Back to Swimming Upstream?

Roe, Roe, Roe Your Boat.   Life, for animal life as scientists currently understand, essentially starts the same way, be it for fish, fowl, or financial advisor.  In theory, one would have to say it was the egg that came first, before the chicken, since it was the fish in the sea that came before the birds of the air (or livestock, since the chicken is not really much of a flyer).  Some eggs have a better chance, in a nest protected by a fierce predator, while others are held in the mother until fertilization and incubation resulting in live birth.  Still others have a delicious chocolate outer part with a gooey nougat center delivered by bunnies that cluck like chickens.  Regardless of the model used, the egg seems to be a jumping off point for many a life and or recipe.

In the case of salmon, they start in the stream where Mom and Dad came to spawn, and later, bear food or lox. The young salmon then travel downstream after birth, hopefully slipping past the many mouths eager to feed on them, to open seas to do whatever it is salmon do until the reach maturity.  Then it is time to head back upstream, avoiding fishermen and bear alike (who, in turn, also try to avoid each other, unless the bear suddenly decides the fishermen are equally good sources of meat, at which point all bets are off).  Passing these obstacles, they finally return to the spot where they were spawned, and repeat the cycle.   In other cases, the spawning happens out at sea, such is in the case of eels, which then head up into freshwater to grow, eat everything possible, and then go out to sea to do it all over again.

By now, one has to be wondering,  what does this all mean?  National Geographic had a great article on the decline of eels as a fishery?  The price of Nova Lox is up at Zabar's?  Evil mutant fish can swim up the sewer lines and attack unsuspecting people in the shower, or worse, on the toilet?  Interesting idea, but not really the theme here.  That will have to be explored later.

The point is, life is an uphill battle.  Everyone starts from the same humble beginning, though the circumstances around one's hatching, uh, birth, help to shape the point at which the climb starts.  Sometimes, the young are protected from the marauding attacks of gulls and grizzlies, other times, the smallest and weakest must face the journey with little or no support.  At times, the chains of bondage grab hold, and retard the effort.  Life goes unfulfilled, and a man cannot reach that stream and is dashed on the rocks of despair.  Other times, some well-meaning interloper creates a spillway designed to expedite the journey, and the climb to the top is accelerated, only to come to the same end.  It is the fortunate few that endure both the struggle and the victory that bring hope; they fulfilled the role set for them long before man had a name.

The whole thing seems fishy, and the example is but one of the struggles in nature.  Man has simplified the battle, using tools and transport to overcome the challenges of the journey.  In doing so, a new journey is created, a flood of new ideas and information inundates and surrounds young and old alike.  Cultures, once separated by long journey's, are now bound instantly electronically, and virtually any place on earth can be reached in a matter of hours, or at worst days (especially on the Garden State Parkway or the M25). People still protect the eggs (or freeze them for later use), and try to guide the young on their own journey; in the polluted and convoluted waters of modern life.  Texting, social networking, information overload are overtaking the grizzlies, and the perils once unknown a generation ago are now pervasive.

As one has completed the first cycle, spawning new life, and waiting for it swim off on it's own, how can this next generation be protected from the new perils that await them downstream?