“We will be known forever by the tracks we leave.”
So read the words you can find on an earth-tone t-shirt or on a bumper sticker affixed to the Saab at the community market. The cited source: a Dakota proverb.
You’ll have to forgive me for being sufficiently irreverent, but had that Dakota spent any time in the woods or near a stream or in the snow? Tracks get covered up all the time in nature. It’s more like we’ll be known for a year or two, max, by the tracks we leave.
Oh, I know, it’s a metaphor for the impact humans make on the universe. But even on that metaphorical level the proverb doesn’t hold. I mean, who was the Dakota who said that? Exactly how much did Exxon spend on promoting its political agenda last year? You can’t answer either question; one answer is lost to the fogginess of time and the other is lost to the obscuring shroud of secrecy and creative money shuffles.
Forever is a long time, and this is a big, big world we live in. We don’t make any impact off this planet, frankly, and the impact we make on this planet is not by the discernable tracks of individuals but by the depressions and gouges and pavings of collectivity. We won’t be remembered, but we will leave a fair mess.
