She is close to ninety, and I wanted to be able to work with her before she completely passes the baton to others.

"The next high tide would erase these remarkable assemblages in 12 hours and others would take their place—always a reminder that time and action are evolutionary agents moving everything toward something else."

As I have learned about the social life of trees and the intimate bonds that indigenous peoples have with various lifeforms and rivers – and as I pore through recent ecophilosophy that explains aliveness to the western mind -- I’ve concluded: We really ought to be talking more about animism and commoning.

While female Bears may parent on their own, they are partnered at every step with Mother Nature. Every aspect of a Bear is shaped in relationship with Nature’s grain. This refined union of self with surroundings has been passed through innumerable generations over millions of years. To optimize their children’s security and wellness, mothers-to-be must be aware of external states as well as their own internal states.

"The term ‘lament’ is typically associated with grief, with sorrow, with loss. Maybe the loss is physical – a beloved passes. Maybe the loss is etheric – a longed for dream of what could be is dissolved by circumstance. Those who have awakened to the nature of dawn songs lament the loss of birds… Perhaps lamentation is a song that enables the necessary mystery to find us in ways that we long to be found.”