Places get wounded. Vandalism, neglect, insensitivity,
overuse and the forces of nature all have their way with places held
special. When I visit a wounded place,
several feelings present, often at once. Anger is the loudest with its judging,
blaming, vengeful tones. Quietly, on the sidelines, is the sadness and the
maybe identifying with the Place (Am I wounded?) There’s nostalgia for what the place used to
be and maybe a flicker of caretaking, how to help the place.
That ice and snow storm of this winter was the most dramatic
natural wounding event in a long time. The evidence is still so clear and
graphic: all those snapped leaders and branches, those hanging, dangling limbs.
After the shock of it all, I began deliberately going out to
see more, to learn about human nature from nature. Somehow surprise encounters
with damaged or misshapen nature was soothing. There was information about pain
and repair.
Sunsets, glistening lakes, eagles in trees, budding bushes
are OK, but only a small, distracting, part of the story. The relentless search
for beauty often keeps us safe from the distress and pain, needed for renewal,
repair and another beginning. Walks in damaged nature can help us learn to just
be with the hurt, to see the larger forces and rhythms at work: that things
change over The Seasons and each day and night. The creeks and rivers keep
flowing, the earth sprouts, the rain falls. There is a vitality in destruction,
offering the possibility of awe and even joy, seeing evidence of that big,
quiet, slow, sacred rhythm of death, dormancy, budding, fruiting and
decay. If the time is right, we may even
feel a welcomed and comforted part of it all.
At work here on the margins of nature are the lesser, fleeting, small gods. They can be encountered. But first, no planned “hikes”, no
guidebooks. Trust your animal mind, your
intuition, your hunches. Risk getting
lost, and feeling “lost”. Then trust you
can find your way back.
Start at railroad tracks, abandoned
lots, swales, even curbs. See what’s washed up from the Hudson at Plum Point,
those tires on the shore of Wickham Lake or what the beavers did to this tree
at Cascade Lake. Let me know what you
find. rustic@warwick.net
Daniel Mack
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