September 1, 2010
For the past several years weāve spent much time walking around the beautiful lake where we live. PersonaliTrees is one result of the awareness weāve gained by connecting with our surroundings. The feeling we have is that we not only live here, we ARE here. Having become acutely aware of natureās spiritual realm and its underlying intelligence, we were invited to become a part of it and accepted the invitation with all of its attendant responsibilities.
One of those responsibilities is to leave it as healthy and beautiful as when we entered. If possible, we should leave it better. The most obvious way to do that is to remove all of the unsightly and unwanted trash that humans leave behind. Each day we collect a combination of plastic water bottles, aluminum drink cans, candy wrappers, glass bottles, styrofoam containers and the various packaging left on the bank and in the water by people whoāve been fishing, boating or hiking. We canāt keep up but we try, and thankfully so do others who live here.
I used to get angry at those who didnāt have the respect of nature or courtesy for others to take away the products they brought with them after turning them into trash. It is, I thought, as if they never intended to return. Surely they would not leave such a mess if they were intent on coming back. It would be like throwing oneās garbage into the corner of oneās living room or the floorboard of oneās car.
And so it is. Thatās when the light came on and I forgot my anger.
What one does is what one is. To respect our natural surroundings is to respect ourselves. We learn that truth only by living it. You cannot do what you do not know. Once enlightened, you cannot go back and behave as before. It is a fortunate circumstance to have become aware of, and to have earned, that respect.
We cannot police our way to respect for the environment. It is just not possible to enforce common courtesy when the fountain that emits such spiritual intelligence is not turned on. But we can bring forth ideas that turn on the fountain, refresh the mind and foster the understanding that comes when one sees his reflection in the pool of his actions. Ā
It is heartening that to hear that a half million people attended an event on the mall in Washington D.C., last weekend and, according to the Wall Street Journal, left not a scrap of trash behind. Perhaps we are on the brink of a new consciousness, one that will extend all the way into our human activities in the wilderness.
August 23, 2010
One of the great challenges to being out in nature ā for me anyway ā is to get in synch with it. To do that I must first shake my incessant need to DO. In the back of my mind and the pit of my stomach is a gnawing sense that I might be using this time in a more productive way. I should be balancing my checkbook, working on a sales proposal, calling somebody about a meeting or fixing the roof. Of course nothing could be farther from the truth.
I think of Thoreauās two years at Walden. He recounts time spent observing the movement of a shadow in the doorway over the course of a day. (I always wanted to do that, and since I first read it almost 40 years ago I still havenāt taken a single day to do it.) He was also driven to measure and record everything measurable and recordable about the pond itself and the surrounding landscape. It is our human nature to do, to create, to busy ourselves with ostensibly productive activities quite apart from chopping wood, carrying water and other requirements for basic survival. Still, he made time to wax poetically on the spiritual nature of the experience and the woodsā effect on human culture in the surrounding communities.
As I bounce back and forth between the requirements of participation in society and letting myself free-fall into the time-lengthened realm of the natural environment, I find the quickest way to make the transition is to laugh at myself. How foolish to struggle against the feeling I canāt get āinside natureā fast enough! Indeed, what IS real time? Humility helps me set my internal clock, so to speak, to run closer to natureās time.
The more I vanish into nature, the more natural it seems to want to be there compared to time spent in the everyday workaday world. Each time it’s harder to come back out. Rather, I donāt want to come out, because the world thatĀ previously seemed so real and all-important now seems pretentious, superficial and a tragic waste of time. Hereās a cautionary note, however, just in case youāre toying with the idea of going off the grid even part-time: Conferring with nature on a regular basis is a life-changing commitment. Your behavior will change. In the short term, friends and family might think you are becoming eccentric, or dropping out (like you did that summer in the ā60s). They might worry about you, and cite your occasional unshaven face, cockleburs in your shirt or general dishevelment.
In the long term, they might come around a lot less or stop inviting you to dinner parties. Oh, well. You can always buy time by explaining that your new hobby is on the order of meditation; but in point of fact the entire experience expands into an entirely different dimension to the extent you are willing to accept the change. That is to say, we donāt make the rules out there; we donāt even pretend to make the rules. We simply exist alongside nature until alongside becomes within, and eventually within becomes the same as.
Every time I come back from a walking meditation I feel changed, a little more pleased with life. But not SO pleased with myself in that I forget how, or wish not, to communicate with people. Iāve made a choice, and while itās reasonable that I might need to explain it, it is not necessary to convince anyone that I am smarter or better than anyone else. Aw, geez, again with the humility. Mindfulness in; mindfulness out.
So Iāll goĀ out into the treesĀ again today. I cannot NOT do it any more than I can put off breathing for a day. The essence of the attraction can be summed up by this remarkable passage from Loren Eiseleyās āThe Hidden Teacherā :
āā¦The human body is a magical vessel, but its life is linked with an element it cannot produce. Only the green plant knows the secret of transforming the light that comes to us across the far reaches of space. There is no better illustration of the intricacy of manās relationship with other living things.ā
August 20, 2010
August 6, 2010
The humidity broke today. A still, hazy morning on the lake; a not-so-sweltering mid-day. Still hot, but the early afternoon light had changed one noticeable degree. A couple of reddened leaves broke through the wall of green. The season tottered for a few seconds. The shade-cooled breeze carried a hint of fall, and dropped it once or twice. The trees knew, the birds felt it; in fact everything was aware except a few scurrying humans who couldnāt, or didnāt, pause long enough to breathe in that particular moment when it passed. Sure of themselves, the dog days of August will not easily give up and summer will quickly resume full blast until further notice. The day has cashed out at 64 degrees, perfect sleeping weather. Still, the bell has rung. The wood will not bring itself in. Lazy summer projects shall commence their annual taunt. The season is on the cusp all too soon.
Joan’s evening piano invention captured the spirit of the day nicely. I named it Cusp of the Season. Enjoy.
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July 30, 2010
T-Bones
by Joan Ketels
Tree Bones
Study them
Climb them
Lay beneath them
Lay on them
Pick them up
Observe how they
Have landed
Disarray to some
To others
Exactly as they
Should be
July 22, 2010
In Time
Things flow
let them flow
streams, rivers, valleys
water runs
gravity pulls
dirt settles
rocks level
diamonds
in time
Let God
carefully pour
items of the universe
power and spirit
into place
Matter drips
expands
fills the void
now
for all time
in time
– Denton Ketels Ā© 2007
July 19, 2010
Today is all we have. Here’s to making the most of it.
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July 16, 2010
Retreat
Walk
One foot, then another
Start over
Breathe in, breath out
The dirt path is covered in brown needles
Sunlight gleams off the water in the late afternoon.
The scent of the library is still on the books
It is a hopeful smell
The boards on the bridge are wearing nicely
They will probably last all our lives
If the gully doesnāt wash it out.
Too few people cross
To wear it out
Moss covered stones lay in place.
They form an outline of time
Nothingās changed
In seventy years.
A lifetime.
Ours.
We walk this circle
And never tire.
So much green
A little blue
Even less red and yellow.
Musky dirt and leaves
Popped up knee high over night.
It will be different tomorrow.
Veer home to a warm glow.
There are no mistakes to be made. No
People to please or disappoint. No
Disapproval. Anymore.
Quiet. Just
Enough space to live. A roof.
A door.
The world minds its own business. And
we mind ours. Just enough time.
To live.
– Denton Ketels
July 14, 2010
We don’t have cable out here in the boonies, so sometimes the girls justĀ sit around in the evening withĀ guitars and cello. No fancy recording, no rehearsing, just turn on the H2 Zoom and go.
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Language of God
Ā
Trees speak,
Water guides,
Paths wind.
Ā
Grass simply grows.
Birds are the barometer
Of life itself.
Ā
Fire provides,
Soil holds
The matter that breathes air.
Ā
Blue, green, yellow, red,
Liquid, vapor, solid,
Soul and spirit.
Ā
Stillness at the speed
Of light, energy
And thought.
Ā
– Denton Ketels
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