s one thing that’s always still happening without people ever really noticing. The wind. Wind governs a great deal about the environment. Wind shapes the land through erosion and creates climates with its global circulations. Winds carries seeds, spreading life’s largest layer of the energy pyramid. It even plays a part in the survivability of animals and their behavior.

Wind has long been a source of movement for humans. We harnessed it to sail the oceans. Once, trade routes were only accessible at specific times of the year because the winds were favorable on a schedule. The winds are highly affected by the temperature of the ocean and as the water warms and cools so does the wind and it sweeps in from the coasts in a circular convection movement much like the ocean’s currents. The winds can further be divided into a few very large sections. The tropic trades blow east from the Northeast and Southeast and steer many tropical storms. The trades also influence the long rainy monsoon periods in Asia. The Westerlies couple with the trades to create the cyclical trade routes, blowing ships from port to port. Wind is increasingly valuable as a power source. It’s nearly limitless provided the sun, our most renewable energy source, does not go out. Germany, Spain and Denmark are leading the way in clean electric energy from the wind. In 2012, 70,000 megawatts were generated and only one is required to power 250 homes. Still, it’s underutilized by the energy world. 

So on this nice day when the wind is providing a nice breeze, it just seems relaxing. You never really think about the other things the wind is continually doing year in and year out. It turns out life is not so still after all.