Come sit with me in the bottom of my canoe, out on a lake of wild rice. Stretch your hands into the seed piled between us, fresh grains knocked off the stalks this morning. Gather a handful and inhale the scent of dried grass and rain-washed air. Feel the way wild rice seed settles into your palms, the weight of sunshine turned to sustenance. Watch out for spiders.

You are not alone; this I want you to know. We are all searching, each in our own imperfect way. Looking to be included. Wanting to be heard. Unsure of where we stand in the world. I want to welcome you. This is my invitation.

Come share the world with me. I will not take you to the great Egyptian pyramids or wander on the Galapagos gawking at the tortoises. I will walk with you in the woods and along the water, perhaps in the city, and most definitely in old fields and along well traveled paths. Walking together I will point out beauty in a fragile orchid or a lichen covered rock. I will show you how to dance among the mayfly hatch, twirling and spinning in their brief airborne glory. I will sit with you lakeside, settling into silence as we watch the sun disappear over pines black with shadow and listen to loons wail across still waters. Their calls spear me, pulling sadness and sorrow from my soul, healing without words. You and I will bathe together in moonlight.

From earliest memory nature captured me. The way sunlight shifts among the leaves of a green ash tree. Twittering wings and a peent pouring from the sky. A city of sand built by a legion of ants. Flowers that follow the sun. I need not travel far, just a few steps beyond my back door, to find new wonders waiting. Each day a different sunset, a new sunrise.

My body will fail me long before my curiosity will be satiated. And when at last I am no longer able to ramble through the woods, or steer my canoe across a stream, I will have memories to visit and hold, words to remind me of places I’ve been.

To write. A writer. Putting words into structure, testing, building, erasing, and starting again. This is the journey I have set for myself. To not write would be easier. To let the days pass with the electronic distraction of bytes and disconnected connectedness. To lose myself in helping others, baking, calling, delivering, asking, interacting, reacting, not reacting, disappearing into other. I can’t do that anymore.
I am on a journey. A journey that will likely take me new places, introduce me to new people, reconnect me with old friends, and lead me to discover myself.

Care to join me?