Reflections

The logging trucks, and most recently the power company, have torn up our gravel road and now there are less trees and more neighbors, which isn’t what I signed up for. I get it. I also don’t like it. Both things.

Yesterday was the last day the public could officially submit their views & feelings about repealing the Roadless Rule act. I thought about tossing my two-cents into the political ring. I even went so far as to click on a link to do it. But I wasn’t sure what to say, because when it comes down to it, I have no idea what’s best.

I’m just some gal living in the woods surrounded by enough National Forest that a person could go for a walk and end up in Idaho having no idea they crossed the state line. A gal whose heart breaks a little every time the logging trucks rumble and Jake-brake their way by our small cabin full of fresh-cut evergreens, who also understands lumber is needed for building and the books & journals I adore come from trees. I get it. I also don’t like it. Both things.

I’m also not sure it’s better to uproot another country’s timber so we can spare our own. Maybe it’s better we see up close and personal the direct effects of our own industry. Maybe outsourcing what we need blinds us to what it takes to keep on keeping on doing what we’re doing.

My first instinct is to say no to more roads through wild places. No to more vehicles through the thickness of trees. No to more access to the hushfall of nature for men with saws & guns. Men with a six-pack and no ability to care enough about others to take their empties with them when they go.

But what I do know. I mean, really. Truth is, nothing is ever as simple as I make it seem.

Here’s what I do know.

If I don’t take the time to notice and also savor the times when our woods are quiet & still, I will be tempted to go around thinking the loggers are always logging and the construction crew next door is forever ruining the peace & privacy we have. Neither of which is true.

Similarly, if I don’t put honest effort into staying close in touch with good teachers & good friends and connecting with poets, artists, musicians & other creatives that uplift & inspire me, I will be tempted to go around thinking that all or most people are toxic or terrible or up to no good.

It’s Saturday morning as I type this post. Usually that means the woods are wonderfully still and quiet, because the loggers and the builders next door don’t work on the weekends. But one of our other neighbors arrived yesterday and I can hear him down the canyon operating machinery. He too is building.

It’s an interesting and curious thing to feel affronted by the movement & sounds of other humans. To feel a kind of possessiveness of the woods, as though they belong to me. To feel a strong pull to protect the quietude of certain natural spaces. To want to respect and uphold roadless places.

A cup of tea steeps beside me fashioned with a trifold of things I foraged & collected closeby: oregon grape, yarrow, and rosehips. There are health benefits associated with each ingredient but that isn’t why I drink it. I drink it because I enjoy gathering from nearby what grows, and connecting more closely with the land. I drink it because it just feels good and like the right thing to do.

I am reminded of a teaching by Master Lin-chi that I aspire to continually & slowly move towards:

If you crave the sacred and despise the ordinary, you are still bobbing in the ocean of delusion.

Some days though, the best I can do it to take notice & delight in small & simple things, and practice not to close my heart all the way to other humans nearby living their life, same as me.

Celebrating Small Wins