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Archives for July 2023

Where the New Ones Grow

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We’ve all heard of ‘black and white thinking’ and have probably participated in it at some time in our lives. It is when we think or feel in absolutes—good or bad, right or wrong, valid or in-valid—with no in-between or gray area. This dichotomous thinking (or splitting) is often a self-protective trauma response when we feel unsafe. It often goes along with ‘me thinking’ when we feel or believe that others ‘should’ think the same way we do and therefore act the same way we do. (And of course ‘me thinking’ is always the ‘right’ way.)

Part of that way of thinking is to try to maintain some sort of order or control over any given situation, which is exactly what traumatized people are always trying to do when they get triggered or activated or to keep from getting that horrible feeling in their guts. We also like to ‘order’ our time with categories, routines, schedules, and things that make sense to us. It helps to ‘calm’ our bodies and minds. We do it with Nature, too. We want the natural world to fit into our categories—just think Winter, Spring, Summer, and Fall—‘white or gray thinking,’ ‘light green thinking,’ ‘dark green and bright colors thinking,’ and ‘yellow and orange thinking.’ But at every turn, Nature is moving us beyond those categories, beyond our limited thinking.

Chris and I walked through a predominantly White Pine forest in the middle of the year at the height of summer. It was dark green with mature foliage and rich brown with tree trunks and only glimpses of bright color at a few chosen places. The trail was covered with pine needles and strewn with pine cones. Sunshine through the trees dappled the pine carpet.

I walked quite a ways on the noticeable carpet of pine needles and cones before I realized that everywhere we walked, tiny Pine seedlings had sprouted from the seeds that had been released from the opened cones. Right in the middle of summer there was new growth sprouting like it was early Spring! Hundreds of thousands of them so tiny and new that our boots could not miss them.

A meadow opened up to bright sunshine and grasses. Mullein, like dancers of the prairie, were standing five feet tall with a spike of yellow flowers that open before dawn and close by mid-afternoon. This wooly plant begins its biennial life with a low-growing whorl of fuzzy leaves in its first year. It needs cold temperatures to induce flowering the following year. It is capable of self-pollinating, and each plant can produce 100,000 to 240,000 tiny seeds that are viable for decades! Respect!

Another beautiful fuzzy plant is the Common Milkweed. The veined leaves are a work of art in and of themselves. And then the incredible ball of flower! Milkweeds are considered a ‘fugitive species’ in the southern Great Plains—their growth is dependent on disturbance because they can’t compete with other vegetation. Here in the northern plains, they are a more permanent member of the ecology.

Milkweeds contain cardiac glycosides that infuse the Monarch caterpillars who eat their leaves (and also the butterfly) with a toxin that deters birds and other predators. Genius defense. (Not to mention the Viceroy Butterfly who looks similar to the Monarch to take advantage of Mullerian mimicry.) But the butterfly we saw on the Milkweed was a not-colorful Wood Nymph whose unusual characteristic is over-wintering as a hibernating caterpillar instead of in the protection of a cocoon.

Who would ever think there is a mushroom called the Funeral Bell?

Two old Bigtooth Aspens grew side by side. Aspens are clonal plants that can grow from root suckers. They are categorized as a ‘pioneer species’ that is one of the first to grow after fire or clear-cutting. Five hundred different species of plants and animals utilize the Aspen tree in some way! What an impact one species of tree can have on the world!

Bulrushes grow near and in rivers and lakes. They are important for fish and bird habitat, including spawning areas for Northern Pike, nesting cover for Bass and Bluegills, and food for ducks, geese, and swans.

Swamp Milkweed (Asclepias incarnata) is named after the Greek god of medicine (Asklepios) and is a food source for the Monarch. They have specialized, scented white roots that like heavy, wet soil.

The forest had many trees as large as these twin White Pines, stately, iconic Minnesota trees. They give a person a feeling of grandeur and history—all the things these trees have seen in their long lives! Wow!

And right there on the forest floor, from the nourishment of old trees, needles, and leaves, the new ones grow.

Nature is neither bad nor good—it defies dichotomous thinking and human categorization. It has gray areas galore. It has diversity and interdependence that connects species and truly makes the world go round. How many of the amazing ‘facts’ did you know about these few plants? Can you believe that individual people have similar ‘amazing facts’ that make up their lives? Just as Nature is a moving circle of Life that creates, develops, grows, matures, and dies, we are the same. We cannot be placed in ‘them or us’ boxes. I have thought and reacted with black and white thinking in a desire for control of who or what was triggering the horrible feeling in my gut. I did it for many, many years, but trying to control other people or things is not the way to erase those feelings. The work is ours, and it is on ourselves. Nature can be our guide to move us beyond our limited thinking, to help us show respect for the unique individuals in our midst, to see beauty and interdependence with ‘colorful thinking,’ and most importantly, to help us heal the wounds that have hurt us all.

Storytellers and Swimmers

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I cannot begin to count the number of days in my life that have slid by in a blur. Some were in the self-centered days of early childhood when as children, we concentrate on getting our needs met and learning about the world. Others were in the extreme busyness of going to graduate school while juggling the activities and needs of three kids. Still others were once again in self-centered mode when pain could not be relieved, and my world shrunk down to cocoon-size in an attempt to manage the overwhelm. I have no negative judgement of those times—we do what we have to do in any given situation. But because of plenty of those blurry, constricted times, I am very aware of the times that are sharply outlined, slowly delicious, and wonderfully expansive for my mind-body-spirit freedom.

A good way to discover that mind-body-spirit freedom is to find some water, trees, and wild sky to park yourself in for a few days. The ‘agenda’ becomes play in the water, hike to the hill-top, and watch the moon rise over the trees. The process originates from our senses—noticing what we see, hear, smell, taste, and touch. And all of the feel-good sensing and activities are grounded in our bodies, memories, and soul by sharing them with people we love who love us. It’s a win-win-win.

One of the first sounds I heard was a loud, chirping/cheeping chatter. It sounded like a much louder version of the baby chicks we used to house on our back porch until they were big enough to move to the chicken coop. A pair of Osprey sat in a haphazard nest in the dead top of a Pine tree and told their story to all who could hear them.

The water the Osprey overlooked and fished from was clear and cold. Red-stemmed Water Lilies floated on the surface like silver coins, along with the silver star reflections made by the afternoon sun.

Yellow Pond Lilies and Northern Blueflag Irises decorated the water and shore with their Summer colors.

A Painted Turtle had crawled up on shore and dug a hole with its sharply-clawed hind feet in order to lay eggs. Our presence interrupted those plans.

One of the common foods for Painted Turtles is Dragonfly larvae. They live in the water through numerous molts, then crawl out of the water, learn to breathe air, shed their skin, and emerge as an adult, winged Dragonfly. A larva shell is stuck to the bark of this fallen log. (right in the middle of the picture) A new Dragonfly flies away!

Freedom is often depicted with the image of a butterfly that has completed its metamorphosis from egg to caterpillar to larva in a cocoon or chrysalis to adult butterfly. Freedom to develop, nourish one’s self, grow, incubate, isolate, change, and fly.

Another resident bird of the lake can sing a person to sleep in the evening as the western sky still holds the day’s light. The Common Loons also woke me in the early morning with a flurry of calls and a swimming/flying routine I called ‘motorboating.’ I wasn’t sure if they were doing their morning exercise or if this activity was for another purpose; I did notice their calls seemed more vigorous than usual.

Then I saw another lone Loon in a different part of the lake, so perhaps they were defending their territory.

Rocks are the hold-in-your-hand or hold-up-your-feet entities that make a person know what gravity is, what sun-induced warmth is, and what eons of history are in this place. Lichens and moss are the writing that tells the story.

Like a foraging Black Bear or a hungry Gray Jay, I browsed through the brush of Wild Blueberries growing in the scant soil over the large rocks. They were just beginning to ripen, so pickings were precious and few. Not so with the Juneberries on the shrubby, thin-branched trees—they were ripe and abundant and oh-so-delicious!

The smell of campfire smoke is like a signal to relax, prepare some nourishment, eat slowly and laugh often. Usually only one or two people of the group become the fire-tend-er; others take care of food, clean-up, and equipment—there are shared responsibilities even when time is slow and relaxation is the goal. As evening smoke drifted up into the calm sky, a beaver swam in circles in the lake—again, it seemed like he was doing it for fun, for the pure joy of movement. At one point we startled him, and he slapped his tail on the water with a loud ‘crack’ and dove out of sight. But soon he was back to swimming his laps. We saw him swim to the shore where a bright green branch of leaves grew or lay in the shallow water, and he nibbled and nibbled his post-workout snack until it was almost gone.

Late evening and watching the almost full moon rise above the trees and reflect on the water—I wonder if these moments could get much better. It’s a ‘savor-moment’—it makes me feel like everything is going to be okay in a time when so many things make it feel otherwise.

Then morning comes after a Loon-call-filled night. Mist from a warm day, cool night floats above the water. Reflections on the calm, still water give us a slightly different view of reality, expanding our minds.

We all go through constricted times in our lives when facts and feelings are blurry. Pain, whether physical or emotional, is a constrictor. We don’t usually have the capacity to do much beyond dealing with the very real but usually distorting pain. Looking back to those times in my life, I realize there were negative consequences to my being in the cocooning pain, but there were also gifts to be had and lessons to be learned. Extreme busyness also tends to blur the perceptions and memories of a given time. Both pain and busyness are integral parts of Life. We won’t escape them, but we can cultivate more feelings of freedom. Being in the arms of Mother Nature, listening to the Loons and Osprey, seeing the full moon rise over the trees, smelling the campfire, tasting the Juneberries, and touching the warm rocks all expand my mind, body, and spirit. I feel like I could fly. I want more of that.

The Unseen River

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In the early seventies—yes, back in the nineteen hundreds—I was one of millions of kids who watched the one television set in the house with my siblings. We watched an array of programs—The Brady Bunch, Saturday morning cartoons, American Bandstand, Dark Shadows, the Merv Griffin Show, To Tell the Truth, Hee Haw, Laugh-In, and so many more. One of the shows we watched—The Flip Wilson Show—popularized an idiom “what you see is what you get” when Flip impersonated his drag persona ‘Geraldine.’ And no one, not my Republican parents, not the ‘media,’ not half the members of Congress, or concerned citizens thought this show was ruining, grooming, exploiting, or influencing children. It was a comedy show with a humorous man dressing up like a sassy character, and it was funny! Looking back at any of those programs could indeed bring on some cringe moments in this day and age, but we survived our tv-watching childhood and became who we were meant to be.

“What you see is what you get” is a statement often used by a person who is unapologetic of who they are or how they are behaving, especially if another asks them to do or be something different. It implies there is no hidden or unknown features, traits, or characteristics beyond what is seen or immediately apparent, and it also implies that the person has no interest in changing. This statement can run the gamut from a person who is humbly grounded in who they are in the world to a rude reply of ‘hey, I do what I do, and I don’t care what you or anybody else thinks.’ I’m not so interested in who says it or for what reason, but in the premise that what we see is the whole story.

When we went north to Bemidji, we were on a bee-line to see the bog, and I was thrilled to see the blooming bog plants. After our bog walk, we picnicked beside Lake Bemidji, a medium sized (7,000 acres) lake with clear water, sandy beaches, and abundant fish species. We hiked along the beach and along the northern shore for a ways, noticing boats and float planes traversing the waters.

Other floaters seemed to ignore the few people fishing and swimming. A red-headed Common Merganser swam close to the beach. A large Snapping Turtle floated to the surface near the dock, then lazily swam under the dock as fishermen threw their lines close by. A school of Yellow Perch doubled their numbers with dark shadows of themselves. A Blue-Winged Teal preened on a rock by the fishing dock, then swam close to the hiking path.

Along the rocky shore where Bass Creek flows into Lake Bemidji, Harlequin Blueflag Irises displayed their showy purple flowers, and the ball-shaped buds of Yellow Pond Lilies floated above their lily pad leaves.

June Wild Roses proliferated along the wetlands, their sweet smell and pink faces bringing joy to those who noticed them.

Bass Creek cuts a path from Big Bass Lake to Lake Bemidji, part of the 396,000 acres of land that drains into Lake Bemidji. The rushes, reeds, and cattails create a scenic wetland and provide food and shelter to the animals who live there.

There is much to see at Lake Bemidji State Park, as with so much of northern Minnesota. It hones your observation skills and makes one appreciate the incredible diversity that is contained in a rather homogeneous area. What you see encompasses a large part of the story, but it is not the whole story. We tend to think of water flowing into a lake as becoming the lake—Bass Creek becomes Lake Bemidji. But there is something we don’t see. ‘Bemidji’ means ‘lake with crossing waters’ from the Ojibwa word ‘Bemidjigamaag.’ The Mississippi River, whose source is less than fifty miles away at Lake Itasca, flows into Lake Bemidji from the south and west, crosses the Lake and exits on the east side. A river runs through the lake. This large and impressive River flows through a number of northern lakes before it begins its southward descent to Louisiana.

The things we don’t see are powerful parts of the story of a River and a Lake, just as they are with the stories of our Lives. My premise is the idiom of ‘what you see is what you get’ is how a person wants to be seen, not all that is there. It’s more likely a way to hide a vulnerability or a painful part of oneself. We have amazing, creative, resilient ways to armor ourselves against pain and loss, but the spirit of who we are runs through us whether seen or unseen. I like that we and all of Nature are an amazing combination of both. I think the challenge is to integrate all those parts of ourselves—the swagger, the shadows, the funny parts, the vulnerable parts, the knowledge, the fears, and the weaknesses—into an authentic, happy, beautiful Self while shedding those behaviors that separate us from ourselves and others. What is the unseen river that runs through you?