Winter Sunrise...

The snow overnight greeted me this morning. White and fresh, beckoning me outside and down to a nearby park, my pup in tow. It has been a long time coming, this snow with me outside enjoying it, noticing it. I have been distracted lately. Spending time at book clubs, woman's spirituality groups, my son's educational center, doggie playgroups, and my UU church. Being more in community with people than nature. While I have loved this opportunity to be with people and form a sense of belonging for myself, I have missed the natural world.

The world of nature with the sun rising up from the horizon, bringing forth light to an otherwise gray day. Reminding me, calling to me to rejoin what I have have stepped away from for the last month. Calling me back to my passion...

John Heinz National Wildlife Refuge

As the largest remaining freshwater tidal marsh in Pennsylvania, the John Heinz National Wildlife Refuge forms a buffer between dry land and open ocean, influenced by tides but containing very little salt. The refuges almost 1,000 acres is a vital feeding and resting place for birds migrating along the Atlantic Flyway and also provides habitats for lots of varied wildlife.

With a view of the city of Philadelphia from the marsh and the sounds of traffic on I-95 well within earshot, it can be difficult to feel one has gotten away from the rush of the city and enveloped in the hush of nature. But despite the fact that I found myself distracted by the sounds of man during my visit there today, the view of the marsh and the waterfowl were spectacular, and went a long way toward erasing any distractions I had due to noise.

While the refuge contains an educational center, the main attraction is the boardwalk and observation platforms that allows one to get out onto the water and able to come in closer contact with the birds and other wildlife of the area.

My husband and I walked the entire perimeter of the main marsh which took us about an hour and 1/2, including stops. On this beautiful 60 degree January day, we came across many fellow hikers, and like us, many had their dogs in tow. While we did see a group of seagulls and a blue heron at the marsh today, I look forward to returning in May when all of the migrating birds on their northward journey pass through.

If you would like additional information on the refuge, please click here.

Nature defined...

Much of the reading I do suggests the benefits of time spent in nature and I am told nature will heal what ails us. This part I know and understand. What I understand less is exactly what is defined as nature. Some books suggest nature can be found just about anywhere as long as one is outside. It can be found in your backyard, along a suburban street or in a forest preserve. I have always scratched my head at some of these suggestions and no matter how hard I try, I don't ever feel like I am in nature as I walk along a street in a neighborhood.

Some may argue that nature is all around us and I certainly would agree. For you can find trees and air and sky and insects on a suburban street and those things are nature. But you can also find trees, air, sky and insects on any street in downtown Chicago and I really would have a hard time feeling like I am in nature under those circumstances. I think it is the noise of man that intrudes in both the downtown city locations as well as the suburban locations. Also the hand of man, what with his grooming of his domain, his lawns, the pruning of trees and clearing of underbrush. The cleaning up of nature takes away from nature, wild nature.

So when books suggest that it is important to spend time in nature, I think they must be referring to wild nature. Nature that is free, away from man. Nature filled with sticks and stones, leaves and fallen branches, tangles and brambles, tall towering trees, low flowering plants. Critters scurrying, water flowing, birds calling, quiet. Messiness. Away from the sterility man creates with his landscapes.

I have been looking for a wild natural place that I can travel to close to home. Heading over to the forest behind the college is a good 10-15 minute walk and I wanted to find something within 5 minutes that I could travel to and visit each day. Well this morning I remembered a small pocket park close to home and after visiting there was well rewarded with not only a place to sit out of the elements, but also a fairly good example of the wild nature I am searching for. At this time of the year with the leaves off, it appears somewhat barren but soon the leaves will be back and I will be immersed totally in nature, not able to see a single home from my perch.

I bet many of us have close by wild natural areas that we can visit just a short walk from home. I know when I lived in Illinois, there was a beautiful wild area near my nature-less neighborhood that I loved to visit and well worth the effort to get there. Seek out these places and reap the benefits of getting more in touch with true nature, refusing to settle for the boring landscapes of man. Refusing to call a walk around your suburban neighborhood being in nature.

Losing yourself in Crum Creek Woods...

Tucked just behind Swarthmore college lies a beautiful tract of land, running alongside Crum Creek. A small parcel of land really, hard to get lost in but a perfect place to get lost if you choose to.

My dog likes to run along the hills or splash in the creek, losing her mind as she rushes about reveling in the freedom to investigate as she pleases.

My son likes to rock climb here or simply spend time reading, losing himself in a story.

Hiking these trails I discover that losing myself in nature may be the best way to find myself. Let the beauty of the natural world bring you peace in the New Year!

The Selves We Had To Be...

Thanks, Robert Frost by David Ray
Do you have hope for the future?
someone asked Robert Frost, toward the end.
Yes, and even for the past, he replied,
that it will turn out to have been all right
for what it was, something we can accept,
mistakes made by the selves we had to be,
not able to be, perhaps, what we wished,
or what looking back half the time it seems
we could so easily have been, or ought ...
The future, yes, and even for the past,
that it will become something we can bear.
And I too, and my children, so I hope,
will recall as not too heavy the tug
of those albatrosses I sadly placed
upon their tender necks. Hope for the past,
yes, old Frost, your words provide that courage,
and it brings strange peace that itself passes
into past, easier to bear because
you said it, rather casually, as snow
went on falling in Vermont years ago.

“Mistakes made for the selves we had to be”. This passage resonated with me. The selves wrapped up in pleasing, seeking acceptance rather than one’s truth. This past is hard to swallow. The years stacked one on top of another, built on personal falsehoods. Built on someone else’s vision of who they’d like you to be. These pasts are hard to bear.

But a collection of pasts, experiences considered and appraised, solved and understood, can potentially set one free of these hollow pasts. Like a vast cosmic puzzle, pieces viewed and connections made, one can begin to see the real picture of self. To see personal authenticity based on ones hopes and dreams, not on those of another. This past is easier to bear.

This is the past I must strive for always as I move ahead into the New Year. A year built on my truths, girded by the knowledge of who I am, my passions and desires steering me into the future. Moving forward, while building meaningful pasts.