This morning I woke up early and went outside.
I went without the dog. I wanted to get the drop on the local deer herd, and because these deer worry constantly about the threat of coyote predation, I knew that going out with a big blond wolf probably wouldn’t help my chances.
But while I was out stalking the deer this morning, I was overwhelmed.
The sun, now approaching its period of greatest strength in this hemisphere, cast down beams through the canopy. The dew on the leaves of the undergrowth glistened.
For the time being, I was no longer a modern human. I was essentially a being of the forest. Perhaps a hunter-gather of yore, maybe a wild beast.
I felt savage.
I hadn’t experienced this feeling in so many months. Most of the time I am domesticated, civilized, and utterly removed from the life forces that make our existence possible.
I am not a believer in a creator. I’ve come to reconcile myself as nothing more (or less) than a philosophical naturalist.
But that doesn’t mean that I’m devoid of my spirituality.
I was overwhelmed again, just as I was so many times before.
I remember a warm June night in the summer before my sophomore year in high school. The day had been punctuated with several midsummer thunderstorms. There were several downpours that day, and when the clouds finally cleared, it was late evening.
And I set out for a long walk in the woods.
As I walked on the barred owls started to hoot. Each breeding pair called from distant ridges. These were territorial calls, but they were hauntingly beautiful. As the sun set, the mist rose from the ground with the owls calling all around.
Another day, I was out with the dogs on one of those teacher work Fridays in which the students were given the day off. I do not recall my exact age at the time, but I was in high school.
It was early March and the land was just waking up from winter. It was overcast, as March days can be, but it was so eerily calm and sweet.
The dogs had a blast running around the woods. They became like wolves that somehow charged out of the Stone Age to run along side me and make me feel again.
These were the same dogs I took out for a long walk on that Fall Break Friday during my sophomore year in college. It was that October Friday that followed the vote on the Iraq War Resolution.
It was a war that upset me. I was disgusted with politics, and though I had been studying political science and international relations in school, I knew that I needed the golden red leaves, the soft autumn sunshine, and the gentle lick of a golden retriever to help me escape.
Man’s inhumanity abounded before me, yet for a time, I was detached from the evils of my species.
It took being overwhelmed by the natural word to soothe me and give me some succor.
I don’t drink, mainly because I don’t like the taste of ethanol, but sometimes I must imbibe on the liquors of the sun, the trees, and the forest.
I become intoxicated by it.
And it frees me.
Maybe for just a moment.
But in that freedom, I’m in ecstasy.
So the sunlight filtered through the canopy, I felt overwhelming joy. I breathed in the sweet air and tried to wonder why every day couldn’t be just like this one.
For as soon as I begin to wonder, I know that I’ll start thinking of the mundane things once again.
These are things that a best keep me from self-actualization and at worst keep me imprisoned.
I can let them go when I’m overwhelmed.
I can be.
And not really be.
This has to be one of my favourite writings of yours!!
I feel the ecstasy high up in the mountains. Sit down and be.
I wish the snow would melt a bit faster this year. Our mountains are still clad in white. I want to hit 2800m above sea level with Kali this year.
Thanks for sharing! I can relate to a lot of things said here…
This feeling of being at one with Nature, which you so well describe, has happened to me twice, first during school days when I always seemed to be wandering in the wild places – and again since I retired from work, except now I know life is definitely not forever and so I seem to appreciate my second childhood even more than the first. I know several other old timers going through a similar privileged experience and I pity those who never have quite the imagination or opportunity to do so.
It’s hard to escape where I live. Just to be out of earshot of the damn traffic and planes is a minor miracle. When all air traffic was grounded a while back due to the volcano in Iceland, I went out early before the rush hour started on the motorway and despite just being on a footpath a mile outside a large town, it was utterly magical. I could hear nothing but the birds and see nothing but a clear blue sky above me with none of the usual criss cross of contrails. Most of the time I can block those distractions out, but it was a very welcome change.
I feel sorry for people who can’t look up into the night sky and feel the absolute wonderment of the universe or walk through the woods with their womb like canopy of leaves enveloping you and have to bring the concept of a sentient being of a creator into it. Personally, I relish the times I’m just content to exist without having to wonder why, how and specifically who.
One of the modern trends I so often decry is the disconnection of so many of our youth w/ nature. Over the years I’ve done my best, thru sponsored nature hikes, foraging displays and one-on-one talks & outings to slow down this process. I’m happy to say that I have had an impact–on many levels.
Although I no longer have the physical wherewithal to do the kind of nature trekking I once did, I still have my daily hike/commune w/ nature. And sometimes nature takes a hand and communes w/ me, as witness yesterday evening. I was out chillin’ in the play yard w/ our new dog Maggie, when a barred owl landed on the playyard fence not 15′ from me. It was a tremendous thrill! I’d been finding owl feathers around the property for sometime and heard them calling this past winter, but this was the first time that I actually saw one–and to be that close…it was awe inspiring. I suspect that they’re actually nesting in our woods now.
I know this feeling well, the feeling of oneness with nature, with the earth, with the universe. It’s hard to describe (though here, you have come very close to describing it perfectly :-) ). For me, it usually comes in the very early morning, or late evening, in the gloaming. I love to walk barefoot in the woods, way up on the mountain where there are mostly beech trees, where the moss is thick and soft on the ground. There’s something about feeling the textures of the earth under my bare feet that makes me feel like a part of it :-).
He did a better job than I could do: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mn2CeHlKrTw
But he did the best! http://www.rc.umd.edu/rchs/reader/tabbey.html
I remember once, in late July I went out to the reef, the water was so warm I didn’t even have to wear a diveskin. It was so clear that it looked like I was in the middle of a bowl of blue jello, and there were no waves. You could hear the rattle and hiss of fish just under the surface, and a little rainbow runner fry kept close in, waiting for me to make a kill.
I got a few good shots in that day, and then loosened the bands on my gun and attached it to my float so that I could just swim, twisting and diving, chasing the useless little butterflyfish and playing to see if I could sneak up on them across the reef surface.
That was a pretty good day.
I’m too far north for most of these, but I’d love to see these streams. We have the snot otter/hellbender/Allegheny alligators though:
http://www.indiegogo.com/projects/hidden-rivers-a-film-series-about-the-vibrant-waters-of-southern-appalachia