Awe-Stuck
Maybe it is because of the frenetic toggling between fire warnings and winter squalls this month, sometimes within the space of hours, that has me feeling awe-struck with nature, its movements, and its knowingness. The Hellebores, tulips, and daffodils are shooting up above the ground. They always know the right time.
I read The Overstory last year and found myself nose-deep deep in the rough bark of a Ponderosa pine, trying to determine if its scent more closely resembled gasoline or vanilla as described in the book (vanilla for me).
“One way of looking at trees is that they are captured light. Photosynthesis, after all, captures a photon, takes a little energy from it before re-emitting it at a lower wavelength, and uses that captured energy to turn air into sugars, and then sugars into the stuff that makes leaves, wood, and roots. Even the most solid of beings, the giant sequoias, are really light and air.” This beautiful quote is from Joe Lamb, a friend of Rebecca Solnit’s that she has tucked into her collection of essays, Orwell’s Roses. The thought of matter coming from sunlight and air sent me down a rabbit hole, and I came across this piece on NPR: Trees Come ‘From Out Of The Air,’ Said Nobel Laureate Richard Feynman. Really?
I am keeping up with my hand-written garden journal.