We were sleep-deprived first time parents of an eight-month-old baby girl when my husband and I sold our apartment in Brooklyn and moved to the Catskills. I definitely felt withdrawal pains after leaving the city—and occasional buyers’ remorse. I admit: for the first week, I thought we’d made a huge mistake and I feared for our daughter’s future. I’ve since completely changed my tune—and my postnatal hormones have regulated themselves. More importantly, our daughter, now two, has thrived. She’s a country kid, for sure. In her words: I love my dad. I love my mom. I love my mountain.
Recently, I read about a new study on attention restoration therapy (ART), soon to be published in Psychological Science, which finds that “interacting with nature dramatically improves cognitive function,” and now I’m even more convinced that we made the right move. The study has found that “a walk in the woods is like a vacation for the prefrontal cortex.” Similarly, last spring I read Richard Louv’s book, Last Child in the Woods (April, 2008), which claims that nature deficit disorder is a real threat to our children who spend more time these days plugged into dvds, video games, television, and the Internet, and/or running to and from overscheduled activities than they do in free, unstructured outdoor play.
This blog is about our own little "back to the land" experiment. But it's more than that. It's about the Catskills and all its offerings. My friends are all tired of me trying to persuade them to move upstate. But I want to start a movement. A mass exodus to the sticks. And now I’m armed with empirical research, scientific studies, and a blog.
Recently, I read about a new study on attention restoration therapy (ART), soon to be published in Psychological Science, which finds that “interacting with nature dramatically improves cognitive function,” and now I’m even more convinced that we made the right move. The study has found that “a walk in the woods is like a vacation for the prefrontal cortex.” Similarly, last spring I read Richard Louv’s book, Last Child in the Woods (April, 2008), which claims that nature deficit disorder is a real threat to our children who spend more time these days plugged into dvds, video games, television, and the Internet, and/or running to and from overscheduled activities than they do in free, unstructured outdoor play.
This blog is about our own little "back to the land" experiment. But it's more than that. It's about the Catskills and all its offerings. My friends are all tired of me trying to persuade them to move upstate. But I want to start a movement. A mass exodus to the sticks. And now I’m armed with empirical research, scientific studies, and a blog.
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