The Day Nature Pulled Me Back into Her Arms
April 2007
As a child I thought I was a doctor, a scientist, a naturalist of sorts. I collected bugs, dissected frogs (okay, and stuffed animals), collected blood samples from family and friends, and spent hours in our neighborhood prairie--my home away from home. I was always happy digging, collecting, building, and discovering. The sun was my best friend and the stars a wonderful mystery.
When I wasn't discovering the natural world, I was the community doctor, caring for neighborhood friends and family. My services were conducted from my special home doctor's office that my parents allowed me to set up in our apartment sun parlor. Besides me, there was only one other neighborhood doctor--well, an almost doctor. I used to take walks past his house so I could see the silhouette of this young Greek man studying his medical books hour after hour, and I'd dream about this one day being me.
I am not sure when or why all this left me. Perhaps it was due to the typical happenings of a growing up --game practices, church choir, high school football games, boys. Don't get me wrong, I was never the camping sort of naturalist. I wanted my bed, my family, and a clean toilet. Other than those amenities, I was a pretty good outdoors woman. However, when life got busy I crossed the line away from yucky bugs and believing that birds were only good for pooping on one's head. Yes, I crossed the line from being the child my mother had to call home from the prairie to the girl who believed the natural world was gross.
However, the real me slowly and quietly returned after my daughter was born--you know that time in life when the world is an uncharted place that are seen for the first time though one's child's eyes. Once again, the pooping bird left something to squeal at, a butterfly is what the two of us chased, the grasses were our ticklers, and the moon had a face. Nature grabbed my heartstrings again but mostly because my daughter was the puppeteer at that time.
However, before long, life's hectic cycle continued with my daughter's world of game practices, girl scouts, birthday parties, homework--all the typical wonderful but time-eating aspects of everyday life. Then as quickly as the cycle had changed, my daughter was grown and life circled around again and I found myself with time for travel, new discoveries, and time for the natural world to send out its shoots, wrap its many wonders about me, and pull me back to the earth, sky, air, and water.
Unexpectedly and really because of my scrap booking and photography hobbies, I began to see the natural world again. Through my camera lens I could focus on the tiniest bug, the scurrying chipmunk, the pinkish streak across a puffed white sky....but still I viewed it all as pictures, or photographs. I continued to shoot "pretty pictures."
Then the night of my first photography class was upon me, and just in preparation I drove around the Morton Arboretum. It was a cold yet springtime evening with a light breeze. Both of these were enough to send the visitors home much earlier than usual. So quiet prevailed, except for nature's music of the birds calling to each other, water rolling against the rocks, squirrels flitting and digging, and many other unidentified sounds.
I remember pulling off the side of the road, having all the windows down, and just sitting, listening, and thinking. Unexpectedly, I had the feeling that I belonged there--as though it were a familiar spot. Then I remember thinking--or was it hearing a voice--or perhaps feeling something spiritually--whatever--it was it said, "Welcome Home. Welcome home, Joanne. I won't ask where you have been. I will only say come join me. The time is now."
As a child I thought I was a doctor, a scientist, a naturalist of sorts. I collected bugs, dissected frogs (okay, and stuffed animals), collected blood samples from family and friends, and spent hours in our neighborhood prairie--my home away from home. I was always happy digging, collecting, building, and discovering. The sun was my best friend and the stars a wonderful mystery.
When I wasn't discovering the natural world, I was the community doctor, caring for neighborhood friends and family. My services were conducted from my special home doctor's office that my parents allowed me to set up in our apartment sun parlor. Besides me, there was only one other neighborhood doctor--well, an almost doctor. I used to take walks past his house so I could see the silhouette of this young Greek man studying his medical books hour after hour, and I'd dream about this one day being me.
I am not sure when or why all this left me. Perhaps it was due to the typical happenings of a growing up --game practices, church choir, high school football games, boys. Don't get me wrong, I was never the camping sort of naturalist. I wanted my bed, my family, and a clean toilet. Other than those amenities, I was a pretty good outdoors woman. However, when life got busy I crossed the line away from yucky bugs and believing that birds were only good for pooping on one's head. Yes, I crossed the line from being the child my mother had to call home from the prairie to the girl who believed the natural world was gross.
However, the real me slowly and quietly returned after my daughter was born--you know that time in life when the world is an uncharted place that are seen for the first time though one's child's eyes. Once again, the pooping bird left something to squeal at, a butterfly is what the two of us chased, the grasses were our ticklers, and the moon had a face. Nature grabbed my heartstrings again but mostly because my daughter was the puppeteer at that time.
However, before long, life's hectic cycle continued with my daughter's world of game practices, girl scouts, birthday parties, homework--all the typical wonderful but time-eating aspects of everyday life. Then as quickly as the cycle had changed, my daughter was grown and life circled around again and I found myself with time for travel, new discoveries, and time for the natural world to send out its shoots, wrap its many wonders about me, and pull me back to the earth, sky, air, and water.
Unexpectedly and really because of my scrap booking and photography hobbies, I began to see the natural world again. Through my camera lens I could focus on the tiniest bug, the scurrying chipmunk, the pinkish streak across a puffed white sky....but still I viewed it all as pictures, or photographs. I continued to shoot "pretty pictures."
Then the night of my first photography class was upon me, and just in preparation I drove around the Morton Arboretum. It was a cold yet springtime evening with a light breeze. Both of these were enough to send the visitors home much earlier than usual. So quiet prevailed, except for nature's music of the birds calling to each other, water rolling against the rocks, squirrels flitting and digging, and many other unidentified sounds.
I remember pulling off the side of the road, having all the windows down, and just sitting, listening, and thinking. Unexpectedly, I had the feeling that I belonged there--as though it were a familiar spot. Then I remember thinking--or was it hearing a voice--or perhaps feeling something spiritually--whatever--it was it said, "Welcome Home. Welcome home, Joanne. I won't ask where you have been. I will only say come join me. The time is now."
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