#22 – Time Alone

This is #22 in the series, “50 Ideas Worth Fighting For.” Here’s another one you might like. How I Go to the Woods Ordinarily, I go to the woods alone, with not a single friend, for they are all smilers and talkers and therefore unsuitable. I don’t really want to be witnessed talking to the

Your Busy Heart

Take your busy heart to the art museum and the chamber of commerce but take it also to the forest. The song you heard singing in the leaf when you were a child is singing still. I am of years lived, so far, seventy-four, and the leaf is singing still. ~ from What Can I Say,

Do you dare?

It was above the timber line. The steady march of the forest had stopped as if some invisible barrier had been erected beyond which no trees dared move in a single file. Beyond was barrenness, sheer rocks, snow patches and strong untrammeled winds. Here and there were short tufts of evergreen bushes that had somehow

Hints of Gladness

That my daily writing sometimes elicits a positive comment or an appreciative mention makes me feel great. That once in a while, someone “likes” or shares my words is a kind reminder that a hand is holding the other tin can at the end of this string. I love knowing that you are there. I

A Healthy Burn

For a healthy forest to remain healthy – for it to survive – it has to burn. That’s not conjecture, it’s science. A forest has to burn frequently enough to clear out the understory – the pine needles, dry grasses, and smaller trees – that when left unmanaged can turn a necessary cycle of periodic

Open, Not Apart

Our hearts do not break apart, they break open. It is through this opening that what we need tiptoes in, staying beyond our vision until we are ready to see. This is difficult to explain. It must be lived…felt…to be understood. Consider the way the fallen Redwood opens space in the canopy of the forest

11 Reasons Why You Should Take a Walk in the Woods

I took a walk in the woods and came out taller than the trees. {Henry David Thoreau} I live in Southern California where a walk in the woods is a luxury enjoyed only after a long drive or, like I did recently, an airplane ride. My dream is to someday live where I can step

Your Busy Heart

Take your busy heart to the art museum and the  chamber of commerce  but take it also to the forest.  The song you heard singing in the leaf when you  were a child  is singing still.  I am of years lived, so far, seventy-four,  and the leaf is singing still. ~ from What Can I Say,

My Developmental Pathway

“You can’t go back and change the beginning, but you can start where you are and change the ending.” — C S Lewis You know the feeling of being lost. You know what it’s like to start out with a sense of direction, a heading that makes sense to you. And then, after a wrong

So Many Trees

There are so many kinds of trees. I recognized this week how few of them I can name. I can spot a redwood, or is that a sequoia? Of course I know a maple leaf (thank you, Canada). But a Japanese maple? And that Bay laurel? The leaf looks familiar, just not the whole tree.