true sound

We are officially in Phase 2 of reopening here in southeastern Washington, and while I am looking forward to doing some things we haven't done for a long time, just getting out into the wild is a sublime thing. 

The evening we went to the river in these pictures, I put on my rubber boots and straw hat, took my camera, and wandered through an undiscovered wood.  I foraged, sniffed, gazed, and touched.  I took in textures and colors, shadows and sparkles.  Perhaps most importantly, I listened.  

I've been doing a deep dive back through years of posts here and seeing how my relationship with nature and the elements has given me so much.  I hope I have been a good steward and that I have given back as much as I have been given.  Listening, which for me is also feeling, has been a constant theme and, paradoxically, a guiding light.  

I've been thinking a lot about the essay by Jay Griffiths I posted about last November, but also about acoustic ecologist Gordon Hempton's Sanctuaries of Silence, which I first heard on the Emergence Magazine podcast and then later watched the film.  Highly sensitive types love silence, and I am no exception, but by silence I mean no human sounds.  Gordon Hempton defines silence not as the absence of sound but the absence of noise from modern life.  I feel this deeply when I'm out in the wild and it's one of the reasons I love it so much.  For me this is true sound - sound free of human static.  Hempton's work and projects are so wonderful.  The last link below is excellent and talks about several of them, if you are interested.  

Watch/Read/Listen: 

The Rime of the Ancient Mariner. 

We Need an NRA for Nature.  

What Hangs On Trees.

Timelines.  

Silence and the Presence of Everything.

Until next time ~ x

in full bloom

Happy May Day!  Today is Beltane, one of the Celtic fire festivals, and it celebrates light and fertility, feasts and flowers ... the turning of the wheel.  Directly across from Samhain (Halloween), it is also day when the veil is thought to be very thin.  It is halfway between spring equinox and summer solstice.  The days are longer.  The fertility of the earth is in full bloom. 

Last night I lit candles and burned incense, my small version of a Beltane Eve bonfire.  I gazed at waxing Grandmother Moon and thought about the feminine influences in my life, grateful for each one.  

Early this morning I went for a long walk.  The sun shone brightly, warming my face.  I brought sprigs of parsley, mint, and thyme from our garden and picked buttercups and weeds along the path, tying them up with grass and offering them to the pond on the way, sending them floating across the surface while a chorus of birds and frogs filled my ears.  At the base of my favorite tree, I left a mandala of dandelion, dock, purple dead nettle, and milky oats, things so precious to me, gifts of spring.  Once home, I tucked some more nasturtium and wildflower seeds into the earth.  

I made a pesto of parsley, mint, and purple dead nettle from our yard for lunch.  For dinner we will have asparagus from a farmer a mile or so up the road.  After, we will light candles and have a drink on the patio as the sun sets.    

The earth is singing.  I will close my eyes and listen.