Forgotten Wildness and Why a Picnic

Linda here with you today.  I awoke this morning to the sound of bird songs;  predawn birdsongs. They were strong, and clear, and filled with passion.   I heard “the call” and so went outside,  enjoying the feeling of cool, predawn air on my skin.

I work and play a lot outside.  Even so, I miss a lot. I think it was the Scott Thomas Carlyle who said, “The tragedy in life is not what men suffer, but what they miss.” And what we miss can be right in front of our very noses.

Wildness is all around us.  And while a trip to rekindle relationship with Wildness can mean travel to dramatic terrains, it doesn’t have to. More often, it may mean simply opening your eyes.  I’ll say it again, because we are so conditioned otherwise, to access the wonder and wilds of nature you need not journey to far off lands. More people live in cities these days than ever before, and to the untrained eye nature seems so far away. Don’t be fooled. There are strongholds of the natural world all around and you’ll find these “footprints” in backyards, city parks, cracks in the pavement, alleyways, drainage ditches, and in vacant and not so vacant lots.

Consider a picnic as a vehicle to get you and your senses re calibrated with what is around you.   There is way more going on in a picnic than snacks, even while they are often the very core of a picnic.  A picnic allows our instinctual selves to rub up against Natures varied expressions.

You can have them nearly anywhere … in backyards, city parks, national parks, even tailgates.  In the daytime, in the evening.  Invite just yourself or include friends/family on a picnic and open up to the wild world around you.

Picnic Foods to Consider

“How the Light Get’s In” Tea eggs –

(for recipe click on February 2014, and scroll to my Feb7th, 2014)

Eat them hard boiled and Savor their aroma, beauty, and flavor

Use the tea eggs above and try them as deviled eggs – a perfect picnic food

Friends or Foes? Friends as Foes Fudge Recipe, Click on August 2014 and scroll down to my August 1st post.

Here are a tiny sampling of some of the things I have met on a picnic or walk. Note, I did not have to venture far to excite my senses.  Just as in a fantastic fairly tale, all I had to do was open my mind and my eyes.  I chose to share some of life’s smaller fellows because they are so often overlooked. The wild world is as small or as large as our opening up to it.

Reciprocal relationship – bees complete the sexual dance of plants s they gather pollen. (Backyard, Tucson)

Ants at work with Texas Ranger petals near opening to colony (out on a walk in Tucson)

Dung Beetle at work – (just off a road)

Exoskeleton – (walking in Tucson)

Pollen Baskets  on those back legs …. now you know why they call bees “pollinators” – (on a walk in Tucson)

This spider probably “feels safe” tucked into the spines of a Saguaro where no bird beak would fear to tread ….