Courting the Wild...

Thoughts on attention, relationship, and reciprocity.

Courtship is about building and deepening a relationship. One area where we are learning more about this way of relating is with the natural world. Increasingly, modern science is confirming what centuries old observations and Indigenous belief systems have taught: we are all connected. We can all thrive when we honor relationships with animals, plants, ecosystems, the earth, and each other.

One way we do this is by understanding our relationship with the natural world, by simply relating to our own bodies we can understand how we belong to our environment.

In her book, Braiding Sweetgrass, Robin Wall Kimmerer writes

“Knowing that you love the earth changes you, activates you to defend and protect and celebrate. But when you feel that the earth loves you in return, that feeling transforms the relationship from a one-way street into a sacred bond.”
― Robin Wall Kimmerer

While loving is activating, it is the feeling of being loved in return, of being in a mutual relationship that creates a sacred bond.

One way to build relationships with the wild, with nature, and with our environment is through attention. Our time of limited mobility in the pandemic offered a unique opportunity to connect to the natural world closer to home. We had so many more opportunities to notice the beings growing, living, and blooming around us. As I reflect on this season three years ago, I remember how attuned I felt to the plants in my yard and neighborhood. That connection has stayed with me even as life has returned to more of a traditional routine.

In her zine, Worry Medicine: A Companion for Troubled Times, Nina Montenegro of The Far Woods, reminds us that when the news media is overwhelming, there is always another source of news we can tap into. We can go outside and take in the information of the world around us through our five senses. This is not to turn away from awareness of global events, but to use moments of noticing at home to ground us in the here and now. For the past two years, I have used The Far Woods 3 Year Garden Journal to keep track of observations the natural world each day. I began in March of 2021. As I come to the anniversary of this beginning, I notice how this practice has helped me notice the finer details in seasons of stillness and to record larger changes in seasons of transition

As Robin Wall Kimmerer writes, “Paying attention is a form of reciprocity with the living world, receiving the gifts with open eyes and open heart.”

Anticipating spring as I review photos from years of daily visits with this tree.

Chronicling My Courtship with Creativity

One of the practices that supports my on-going relationship with creativity is traveling with a word of the year. I both choose the word and feel like my word chooses me. This year my word is attend.

I settled on this word when I came upon a definition that both surprised and resonated deeply with me. In his book, Scattered Minds, Dr. Gabor Mate describes Dr. Scott Peck’s definition of love as action. He connects this to attention:

To love is to extend oneself toward another or toward oneself, says Dr. Peck. It so happens that this is also the precise meaning of giving attention to another or to oneself. The origin of the word attend is the Latin tender, “to stretch.” Attend means to extend, to stretch toward.

This brought me back to this pair of paper cuts I created a few years ago to illustrate the word attention:

On the left, is the broadcast attention announcement of caution or alert. On the right is the gentle drawing in I feel when in the natural world, depicted as a fern unfurling in spring.

I’ve been reading lately about the attention economy and ways technology is impacting our attention spans and our ability to pay attention.

I don’t like thinking of my attention as a commodity so I felt reassured to find that the etymology of the word is closer to the attention I prefer, the stretching and extending toward something I enjoy when exploring, This is a kind of more organic attention that comes along with curiosity and might lead to discovery and sharing.

While there are times when we need the “ATTENTION!” announcement for safety and information, I am noticing how, digital notifications can create a false sense of alert and pull me away with things that don’t need attending to in the moment when I want to focus on creative work.

I find it helps to remember the etymology of attend, and to allow for choice, wonder, and beauty to be my guides toward where I want to extend myself and what I want to stretch toward. There is intention, freedom, and pause in this slower form of attention.

This stretching and extending is relational, an act of connection.

Inspiration and Connections

The Museum of Healing Attention, is a fictional museum imagined by Jessi Rado and featured in the Museum of Modern Art Magazine.

I enjoyed this perspective on attention, on healing in public spaces, and ways to foster presence, connection, and relationships.

I am often inspired by women scientists and naturalists, by the unique attention they bring to a relational study with animals and the natural world.

Here is one of my octopuses with the very delicate egg case of an argonaut octopus. The female argonaut is the only known species of octopus to form a shell. The shell is the female octopus’s egg case and all it allows her to move suspended in the ocean currents, filling the shell with air to float.

Most of what we know about this octopus comes from research by Jeanne Villepreux-Power, a seamstress and self-taught scientist and researcher. She was the first person to record observations of live octopuses. Prior to that, drawings and research had focused on dead species. In seeking to study live animals, she also designed the first aquariums. Her observations not only confirmed that the female octopus created its shell but also recorded ways an octopus would repair a shell that had been damaged. In seeking to prove her hypothesis that these creatures were creative problem solvers, building and repairing their egg cases, Jeanne Villepreux-Power used her creative problem solving skills to greatly advance our knowledge. Her observations contributed important knowledge about the anatomy, life cycle, and mating habits of argonaut octopuses. Her aquarium designs were the predecessors of all modern aquariums. You can read more about Jeanne Villepreux-Power in these two books:

The Lady and the Octopus: How Jeanne Villepreux-Power Invented Aquariums and Revolutionized Marine Biology

Secrets of the Sea : the Story of Jeanne Power, Revolutionary Marine Scientist

I am struck by how Jeanne Villepreux-Power’s relationship to her research was one of curiosity, care, and connection with living things and how that was new for her time.

A generation later, Florence Merriam Bailey and her book, Birds Through an Opera Glass was similarly new in its advocacy of studying birds alive and in their natural environments. At the time, most bird study involved killing and stuffing birds for illustration and decoration; she encouraged people to use their opera glasses (binoculars) to observe live birds in their parks and neighborhoods. She was also a strong advocate to protect birds from killing for feathers and taxidermy for women’s hats. You can read more about Florence Merriam Bailey in She Heard the Birds: The Story of Florence Merriam Bailey.

I would love to hear from you too:

What is drawing your attention right now?

Where do you find inspiration for relational ways of living and being?

Thank you for reading and being part of creative community through this newsletter.

With a grateful heart,

Kathryn