We Are Dinosaurs

Some years ago, at an old farmer’s funeral, his son, eulogizing, looked out and upon the congregation. His eyes fell on all those familiars as if we were strangers or suspects. He looked high into the balcony and repeated what he’d just said. “Some of you, here today don’t know it, but you are dinosaurs … dinosaurs.” He continued, giving fantastic details of his father’s humble and yet adventurous life. The dinosaurs in the room could perhaps begin to identify themselves. He was talking about the lumbering, tinkering, committed types working wholesale vegetable farms with their family in tow.

Part of being a dinosaur is not seeing it coming. How could they? When you are confined to the biological needs of metabolism, you don’t have time or the resources to build telescopes and the subsequent weapons you’ll likely need to defer your extinction. I remember another speaker, not a eulogy, this old farmer was angrily concerned that a new tax was going to depress his property values. The community house was full that night as politicians and land preservationists listened to the citizens react to the idea of a 2% transfer tax, the Community Preservation Fund. The tax would be levied on all land transactions and the money raised would be provisioned for the purchase and protection of farmland. But this farmer, perhaps knowing he was a dinosaur, stomped his cane and stated “Farming Is Over!”, while my brother and I, still baby dinosaurs and not seeing the big picture, looked cross-eyed at each other, mocking this old man’s opinion.

Another part of being a dinosaur is reduced habitat. We once roamed from the Montauk Highway to Peters Pond. Reduced acreage means I seldom venture far from home. Yesterday I went as far as the eastern edge of Sagg where I saw a sign that scared me. Not a comet streaking through the air, but a literal one, Welcome to Sagaponack. Enjoy the agricultural history. In addition to being a dinosaur and a farmer, I was also once an English major. Words, while we try to use them for clarity, are also shaped by context and personal interpretation. A dinosaur will read this sign differently than your average person-taking-the-back-roads will. History, to a dinosaur, means part of the past, and like themselves, not likely to be accommodated in the future. History, to a person-taking-the-back-roads, explains why they see wide open expanses of protected or privately owned land. They might not know about the CPF or the complex partnerships that make it possible to have a land museum. The motorists can, for now, enjoy as they pass, the shrinking and ever more precious collection.