Late Summer Stick (and Puppy!) Magic
Hello Reader
Whoa! Well, it’s been a few weeks. An interruption longer than I’d anticipated. But, for good cause. We’ve added a puppy to our home, which involved travel and “puppy magic fog.” And, I was in Maine for a week to complete my certification process with the Association of Nature and Forest Therapy.
How about you? As the last days of summer wash over us, what are you hoping to enjoy, and how are you resting in the bounty of summer?
On the horizon: I’ll be integrating my two newsletters into one nugget-rich hub of nature-rooted goodness, delight, wisdom, and exploration. Nothing you need to do, and I’ll explain the “merger” as it happens across these next few weeks.
For now, get outside and savor one tiny (or big!) live being.
Cheers,
Jennifer
TABLE OF CONTENTS
- Weekly Reflection 🍃
- Weekly Practice ✨
- Seasonal Offering 🌿
- Little Tender Things 🐞💚
WEEKLY REFLECTION
Late Summer Stick Magic
Jennifer Ruth Keller
The dim light slows me down. Me, who is already slow. Young birch crowd together in the leaf litter. An occasional grandmother tree holds the non-center center of the forest. Mossy patches arrest my eyes as I adapt to a kind of terrain I’m unused to.
For the afternoon I’m to stroll and wander. Let whomever calls to me call. Let however I feel drawn to answer, be enough. Await. Allow. Accept. Attend. Four motions from an old mystical prayer tradition, now recast in the non-formal-church wild of the ordinary world.
I’m in the woods of midcoastal Maine for the week to finish my training with the Association of Nature and Forest Therapy. I’d done the first part of the training across 2023 and 2024. After some delay, and many attempts, I’d made it to the forest for the final phase of the program.
In the forest, on a last afternoon, I creep along, let my breath decelerate to the stillness of the woods. After awhile, to my left, tucked back some thirty yards away, a giant leaf-strewn boulder. It seems to come to a point, a kind of “V” shape, pointed towards me. Buried in forest detritus and moss, the granite beneath commands attention. “Here, lady,” they call. “If you’re looking for a place to sit, to take it all in, I’m the one.”
I approach through the crunch of dry leaves. My tick-repellant clothing has been mostly untested as we’ve arrived during a low point in the tick-mania season, for which I’m grateful. As I approach the rock, it feels right, like me being there for a spell will do me some good. Which is to say: will receive me with no agenda, if I do the same.
The rock is just the right height for sitting and feeling my feet rest on the earth. I let my senses dilate, become aware and receptive to the range of details around me, and with me.
I notice a stick near the boulder, around two feet long, with a notch and entrancing texture. “Hmmmm,” I say to no one and everyone. “Could be a talking stick.” I wait, and breathe. Then, say to the forest a few things that need to be said.
But/and, then I sense: Hmmmmm, not so much a talking stick. I think I’m just supposed to hold the stick, and let it companion me here.
A couple hours later, the sharing feels complete, and I move on through the woods, along a creek noodling through the edge of the forest, through stands of fern and birch who hold a story I am both part of, and distinct from, at the same time.
A pop of yellow from the forest floor adds whimsy. A reminder that not all is dark in the woods.
Near the end, in a swath of forest more dimmed by the tree canopy and cover than other parts, the trail emerges into a meadow festooned with Queen Anne’s Lace.
Looking behind me, at the darkened woods, the birch gather together like an alternate cavalry. I turn back to the meadow, and in an instant, within, hear: “It’s okay to walk through the meadow.”
What is your meadow? Your darkened woods? Your boulder? Your stick?
WEEKLY PRACTICE INVITATION
The what: Who/what/where might be your stick or boulder? (or bright yellow mushroom of whimsy! or meadow of sunshine!)
The how: Go to an outside place where you are curious to explore and/or feel familiar in a way that lets you drop in, undefended.
Await a feature of your surroundings to introduce themselves. (You’ll know when you know. And if you’re not sure, guessing always works too!)
Allow the feature to come into your sensory range, and be with you.
Accept the sensations that arise within you. And, from without. And, in between! (Unless, of course, some unanticipated danger has presented itself. Like a belligerent wasp.)
Attend to the features/beings where you are who have joined your sense of being alive. Doesn’t have to be some shazam moment of sublime wonder. Whatever arises, arises. It may be quiet, and, heaven forbid, “boring” by the standards in which many of us have become entrained.
Maybe, even, with a long dose of this kind of unhurried, unstriving strolling and sitting you will discover a new companion, and be befriended in return.
As we say in the forest therapy approach I’ve been trained in: “It’s all welcome.”
The Listening Ground
Autumn 2026
Tended Exploration,
Gathering, & Repose
Yearning for some unhurried nature-engagement with a non-fussy guide to help you reclaim your attention, recalibrate your life rhythm, and savor a consistent connection with the natural world and your loved ones?
Join me for this autumn-long immersion, whether you’re local to eastern Washington or not!
For more details and to let me know you’re interested simply reply to this email.
Or, text/call! 760-920-1789
LITTLE TENDER THINGS
We see you ladybug,
day after day,
nestled in your Queen Anne’s cup
of soft, green, cozy goodness.
Three days, and then,
off you are, on
some next adventure.
