“The tree in the garden is in reality no less other, no less worthy of our wonder and respect, than the tree in an ancient forest that has never known an ax or saw – even though the trees in the forest reflects a more intricate web of ecological relationships” (Cronan 88)

-it can be easy to confuse wilderness with the most remote places of the earth; being able to find and appreciate the beauty of what surrounds us everyday

“Often in a snow storm, even by day, one will come out upon a well-known road and yet find it impossible to tell which way leads to the village. Though he knows that he has traveled it a thousand times, he cannot recognize a feature in it, but it is as strange to him as if it were a road in Siberia” (Thoreau 186).

-the unfamiliarity of what surrounds us; how well do we really know about what is around us?; easy to forget the vastness of everything, the power of Nature