some friends hold the best silence

i visited a forest ecosystem today. there were brambly types and lofty types, there were blue jays, birds of prey and an enormous white cat. there were deer track and dog tracks, and one lone beer bottle. not too bad for an hour out of town. and oh! the river.

at night, the milky way was stunning. i watched orion drift across the sky, the pleiades amuse themselves (they're like the people who hang out in the kitchen at parties. there's nothing different about them, but they seem to have more fun nonetheless), a star fall like a lone firework quietly streaking through the night.

i thought about trees. about the huge banyan tree i'd seen in honolulu, the branches cascading down into roots, how i could walk through them. i thought about palm trees, how they seem to dance in the wind like shaggy fraggles rockin' out to the sweetest tunes. i thought about the tree on 108st i usually touch as i walk by, its trunk expanding past the skinny public swath of green between the road and the sidewalk, its roots upheaving the poured cement. i thought about all the tress i won't meet, the trees destroyed by storms and clearcut by humans who don't know or don't care that those kinds of drastic methods are neither necessary or even beneficial to the value system that's emerging. reading this book is helpful and inspiring, but the best thing is just getting out there. i want to go to california and hang out with redwoods.

i wrote this in my journal: "with just our ignorance, we could get by. it's our shame that debilitates us. making mistakes is one thing, not fixing them is another." we could fix things so easily, we're so clever. but we would often rather be windbags. strange how shame is so powerful. how did we let it grip us so tightly?

i feel re-inspired, like i can smell again. i want to love the parts of life that are awesome.