Diving in Van Damme State Park

The mission statement of Divided Core is "Defending Freedom and Nature Through Art."   I admit that this site not living up to that purpose, but it remains a goal that I intend to see through by gradually building this platform into an organization.  This will take time and money, so we're just gonna have to wait.  Driving up and down the California Coast to go kayaking and diving most likely does more harm to nature than good, so the question becomes one of the impact that individuals have on the environment(s) they explore and are a part of; how to minimize one's ecological footprint and regulate the degree of one's exploitation and pollution of nature, as well as how to give back and leave it a place better than you found it.  For instance, I found an abalone on this dive trip, but I left it there because it did not feel right to prospectively strip it of its home and life (granted, this would be different had I needed it for food or to sell for money, and, as an indirectly related point: the act of buying a fish from the supermarket can be more unhelpful to nature that going fishing oneself.)

“One final paragraph of advice: do not burn yourselves out. Be as I am - a reluctant enthusiast....a part-time crusader, a half-hearted fanatic. Save the other half of yourselves and your lives for pleasure and adventure. It is not enough to fight for the land; it is even more important to enjoy it. While you can. While it’s still here. So get out there and hunt and fish and mess around with your friends, ramble out yonder and explore the forests, climb the mountains, bag the peaks, run the rivers, breathe deep of that yet sweet and lucid air, sit quietly for a while and contemplate the precious stillness, the lovely, mysterious, and awesome space. Enjoy yourselves, keep your brain in your head and your head firmly attached to the body, the body active and alive, and I promise you this much; I promise you this one sweet victory over our enemies, over those desk-bound men and women with their hearts in a safe deposit box, and their eyes hypnotized by desk calculators. I promise you this; You will outlive the bastards.”

-Edward Abbey