Lake Union predawn |
Golden Gardens sunset |
Mt. Stuart |
Bainbridge ferry |
So to wrap up, I'm still processing 2020. It was just too big to neatly tie up. Our world has shifted.
Lake Union predawn |
Golden Gardens sunset |
Mt. Stuart |
Bainbridge ferry |
And despite environmental concerns, unprecedented wildfires, political and social conflicts, a global pandemic, and not being able to hug friends and family...yes, there is still much for which to be grateful this year.
For starters, I'm grateful to live where I do, near a perfect sandy beach on the Salish Sea. In late January I started doing almost weekly plunges in the sea within about 10 minutes from my home.
While my nearby beach is not a warm, tropical spot, it's thrilling to wade in offshore, then plunge into the chilly sea. It makes me feel like I've done something epic, even though often I'm swimming for less than 30 seconds.
It's the ultimate Zen experience, being completely in the moment, shocked and exhilarated by the cold saltwater. I highly recommend giving it a try if you can.
Plunge buddies |
As a self-employed business owner who works out of my home, I'm grateful to have several projects to work on this year. And honestly, working from home is not a change or adjustment for me. I've made my living out of my home office for over a decade.
I miss weekly mornings working at a few local coffeeshops/teahouses, where a friend often parked at the table beside me with his laptop too. It eased my cabin fever and was nice to be around others. I'm grateful all my favorite spots have managed to stay in business during this difficult time.
Thursday mornings at Miro Tea. Next year again? |
I'm grateful for the friends I've gotten out hiking and kayaking with this year.
And for the power and joy of being out in nature here in the scenic Pacific Northwest. All that forest bathing and expansive landscapes and seascapes have been a strong balm to help ease the stresses of this year.
And I've caught myself in moments recently just feeling grateful for the precious gift of this life. In my office today, it hit me again. There was nothing extraordinary about sitting at my desk, but I felt gratitude for the everyday, of being here to experience life in all its imperfect, messy beauty.
Joey napping |
So here's to giving thanks, even if at times this year it has been hard to feel it. I write this partly to remind myself, too.
May you have a safe, happy holiday season. I'd love to hear some things you're grateful for, too, in a comment below!
Happy trails and thanks for visiting Pacific Northwest Seasons! In between blog posts, visit Pacific NW Seasons on FaceBook, Twitter, and Instagram for more Northwest photos and outdoors news.
There's something indefinably magic about autumn that makes it my favorite time of year. And this year, we all can use some magic, right?
While it's a drippy rainy evening here in Seattle as I write this, we've had some brilliant fall color and weather. Our first frost is expected in a few days.
People this year are flocking and recreating outside in our forests and parks like never before. So today's post is about getting outside and celebrating late summer/autumn beauty in this splendid region.
Early Autumn
By late August, you can usually feel a hint of autumn at higher elevations in the Cascades. The sun travels lower across the sky, vine maples are starting to show a hint of color, and pesky bugs are no longer an issue.
Just before Labor Day weekend, I joined a friend and her daughter for a weekday hike near Snoqualmie Pass in the Mountains to Sound Greenway, less than an hour east of Seattle. We got an early start and felt a morning fall chill that later transitioned to mellow warmth.
Within a couple hours we made it up to tranquil Mason Lake, where huckleberries were starting to pop out on shrubs around the lake. While sitting on the shore of this mountain lake in the soft warm sunshine, all that 2020 anxiety drained away for a spell.
But this being 2020, heavy smoke from the raging West Coast wildfires kept us inside for almost 2 weeks starting Labor Day weekend. I was lucky to get out a day ahead of the smoke to kayak off Vashon Island.
Early sign of fall on the beach |
When things cleared up later in the month, I caught an early morning ferry to meet my aunt and friends for morning coffee at Fort Worden in Port Townsend, Washington.
Olympic Mountains, predawn |
Historic Fort Worden building |
Near the top of Mt. Sawyer, we filled emptied water bottles with huckleberries after discussing the lyrical poems. With a clearing sky and all that mountain fresh air too, it was another perfect fall day. (And the huckleberry tarts I made later were pretty wonderful too.)
Evergreen state |
October
And then there were golden larches. I'm addicted to seeing these deciduous conifers each October at their peak brilliance. This subalpine species only grows in a limited range, between elevations from 5,800 to 7,500 feet on the sunnier eastern crest of the Cascades.
On a midweek hike to Ingalls Pass in the Teanaway region near Cle Elum, Washington, I met up with my high school backpacking buddy Alice. Many years had passed since we tramped together along a trail, so it was a special day for me.
Mt. Stuart |
As I write this, the air outside is tinged with a smokey fog that smells like a campfire here in Seattle, where there shouldn't be campfires. Yesterday the sky was tinged orange, although it's slightly improved today. Our air quality is still considered unhealthy.
This is not the Pacific Northwest of my youth or even young adulthood. Big fires happened sometimes, but absolutely nothing on the scale of the last few years and this past week.
Most of us here are grieving for the loss of lives, homes, and many special wild places. Right now one of my favorite trails is burning; some of our last remaining old growth forests and wilderness areas have burned.
Turns out there's a word for what I'm (we're) feeling: “solastalgia.”
Coined by Australian environmental philosopher Glenn Albrecht, solastalgia is “manifest in an attack on one’s sense of place, in the erosion of the sense of belonging (identity) to a particular place and a feeling of distress (psychological desolation) about its transformation.” In other words, it's “a form of homesickness one gets when one is still at ‘home.’”
This term came about from distressed people who had remained in place, even as the landscape that had once brought them solace became unrecognizable. It’s a word that has started to be used in the context of climate change.
Before I read the article in the L.A. Times about solastalgia, I was basically trying to come up with words to convey this feeling, which has been exacerbated by the fire maelstroms here in the Pacific Northwest this past week.
Some of of my most treasured places, such as trails through lush forests carpeted with moss and ferns, have burned or are burning. I read that western red cedar will eventually become a victim of changing climate. I can't imagine a world without these magnificent cedars in our forests, where I feel the most at peace in the world.
As quoted in the L.A. Times article, “We have relationships to places,” says Dr. Susan Clayton, a professor of psychology and environmental studies at the College of Wooster in Ohio. “They’re very significant to our history and our sense of who we are.”
I was nurtured and shaped in ways I didn't recognize until midlife by woodlands thick with western red cedar. I can't explain clearly the visceral way I'm drawn to these trees.
So here I'm posting shots of places that might have burned (like Silver Falls State Park east of Salem, Oregon, where we're still waiting to hear the extent of fire damage). But I also hope to convey a sense of a changing region, and what's being lost.
Our forests westward of the Cascade Mountains crest are temperate rainforests, which are home to one of the highest levels of biomass on Earth. They harbor a richness of life that needs a good dousing of rain off and on, even in the summer, to thrive. Instead the trend is higher temperatures and longer, drier periods that allow the underbrush to dry out and serve as fuel for fires.
Granted, it's not just a changing climate that is contributing to our increasingly record-breaking fires. Historically there were burns, but it was part of the natural regime. Fire suppression and profit-driven forest practices in the last century have played a role in exacerbating bigger and more extensive fires.
Happy trails and thanks for visiting Pacific Northwest Seasons!
In between blog posts, visit Pacific NW Seasons on FaceBook, Twitter, and Instagram for more Northwest photos and outdoors news.
With 2020 bringing an unprecedented series of challenges, it's a hard time to feel settled.
As the year
lurches along, many of us have stepped back from the news and sought solace in
rituals, like long daily walks.
Studies have shown that rituals help us feel in
control when there are a lot of unknowns in our world. For anxiety-prone people
(shooting my hand straight up in the air here), rituals can be calming.
While rituals have their roots in ancient religions, they can be anything we do with regularity, with a sense of purpose, just because. Rituals provide an ongoing way to structure our lives. The ritual process provides a sense of stability and continuity amidst the ever-changing world. Like that daily walk. Or that morning cup of tea or coffee, savored slowly.
My friend Andy's morning ritual involves brewing a cup of coffee
just so, then sipping it while doing one game of Sudoko before starting her day.
For me, it’s a
variation. During a museum internship in London many years ago, the art department where I worked took a 10-minute break together for tea
and biscuits, twice a day. From the department director to the janitor, they all took
turns bringing biscuits (cookies) to share.
So although I
work at home alone, around 3 p.m. I break and have a fresh pot of silver jasmine tea and a buckwheat fig bar, reheated until just crispy. It’s a cozy and calming few minutes. (And sometimes I think about those heady days as a student in London.)
In a Psychology Today article on rituals I read while prepping for this post, some really resonated with me. They say rituals connect us with nature and the seasons. By watching the constant shifts and turns in nature, we recognize our own cycles of life, our own rhythms as humans. Rituals remind us of the interconnectedness of all of life.
While I don't have such lofty thoughts when out hiking/walking in nature, walking throughout the seasons does make me feel more connected to the places I pass through. I especially feel this connection on silent meditation hikes that I occasionally lead, where we walk in silence.
Every autumn, I also watch for the peak of golden larch season in the North Cascades and head out for a hike to catch the glorious display. (Now they call it "Larch Madness" or a "Larch March.") My autumn wouldn't feel quite right without a ritual walk amongst those shimmering golden trees.
Rituals provide us with a sense of renewal. They offer us a time-out from our everyday routine, habitual existence. Metaphorically, rituals can provide a time to rest, replenish, and restore our selves.
My morning
meditation practice, which has its roots in centuries old rituals, is lovely way to start the day. I don't hit every day, but
when I do, sitting silently, focusing on my breath, trying to "stay in the
room," in the moment, instead of letting my mind wander all over, is calming
and balancing. This year, that's gold.
My meditation is
done via Zoom, with my laptop propped in front of me while I sit with people
in the Seattle area, Michigan, California, sometimes Florida, and Georgia. Maybe there are people logging in from more locations too.
And then there are rituals I've been doing for years, for no particular reason. Every time I walk on a beach, I go down to the sea's edge and dip my fingers in the salt water.
Before COVID-19, a loose group of us met most mornings at a local bakeshop when it opened at 7 a.m. for coffee/tea and pastries. This diverse collection of people, from an economics instructor, a professional photographer, an insurance company owner, a former chicken farmer, a software engineer, a retired Boeing engineer, a cook-chef, to this writer/editor, was anchored by our matriarch, artist Carolyn.
This morning ritual offered a dose of camaraderie, often laughter, and friendship as we gathered around a table and traded stories before heading off to our respective days. It went on for over a dozen years, with people coming and going, until the pandemic. And fittingly, Carolyn chose a perfect time to move on to the next realm, whatever that may be, with her passing in March.
Here she is at her 95th birthday party we threw for her last year. Wasn't she beautiful?
We all miss Carolyn and mourn her death, but she lived a long, fascinating, often whimsical, and productive life.
So we create new rituals as others fall away. They anchor us, give us solace, and maybe connect us to something beyond.
Have you relied on rituals more than normal during the pandemic? I'd love to hear about any of your rituals in a comment below.
Happy trails and thanks for visiting Pacific Northwest Seasons!
In between blog posts, visit Pacific NW Seasons on FaceBook, Twitter, and Instagram for more Northwest photos and outdoors news.
Labyrinth walking, another ancient ritual. |
Zen rock garden, translated to "ritual space" in ancient Japanese |
There's something indefinably magic about autumn that makes it my favorite time of year. And this year, we all can use some magic, right...