I am infinitesimal in comparison to places like this.
A tiny dot.
A blip in time.
And my ego was checked somewhere mid-ascent of this 80 degree incline.
Here, is also where I am reminded of who I am.
A loner.
A wanderer.
A wild one.
Content with disappearing into the great expanse.
To go unnoticed in nature, is an art form.
To draw attention away, not towards.
Unlike society, wallflowers are much obliged in the wild.
Most conversations are had without speaking a word.
Revelations are kept close to the heart.
Worries are carried up and away on the wind.
Secrets sink deep into the forest floor.
No one cares what I have to say here,
how I look,
how I present myself,
or what I’m wearing.
There are no humans to be found.
Only feathered friends.
I am joined by three Bald Eagles, swooping up and over the mountain, just above my head. So close that their shadows blot out the sun for a brief moment and I am left mouth ajar, marveling at this magical experience. It’s the closest I have ever been to an eagle in flight.
Nature knows who I am.
She bores right through my center.
There is no fooling her.
I go to her when I need a wake up call. A reminder. A confirmation. Because peeling back the layers of societal programming is a long, arduous, and jarring process. Confusing, too. This strange compulsion to continue on as I think I should, as I was told I should, but not as who I am. Cramming myself into some made up ideal to appease the masses and conform to a structured normalcy, even if it doesn’t work for me.
I am digging myself out of this deep trench, from decades of insecurity, mistrust, doubt, and inferiority being shoveled so high upon me – from a life that left me wanting to be anyone but myself. I am surely and steadily unbecoming all that I became so I can step back in to who I already was.
And I will not find her in most places that people tend to go looking.
Trebbe Johnson wrote something so beautiful here that I want to share it with you. It was published in Orion Magazine in 2015 and is titled Uncommon Gratitude. This piece is something that resonates so deeply with me. It also hits home as she writes of Northeast Pennsylvania, where I am from.
Gratitude is huge in my book, especially when it comes to my own personal relationship with the natural world. It might seem like something so simple and yet, it is so powerful in its transformative ability – both within our own psyche and in building a deeper, more meaningful bond between human being and our wild counterparts.
There are so many emotions that come up when we witness the taking, the destroying, the exploitation, the devastation, the abuse, the violence, the purposeful and intentional harm – to wild places and spaces, to animals, to trees, to all who may have once called a place home. Or in the practices and methods that drive unecessary pain and abuse to living things while contributing to global warming and climate change. Attached are emotions of grief, sadness, frustration, heartbreak, and also an overwhelming feeling of helplessness.
Many times we believe there is nothing we can do. But there is. There is something so profound in the simple recognition of place, of animal, of an individual life or the collective, of what once was, what will never be, what could have been. To acknowledge, to honor, to respect, and to share with it or them, our joy as well as our pain.
I agree with Terre. There are so many gifts a place can give to us. And in return, we can offer our respect, our appreciation, our gratitude, our thanks if/as we take or the land provides, our expressions of wonder and joy, and even our recognition of sadness and grief. It is a way to honor place and be reciprocal in our relationship.
We have the opportunity and the ability to see and feel what others may not. To hold place as important and sacred, even if it never belonged to us, only to the wild. To hold all which is alive as sacred and worthy of respect and existence. To honor what gives its life so that we might live our own. This includes recognition of the forgotten, the lost, and the hurt as Terre so eloquently speaks of in her piece.
——————
To mirror Terre, here are some gifts that I receive from place:
morning birdsong
sunrise through the trees
friendship with an old pine
a pair of Ravens nesting nearby
Crow calls both distant and near
a boisterous and brave Red Squirrel
a male Downy Woodpecker who doesn’t mind my company
a forest floor full of Trilliums in spring
trees that offer privacy and protection
rich soil that brings abundance and sustenance
visits from an array of Dragonflies and Damselflies
Orb Weavers spinning amazing webs
a graceful fox darting through the woods
a Flying Squirrel only witnessed by hidden trail cam
a raft of Turkeys who gather for mid morning meetings
unobstructed views of starry nights
entertaining Moth watching nights
an orchestra of night sounds
lightning bug light shows
full moons like a backyard spotlight
nightly aerial shows at dusk from a local bat colony
some of the best and most cherished memories of my life so far
Comfortable is some dry ass dusty soil in a long forgotten terra cotta pot in the corner of a room with no sunlight that hasn’t been watered in ages and has left your leaves and stems all shriveled up, droopy and sad, flower petals scattered on the floor.
Comfortable is where life goes to die.
YOU CAN’T GROW THERE.
Once you start living outside the confines of your own safe zone and you stop trying to protect and preserve the safe zones of those around you by setting healthy boundaries and speaking your truth, a lot of folks are going to take up issue with it. They’re not going to like it. They’re going to have lots to say. They’re going to get all up in arms.
It might trigger in them, all the things that have yet to address within themselves. Being comfortable with being uncomfortable isn’t easy. Your calm response to their emotional reaction will bewilder them, enrage them even. They might get defensive. Dismiss the conversation. Shut down and walk away. Gaslight you. Guilt you. Shame you. Deflect. Ignore. Smear campaign your name.
Remember: YOU ARE NOT RESPONSIBLE FOR THEIR BEHAVIOR OR THEIR REACTION.
They might claim you are “mean”. They might find you “intimidating”. Too confident. Too bold. Too much. They might even think you a b!tch or an assh0le because you set boundaries, hold space for difficult topics, are open to honest communication, and refuse to deal with bullsh!t, including your own. That’s alright.
They might even try to knock you down a few pegs… put you back where they think you belong, so that they can resume their own version of comfortable and where you fit in that scenario.
DO NOT LET THEM.
Go on. Destroy your reputation. It’s okay. It’s going to happen. Even when you’re professional, even when you’re respectful, even when you choose the high road, even when you refuse to take the bait when someone is trying to get a rise out of you. Just hold steady.
I want you to step outside the box. Not just think outside of it, no. Like crawl right on out from it, kick it to the side, then take a match to it.
I don’t know about you, but I’m tired as hell of pulling pre-assembled boxes off the assembly line – with their neat, little labels already slapped on – and living out of them. Trying to cram and fit myself into them. Because it’s normal. Because it’s accepted. Because they told us to. Because someone out there is threatened by the fact that you DON’T want to be in the box.
As a kid, it’s perfectly acceptable to color outside the lines. We praise kiddos for doing the damn thing – like anything they want. Scribbles. Half-finished. Something else drawn on top of what’s there. A one color wonder or too many colors to count. You catch the drift.
The same rule doesn’t seem to apply to adults. But it should. We’re judged on precision, color scheme, accuracy, and attention to detail. There is no room for creativity, abstract thought, or personal artistic interpretation. We only seem to be praised by the norm – what is considered widely and generally accepted by the majority. To live outside the lines, well, that simply just won’t do.
You should want to be normal. You should want to fit in. You should want to do what everyone else is doing. You should want to think and feel what everyone else does. You should want to have what everyone else has. You should want out of life what everyone else does. You should care about the same things they do. You should care about what those people think of you.
Look the same. Love the same. Live the same. Believe the same. Think the same. Act the same. Educate the same. Heal the same. Grieve the same. Grow the same. Work the same. Want the same. Do the same.
But here’s the thing, WE AREN’T THE SAME.
You will be judged for coloring outside the lines.
Do it anyway.
You will be ridiculed, misunderstood, envied, bullied, threatened, rejected, called out, guilted, shamed, thwarted, gossiped about, secretly coveted while outwardly having insecurities vomited upon you – all when you choose to step out of that box and over those imaginary lines.
DO IT ANYWAY.
Because there is not a damn person out there who knows how to put color to your life like you do.
Your creative freedom, your creative expression, is your truth. Don’t let anyone make you feel like you aren’t a masterpiece of your own design. We’re not meant to be perfect, just real.
Live confidently and unapologetically as you, squiggly lines and all. Fuck those people. Kick ’em to the curb alongside those boxes. Just don’t take a match to them, that would be frowned upon.
Our lives are strung together by seconds, minutes, and hours. Days, weeks, months, and years. Boxes to check marked by age and gender – dictated to us to be the norm. Deadlines to meet – forged by societal expectations instilled upon us since birth. College by X. Career by X. Marriage by X. Babies by X. Homeowner by X. We may impose expectations on ourselves that come from some voice within, influenced by the above, centering on words like, “success”, “achievement”, “status”, “wealth”, “affluence”, “worthy”, “accomplished”, “important”, and “majority”.
Sometimes, parents and prominent figures play a role too, putting us on a fast track to somewhere they want us to go or someone they want us to be. They can also set us up for failure or throw us off our own course, knowingly or unknowingly. Often, we find generational cycles of trauma repeating. Either way, some ways, or all ways, woven into the fabric of our lifetime are the choices we make that determine our course – influenced by nature, nurture, and all that surrounds us as decisions are made and actions are taken.
There are decades that make us and seconds that can break us. There are moments gone in a flash while others seem to drag on endlessly. All the while, time ticks on – unaware that living things only have so much of it to use. Time doesn’t know that a lot of us may squander it, that most of us long for more of it, that work shouldn’t be the brunt of it, that at times we fear it, that we don’t always know what to do with it, that we think we have enough of it, that quality should lie before it, or that might wish to turn it back when we feel like we fucked it up or took it for granted.
In our youth, we rush time. Hurry up to grow up.
In young adulthood, we underestimate time. It’s infinite and on our side.
In our midlife, we chase time. So much to do and so little time in the day to do it.
In old age, we question time. How much of it is left for us?
“I can’t go back.”
“I can’t start over.”
“I can’t do this again.”
“I can’t change who I am.”
“I can’t undo what I’ve already done.”
I’ve heard these lines so many times, most often in my own voice. And all but one are a lie.
You have the time. Right here. Right now.
To leave a toxic, unhappy, or unfulfilling relationship or job.
To cease a joyless pursuit.
To start a new career.
To write a book.
To go back to school.
To play an instrument.
To ask for help and support.
To fall in love.
To take that adventure.
To pursue a passion.
To climb that mountain.
To chase our dreams.
To reinvent ourselves.
To break some rules.
To let go of expectations, ours and theirs.
To break down walls.
To heal.
To end generational cycles.
To look fear in the face.
To live life the way we want to.
If we don’t know how much time we have left, how do we know we’re too late? Guess what? We don’t. No one can turn back time. We know this. None of us can go back to start over, at least not in this lifetime. But what if we started from here? Today. Now. Tomorrow. This week. We can change the ending by grabbing a hold of the present narrative. Only our past is locked in. And that’s okay. We’re not meant to turn back time. We’re meant to live out the time before us.
We all have a clock. Grab its hands. Make it count.
It’s 1:00 AM when I step out from the cozy warmth of this tiny cabin I get to call home for the next few days. The chill is crisp and sharp, as is the darkness. The forest at night is reduced to shades of blue and black. Blue, the open space of air and sky. Black, the backdrop of tree silhouettes towering around you, the slightly sloping hills in the distance, the soft earth underneath your boots. The sky is full of wooly, expansive clouds that obscure a Waxing Gibbous moon which softly illuminates the thick floating puffs as if they were ambient lanterns, huddled densely in the celestial canopy.
Our eyes only just begin to adjust once we reach the water, where the scene becomes a watercolor of indigo and onyx, a brand new way to take in my favorite view, my special place, beneath the pines by the lake. A divergence of earth, water, and sky. Home and habitat to wild things that thrive in all three. Most notable for its nesting Bald Eagles. A place so familiar in the daylight, so foreign in the witching hours. We simply become part of the night, blending in with the shadowscapes, silently taking in all the wonder and beauty under the camouflage of darkness. Inconspicuous are we, here in the wild wood, where time and space move differently.
A misty rain drizzles down and like a gentle sea mist as I look out over the water. I close my eyes and tilt my head back, letting the tiny droplets wash over me. Giant but gentle gusts of wind break the still surface of the lake, building waves that hungrily lap my feet where water meets the land. Billowy froth forms in clumps, swirling in the shallows. Their milky forms a stark contrast to the stone and pebble below. The wind carries with it my wonder – across the water, through the trees, and up into the cloud-laden skies above. If this isn’t magic, I don’t know what is.
Seemingly out of nowhere, a slender-sleek silhouette glides effortlessly through the rippling lake to my left. She’s a few shades darker than the water so I can just make out her form. The splash of a talented swimmer propelling forward, more graceful and nondescript than the break of tiny waves formed from the wind cutting into the water’s surface. We see her before she sees us. An eager husband pushes the soft button of a headlamp to catch a quick glimpse before she’s gone. Just as eager to put a name to form, I too can’t help myself, whispering out loud when the light finally catches her body, “Oh my goodness, an otter! Hello there!” The artificial light beams straight at her like a tiny lighthouse. Coupled with my non-natural sound of escaped excitement, it cautions the otter to dip below the surface, disappearing beneath the blue-black surface, re-emerging a few feet away. We watch in awe as she makes her way around the curvaceous bend of the shoreline, fading into the darker shades of the night, sailing towards the swamp lands.
———-
If you want to talk of enchantment for a moment, I shall tell you of the card I pulled the evening before as I sat at the small wooden table of Cabin #5, its wood worn and weathered smooth from decades of use, like a weary tumbled stone. I always bring my oracle cards with me on camping adventures. I tend to receive affirmations and messages with much more clarity out there than at home, especially when seeking wisdom from the wild world – as I listen closely to what the flora and fauna of the spiritual sense have to say. I chose to consult with the Woodland Wardens that night – as they always seem to convey a timely message, especially when I feel a bit shaky on my present course. The card revealed Otter and Cattail – a card representative of peace, calm, and tranquility.
Was the otter just doing her otter thing out there during her stealthy late night voyage? Surely. She didn’t expect me to be wandering around in the dark after midnight, pulled over and idling in the shallow shoulder of her lake water interstate. Nor did I expect to see her in that moment, even when knowing that otters are more nocturnal and crepuscular than they are daytime hustlers. I’ve seen the signs, empty snail shells in abundance along the swampy water’s edge. But for as many times as I have visited this same place, Otter herself was nowhere to be found. Only remnants left, of a meal fit for a Queen, cracked shells popping and crunching beneath my feet.
Enchantment can come about in the form of a happenstance encounter, one that might not be so serendipitously coincidental for a wild woman who needs Otter energy at this time. Peace is the word best described for this wild place I have loved since childhood. It’s what I can’t help but feel every time I am there. I breathe it in. I fill my lungs with it – all damp earth and fresh pine. And there she happened to be, this symbolic representation of joy, of tranquility, gliding flawlessly towards a cluster of cattails, just around the bend.
Denial is an island. One we like to escape to, frequently. And sometimes, some of us, become permanent residents.
Denial island is easy to find, and much harder to abandon. Like Hotel California, it lets you check out any time you like, but most will never leave.
One of my earlier tattoos, back when I still had more naked skin than inked, was a modified quote by Henry David Thoreau. The original is from Walden, Chapter 18, and it reads, “Rather than love, than money, than fame, give me truth.” Mine was taken from the 2007 movie Into the Wild where Emile Hirsch’s character paraphrases Thoreau, “Rather than love, than money, than faith, than fame, than fairness, give me truth.” I liked the extended version, so that’s what I chose. Faith and fairness tend to skew, bend, and abandon truth just as much as the rest.
If life taught me anything up until that point, it was that truth was an endangered species. Rare to catch a glimpse of anywhere out there, even amongst the ones you loved. Sometimes, especially so.
Denial is a fickle bitch. It offers an abundance of comfort. It is there, in that safe guarded place, where we can remain in our false sense of security. We don’t have to face hard and difficult things there. Painful things. It is there where we can defend what we choose to believe, what we prefer to see, what we wish to be.
It is there, where we wrap ourselves up so tight and warm in the alternative narrative of our choosing. A narrative that helps us to justify and excuse our behavior. Or justify and excuse the behavior of others. A narrative that helps us place blame elsewhere so we don’t have to hold ourselves accountable. A narrative that helps us to see the world the way we want to, not the way it really is. See ourselves and others the way we want to, not the way we really are.
Denial island protects us from fear, from failure, from grief, from sadness, from reality. It also helps us to integrate into our families, our relationships, our careers, our religious beliefs, and our social circles, in the normalized dominant way we are presented with. Despite how opposite our authentic self and beliefs are to those things.
When I first read Thoreau’s quote, and then heard it again when I watched Into the Wild for the first time, it struck a deep cord.
Thoreau goes on to write, “I sat at a table where were rich food and wine in abundance, and obsequious attendence, but sincerity and truth were not; and I went away hungry from the inhospitable board.”
TRUTH – that which lies beyond us, far away from the superficialities of daily life.
TRUTH – that which is a mantle built above status, above wealth, above fame, above material possessions, above the faith we believe in, and yes, even above love. To me, truth is love, even when it seems unkind.
And the lies we tend to tell ourselves are much more painful than the lies we are granted from the mouths of others. To deny ourselves truth, especially our own, is the ultimate travesty.
Years back, on the day those words became permanent on my own body, I promised to leave denial island. It would be a lie to say I haven’t washed up on its shores since then, stayed awhile, and then left once more. But never again, would I choose to be stuck there.
I did not want to walk through this life with rose-colored glasses and kaleidoscope eyes. I chose to see myself clearly. Others clearly. Life clearly. And that includes the pain and the harshness that come with being alive, with being in love, with living true to yourself. And the ultimate truth that change is forever a constant, and loss is inevitable. But to me, an uncomfortable truth will always be more valuable than a reassuring lie.
Like Thoreau, I longed to live beyond, far and away from the superficialities of daily life. I desired wealth of a different kind. And rich in truth, I would become – at the expense of a great many things. First and foremost, the comfort I had been so comfortable in.
I didn’t want to look in the mirror and lie to myself. I didn’t want to look in the eyes of others and lie to them. I didn’t want to leave this world living a lie of any kind (if I could help it).
Why stay frozen in comfort when I could run towards truth? My truth. Your truth. The truth of the society. The many truths of this life.
With truth, we shed expectations. With truth, we learn awareness. With truth, we find acceptance. With truth, we abandon validation. With truth, we seek authenticity. With truth, we relinquish the ego. With truth, we evolve and transform. With truth, we heal and repair. With truth, we discover ourselves. With truth, we break free.
I would rather dine with the man who lives in the hollow tree and speak in all manners of truth, than feast in some great hall overflowing with superficial falsehoods and idle virtues, no matter the company.
Rather than love, than money, than faith, than fame, than fairness, give me truth.
Hiking in the rain is akin to hiking after a powdery snowfall. Much like its frozen counterpart, the rain shrouds a forest in stillness, something rarely found in the buzzing heat of a summer day. Precipitation brings about a special kind of peace and solitude, something that can only accompany inclement weather.
The fallen leaves, soaked through to the soil below, glisten their reds, yellows, and oranges amidst the patches of once green ferns, now lemon and rust, that sway in a gentle breeze which sweeps the forest floor, almost as silent as you. A woman can move without a sound amid the dank and decomposing deciduous confetti beneath her boots.
The moss, at the water’s edge, swollen with the last two days of rainfall, becomes a lush and loamy tapestry beneath her feet, flattening underfoot, and then slowly rising once again to resume its luxuriant form as the boot lifts away. The Sphagnaceae reminiscent of Lewis Carroll’s Mome Raths.
The scent of damp, dark earth surrounds her. If only, she thinks to herself, there was a way to bottle it and keep it, breathing in its elemental magic, infused with the kind of healing properties she will find nowhere else but here, in this moment. Under the trees, the scent of pine rises up to greet her from the fallen needles below.
The birds flit and flutter at ground level. Are you a warbler, little friend? She sees you there, peeking through the thick bramble of the low lying shrubs, with your white underbelly, dusty gray body, and bright splash of lemon. Little bird who is quick-footed and fast to fly, always outwitting the curious observer longing for a proper identification of her allusive feathered forest companion.
White-breasted Nuthatches dance on the thick trunks and bare branches of the mighty Eastern White Pine. A crow calls in the distance overhead, obscured by the overcast sky – a body-less caw on the wind.
Around the bend, where the stream flows to greet the lake, the swamp smells of fish, so intrusive in the misty air, it’s as if she is holding a fresh catch right there in her own two hands.
All the autumnal browns of the lake and swamp vegetation that are making their transition into death are heightened by the muted gray backdrop of a sunless, fog-laden sky. The perfect contrast.
It’s as if she and this wild place have been plucked straight from the vastness of the world and gently tucked inside a water globe. The dense fog is the frost-covered glass of the dome, the gods giving it a shake so that a gentle rain falls all around her, dampening the intrusive sounds of an outside world she can no longer see.
Tiny droplets pool at the sharp edge of a pine needle, pulling and drooping the bundles down towards the ground. The fallen bundle together in pockets and coves to create a golden mosaic that floats and swirls atop a calm, reflective canvas. There is the pitter patter drum beat of droplets as they hit the water’s surface, creating ripples and waves that draw her into a state of soothing meditation.
She, and this swath of forest, lake, and swamp, are encased in a fog-laden wonderland of a grand and wild design.
As a child, I preferred the language of the forest. It spoke to me in a way that I understood much easier than the language of man.
I never had difficulty finding my sense of belonging among the wild things, tucked away in wild places.
I welcomed the quiet comfort it brought. The peace. The solitude. A freedom I found no where else. It shut out the noise of hurriedness. Of expectation. Of judgement. Of hurt. Of ridicule. Of rejection. Of things I didn’t understand.
I never feared the creatures who crossed my path, both large and small. It always felt like we had an unspoken understanding between us. Meeting the gaze of a wild animal was something magical. The fleeting moments of shared personal space was something to treasure, not fear. I would always say quietly, “Don’t go. Please stay with me awhile. I won’t hurt you.”
Where society was busy, loud, obnoxious, rude, judgemental, confusing, and scary, the forest was a sanctuary I could disappear in, getting lost on purpose.
I felt most alone in the crowded spaces that tried to tame my wild heart. That wouldn’t let me be me. That threw me in boxes I didn’t belong in. That trapped me and tried to break me.
this wild thing, ltd 