Here's a quick blog update from the road. Yes, I'm on the road, 1200 miles from home, and just HAD to come on here and add my 2 cents to a conversation topic that's already been done to death.

Few things are more annoying than this: You're laying on the beach just relaxing, getting some sun, listening to the waves crash, the chatter of the sea birds flying overhead, the wind blowing gently, and then suddenly it happens. With all of the vast expanse of sand stretching most likely at least a mile left or right of you, a group of people, usually young and loud, decide to set up camp a mere 4 feet from your chosen spot. Disturbing your peace, they launch into loud, obnoxious conversation of the high school valley girl kind (So, like, I was totally, um, what's the word, oh yeah ::snaps bubble gum:: tired last night, so I totally like, got some like, sleep). Then they start laughing, screaming, and doing all things possible to make you want to force-feed them fistfuls of sand.

That's one thing that is hard to beat, but for me, the nature lover that I am, there is always worse, and then, they do it. They bust out some cigarettes, and when they're done, right into the sand with the butts. Someone please explain to me why people do this. Even if you don't care about the fact that the fiberglass filter you're smoking through is non-biodegradable and will still be there 100 years later (if it's not swept out to sea due to beach erosion) and you don't care that hundreds of birds die needlessly every day from having stomachs full of plastic and other artificial parts that they mistake for food, what about your own investment? Yeah, sometimes the only way to make people see a reason to be more responsible is to put it into terms that they DO care about. Most beaches, even if they're free to get on, charge you some kind of rate for parking. For instance, in NJ, not only do you pay anywhere between $15-$50 for a full day of parking, but most beaches charge you a good $6 (at least!) just to walk onto the sand. In Florida, most beaches are free because they are run through municipalities of large cities that already bring in a lot of cash from tourism, but you still have to pay for parking.

Those parking and/or entrance fees go towards two main expenses: lifeguards, which are only on duty for certain hours and then it's "Swim at your own risk," and clean-up. So even if you're not from town and you aren't paying property taxes to the city for them to conduct basic local cleaning, you're paying good money to walk onto something that by all natural rights should be 100% free, and the reason is so that they can A.) save you from drowning, and B.) make sure there's no medical waste for you to drive through the sole of your foot when you least expect it.

Most people would reply to this and say, "Well yeah, I have the right to litter if I'm paying for them to clean it up, right?" In a way, you're actually right, but what about if you're in a party of 2 or more people and you only had to pay for parking. What if your whole group is doing that? Then your measly $1 per hour doesn't do a whole lot when you have a caravan of people dumping' their shit into the sand instead of using the trash bins that are typically spread out around the area in easy to access places. Plus, wouldn't it anger you if you were just a single visitor paying to be on the beach and then you see a whole family leaving tons of garbage behind? All that means is that next time around the prices will be higher because the cost-benefit factor is tilted and they can't keep up with all the waste people leave behind.

I pay to be on these beaches too, and unlike the typical sheeple out there, I actually care about what happens there and what we do to the planet that allows us to survive here. We have no more rights than anyone else to be alive and use what nature gives us, but we hoard it, and when we feel we've used all we can, we use theoretical slash and burn techniques to make sure nobody else can use what we didn't. Which is why after we're done repainting the pristine skies with high rise apartments and billion dollar hotels, we start charging for people to set foot on what the Earth gives us for free. We subsidize and privatize things that aren't ours to own and then we trash it because we feel justified since we have to pay. However, that's backwards thinking--we're paying because we've wrecked it all.

This turned out to be a longer entry than planned, so I'll leave you with this: Next time you have to pay in some shape or form to enter any kind of natural area, be it a beach, a forest, or a preserve of some kind, remember what you're paying for, remember why you're really paying, and just apply some basic responsibility and don't leave it worse than you found it. Eventually someone will be hired to clean it up, but they can't do their job if you keep making it worse.

-Robert Acocella