There’s a new mental disorder stalking the western world: Nature Deficit Disorder. Our widespread disconnection from the natural world—most of us can’t distinguish one tree from another, don’t walk in the woods, don’t look at the stars, rarely stand in an unaltered landscape—is making us sick. The list of effects I found in the official …
Our daughter-in-law, Jane, interpreted the saying “It takes a village to raise a child” liberally. Of course, in these days, municipal boundaries are a bit wider than they used to be. A day’s plane journey appears to mark the village limits for our family. Which is why you would have found me in Washington, D.C. a …
Therese will be leading the November Mini-Retreat at Trinity Episcopal Cathedral in Portland, Oregon, on Saturday, November 18, 2023. This in-person gathering will focus on the inseparability of grief and joy. The event begins at 9 am and ends at noon. More information to come.
She was getting out of her van by the beach, clearly unnerved by the thick smoke in the air. “Did you hear that they’re evacuating all of Yellowknife?” I blinked; I didn’t know her from Adam, but she sure needed to talk. “Yes,” I said. I felt anxious too. But I know how to listen …
When I was a kid, sacred was about church. It was the Lord’s Prayer repeated each Sunday; it was the consecration, the communion cup, the baptismal fountain, the ashes on the forehead. In Braiding Sweetgrass, the indigenous biologist and author Robin Wall Kimmerer recounts an observance enacted daily during the summer months that her family camped …
Sunday book study meets on alternating Sundays from 10-11:30 a.m. We’ll be starting up again on Sunday, October 2, 2023. We’ll be finishing up Braiding Sweet Grass by Robin Kimmer Wall, and then move on to Second Simplicity by Bruno Barnhart. For the zoom link and more information, email widespottz@netidea.com.
In parts of rural Britain, sheep are said to be “hefted to the land.” After hundreds of years of being herded on common land, the sheep have learned their place. Hefted ewes pass on to their lambs the knowledge of boundaries, choice grazing sites, sheltered folds, the round of seasonal return to their farm for …
In the kitchen of love, only the beautiful are killed. Death does not frighten a true lover for those not dying for love are already corpses. –Rumi Translation by Maryam Mafi and Azima Melita Kolin I knew it was her as soon as I pulled the bag out of the freezer. I knew because she looked …
It’s a fallacy that deer don’t eat potatoes, or at least strip the plants naked. I guess I should be grateful for the stalks and tubers left behind, and hope that the deer get sick enough to discourage further nocturnal raids. It’s another fallacy that talking about how we feel always results in connectedness, support, …
If you’re as old as I am, you’re already singing the next line in this iconic Dylan song. You also know that the answer “blowing in the wind” is both blindingly obvious and as ephemeral as a breeze down Carpenter Creek Canyon. I’d like to think that one answer to Dylan’s rhetorical ponderings is blowing …
Like what you read? I would love to have your support!
Canadians can send an e-transfer to descamp@widespot.ca. Everyone else, I take cheques of all nationalities.
Box 452, New Denver, BC, V0G 1S0, Canada