Walking on the dirt road is not like walking in the woods.
On one side a cornfield, the stalks cut the soil soaked with fresh manure. Across from it, a young forest of birch and pine. Further up a red barn and house that leads to the woods where when it isn’t hunting season I walk. Then there is the pasture, overgrown with low bushes and across from that, the road lined with shagbark hickories.
I never walk in the young forest of birch and pine trees. The only paths are made by the animals who live there. And I like that about them. That they are not for me to wander in.
This way I get to look into them from the outside and wonder at the thick curtain of trees and the light that passes through them.
The last time I walked in the woods, I was so overcome with joy about nature that I cried. I just fill up with so much gratitude that it takes my breath away. It is actually kind of hard for me to walk in the woods like that.
That is very beautiful Patsy. And I know just what you mean.
Looks like an invitation to paint.
I was thinking of a quilt LoisJean….
The woods to me are welcoming church, silent therapist and healing environment: in the same way it takes in and holds the physical spew of our mechanical world to limit its detrimental effects and offers in return the most basic element necessary for all life, for me
they absorb mental stress and physical tension and help lighten my load, offering me the peace to find workable solutions or resolute acceptance, solitude and gratitude. The woods are so simple and primitive, yet so complex and diverse, that it is easy to feel overwhelmed and insignificant in comparison, but being in them is beneficial – forest therapy.
I am learning about the Japanese art and science of shinrin yoku in “Forest Bathing” by Dr. Qing Li.
Such a lovely desciption of the woods and how they help us Amy. The book sounds very interesting. When I first heard of “forest bathing”, I understood the idea completely. Thanks for your words.