Reflections on My 10-year iNat-iversary.

Gee, I ought to get outdoors more...

My health suffers because of iNaturalist. I spend far too much time at the computer and snack on too much junk food as I try to identify obscure moths for other people. The hours of screen time by day leave me with that visual/biochemical hangover at bedtime that all the doctors have warned us about. I lay awake at night in bed, worrying why I can't identify that fungus gnat that seems so distinctive to me. But I'm up the next day, composing an iNat journal post that will thrill about three people around the World, yet tearing my hair out trying to get the formatting to work, or worrying that my Spanish grammar in the brief resumen will make me look estúpido.

Who will be the next person to block me? or disagree with one of my identifications? or, worst of all, properly correct one of my erroneous IDs? I will be humiliated. No one will like me. I will have alienated 2.9 million other human beings scattered around the globe. I won't be able to show my face anywhere....

Wait a minute! Outdoors! I can go out-of-doors! Into Nature! I won't have to interact with my own species for a time. I can recharge my mental batteries. My lithium batteries are all charged up and I only have to open the door and step out.

Ah, the Fresh Air! The sounds of Nature! What a beautiful trail I'm on. There's birds--and I know all of their sounds--and butterflies--and I can name them all--and beautiful flowers and plants--the entire ecology of which I can expound upon at length...to myself, under my breath. And there's a moth, but it flies away too quickly. "I'll see you at the moth sheet tonight, my friend!" And look at this fancy lichen on the oak branch; I can put a name to this one! And that mushroom over there--I know someone who can help me ID that--and the same for that hoverfly on that daisy, and I think I remember the family name for this creepy little millipede under the log.

Uh, Oops! Aaaagh! I've slipped on the leaf litter and fallen and broken my wrist! Oh, the pain...the agony! The frustration...the hassle...the expenses! At least I broke my wrist in a lovely location. And I was smart enough to break my off-hand, my left. I'm well reminded that the outdoors is a dangerous place!

Boy, will I be glad to get back to my computer and rejoin my Community. Safe, secure, accepted. Nature is so interesting....online.

Posted on 07 de dezembro de 2023, 05:28 PM by gcwarbler