IT HAS BEEN a long wait. But the rains have finally come. No lightning bolts. No thunderclaps. No 70mph winds. Just a slow, gentle rain, going on for hours now. The wild ginger on the forest floor is waking up. The sarsaparilla, too. Every clump of moss and even the lichens seem to be sighing in appreciation. The bluejays fly
APPROXIMATELY 12,000 years ago, this boulder was left upon this granite bedrock point by a retreating glacier. It has not moved one inch in all that time. It observed the passing of eons, the earliest of the Eurasian migrants across the Bering Straits, the Clovis culture hunters of the mastodons and woolly mammoths, their descendants who came to be called
YESTERDAY WE HAD a memorable event here in the Pine Point Woods (sometimes known as the Church O’ The Pines). Two of our congregation members–our resident pair of Bald eagles, whose nest is 60 yards from the cabin–saw the second of their two young ones fledge. They graduated from the high white pine which had been home since late March–and
HAVE YOU EVER NOTICED how sometimes things that are delicate and fragile and beautiful can be stronger and tougher than those who brag about being strong and tough? Have you ever noticed that? I have. And occasionally, if I forget, this little harebell by the Fawn Island cabin reminds me. Or the ones growing out of the sheer granite cliff
ON THIS BLUE-SKY, warm-wind Earth day, I wish you beauty. I wish you the secret space between two pines, there to wander through and discover a new world. Perhaps to discover the very first bloodroot blossom of spring, or the very last scarlet cup of late winter. The shiny rabbit-ear leaves of the early wild leeks, or the tender, spotted
TODAY IS A VERY DARK DAY for those who love the North Woods, the Canoe Country, protected wild places, and particularly the Boundary Waters Canoe Area Wilderness. The Republican Party has, as is their custom of late, engaged in a great betrayal. A betrayal of all those people mentioned, of the state of Minnesota, and of the United States of
ONE OF THE GREAT advantages of living in the forest is that we are surrounded by real things. Nothing phony, no lies, no ‘misinformation.’ This seems helpful in keeping one’s bearings, in maintaining a stranglehold on truth, and in nurturing a sense of perspective. Among the ‘real things’ that help in this endeavor are the real creatures that live here,
IT IS APRIL at the cabin-in-the-woods. ‘Good Friday.’ But it looks a bit more like January. Still, all is beautiful. The soundscape is alive with the yodeling of loons from the river (no, they don’t stay through the summer, so it is a joy to hear them!) Tundra swans’ high voices echo through the sky as they fly overhead, arrowing
EACH YEAR we gather in the Autumn woods, awash with colors and the scents of fallen leaves, to explore the craft of writing. Of self-expression. We call it ‘WRITERS IN THE WOODS.’ Some have been returning for years, and some are new arrivals. It doesn’t matter–we quickly become a family, supporting each other, sharing and learning together. The art of
GOOD NEIGHBORS: If one is a cat, even an extraordinary cat like Koda-the-Forest-Kitten, one does not venture outdoors much when it is below zero day after day. Instead, one takes a nap. Then, after resting up a bit, one takes another nap. Then, after a bite to eat, perhaps, and bathing and resting a little more, it is no doubt