A Walk in Muir Woods

[forestofglory]

Recently we took a trip to Muir Woods. It’s an old growth redwood grove that’s generally very hard to visit because it is very popular, and doesn’t have much parking. I think the last time we were there was when friends from the UK visited us, many years ago. Due to the pandemic fewer people are traveling and they have instituted a reservation system for the parking limiting the number of guests. So R made a reservation and we planned an expedition.

I had been struggling that week, having a hard time focusing and feeling sad and distant from the world. So I was harboring some thoughts about being swept away by the majesty of nature, even though generally I’m critical of the myth of wilderness. The idea that some places aren’t impacted by humans is silly and harmful. It erases ways that the landscape is and has been impacted and makes us over value some kinds of landscapes.

Muir Woods is very much not Wilderness. Signs of people are everywhere. Informational signs, trails, hikers, boardwalks, fences, salmon restoration projects And the landscape is impacted in ways that are not obvious at glance by the human history of the place. One sign mentioned that there had not been a fire in Muir woods for 150 years. This major change from the pre-Eropean fire regime and a major way humans have impacted the landscape.

It’s hard to talk about humans impacting the landscape without seeming to downplay the grandeur of nature. But both can be true at once. I love the grandness of the old trees, the way they rise above me when I walk among them. But I also appreciate the signs that tell me about the ecology and history of the place, the paths to walk on, the restored salmon habitat. On my visit I was not swept away by the majesty of nature, but I did enjoy being surrounded by beauty, and know that other humans had work to preserve it. It felt special just the way it was.

Comments

[darkemeralds]

Your perspective on things is always so deep and thoughtful. Over and over again (mostly on Twitter, I admit), you've gotten me thinking differently. Tea, chili peppers, and now "wilderness."

One thing I see all the time in environmentalist discourse is the complete failure to understand humankind as part of nature. Yes, we have (arguably) a different kind of consciousness from other animals, and yes, we are really, really destructive, and yes, for both of those reasons we have responsibilities toward the natural world we're a part of that we need to take seriously.

But the "man/nature" dichotomy (and I use the term man advisedly) is the very thinking that others both sides from each other and gives us some sort of permission to fight, destroy, objectify, use, abuse and generally not empathize with the world that spawned us.

[forestofglory]

Thank you! If you are interested in reading more about these topics I recommend Braiding Sweetgrass by Robin Wall Kimmerer

[darkemeralds]

Insta-rec. I've just bought it on Audible and will be listening right away.

[forestofglory]

Yes! I really love that book, so I hope you will too!

[darkemeralds]

Oh, I am so enjoying this lovely book.

I'd like to offer a couple of reciprocal recommendations in a similar vein, with absolutely no obligation or expectation, of course--just, you strike me as someone who might appreciate one or the other, or both, and I hardly ever get to recommend them.

1. Plant Intelligence and the Imaginal Realm: Beyond the Doors of Perception into the Dreaming of Earth, by Stephen Buhner. (Link is to my Goodreads review. This was a paradigm shifter for me.) Poetic, discursive, not an easy read, but a lovely one.

2. Entangled Life: How Fungi Make our World, Change Our Minds, and Shape Our Futures, by Merlin Sheldrake (Rupert's son, if that means anything to you). A more straightforward read than Plant Intelligence, but like father, like son, he's trying to navigate the deficiencies of science while also practicing science, and his passion for the micorrhyzal realm is engaging.

[darkemeralds]

As I was straggling to my coffee pot this morning, listening to Robin Wall Kimmerer describe her father's coffee ceremony each morning when they camped by the Great Lakes, I refreshed my podcast feed, and look!

Robin Wall Kimmerer on the On Being podcast. Haven't listened yet, but Krista Tippett always does a beautiful interview. Thought you might like to know.

(Okay, I'll stop spamming your comments now. Honest.)

[forestofglory]

You don't have to stop! I am enjoying all the recs!

[lunabee34]

I'm glad you had a good experience. That sounds lovely.

[enemyofperfect]

I really like your take on the role of humans in the world!

[forestofglory]

Thanks!

[owlmoose]

That's lovely, and how I most enjoy nature, too. Signage about the biological and historical context of natural wonders make me feel more connected to them.

[forestofglory]

Yes, signage is helpful.

[clevermanka]

So good that you got a special moment surrounded by beauty. ❤

[0dense]

yeah, it may not be wild at all any more, but it's certainly a very loved place :)

[lokifan]

<333 Love this.

[forestofglory]

Thank you!