Here we are about to welcome a new year (even though the calendar says that starts tonight, Solstice has come to feel more like the start of a new year, as it marks the start of the slow passage through darkness into light) and I think we’re all ready for it. It’s been a rough year for many, perhaps for most, and I’m hoping 2022 holds better things for everyone.
Last night was a night of very little sleep. I laid in bed for hours, ears pricked to every sound, eyes wide open watching the wind in the tree branches just outside the bedroom window. When I finally drifted off, I had strange dreams. One was full of moths, toads, and an orange tabby kitten. In another, I found a mountain of tiny bird eggs in varying intensities of blue resting in a large nook of a tree near the barn at my childhood home. (Those blues again, like the snakes I dreamt of in May.) An opening in the nook was a passage to the heart of the tree.
I’ve been thinking about daily practices and what I give my time and attention to. Nature journaling is a lovely, lovely way to walk through the days, observing the seasonal changes. As they say, the more attention we give to something, the more sacred it becomes to us and the more we will do to ensure its care.
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slow notes:
I shed some tears for more than one reason when reading this, at Terrain.org. Orca rituals and celebrations - so beautiful. “Have we reached it yet? The point where we circle up and take turns, holding and pushing a collective grief? The day we leave our denial behind and come up for air? On this dimming horizon, with everything on the line, can a matriline rise? Embracing a maternal instinct to protect lives beyond our individual fingerprints, willing to die in the process like the Chinook guarding their eggs? Can we gather like the J-Pod and hold what is precious—centered in moonlight—even as the moon moves?” - Christina Rivera Cogswell
Speaking of moths, this, from the Aeon+Psyche newsletter.
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Wishing you peace, love, wonder, joy, and good health in the year to come.