I like writing because I get to sit outside and let the wind blow all the thoughts out of my head, clearing space for something fresh to grow—and then I get to call that process “work.” I “worked” today. I abandoned my compression socks and strolled barefoot through pillowed grass. The irises looked especially pleased to see me, and—not wanting them to get droopy—I assured them the feeling was mutual. Then I sat under “my” maple tree, who I sincerely hope thinks of me as “her” human by now, though as I type this, I’m wondering whether the isolation of the past year hasn’t left me a little addled (“touched,” some might say), or are these plants really my friends?
The thing about sitting under a tree is that you only think you’re sitting under a tree. Think a little harder, and you realize you are in it—held between roots and branches, perched between seen and unseen. Today, that was exactly where I wanted to be. For now, all I really want is to be in this moment, perched between eternities.
I don’t always feel quite so content with the present, of course. If you read my newsletter last week, then you know that I’m as good as the next guy at contracting into a miserable little ball. There are moments when everything feels heavy and dark. There are times when I’m too busy resenting the flies to greet the irises. But not today. Today, a fly buzzed around my head, and it never occurred to me to swat him away. He was part of the choir—a lone tenor joining the soprano birds and the wind song of leaves and grass.
And in that moment, the lion’s roar of long Covid was nothing more than a quiet buzzing. In that moment, suspended between branches and roots, every hard thing in my life was just a harmless humming.
We can’t live in that place of presence all of the time. We will, yet again, try to escape the present, digging down into roots or clambering up into branches, resisting this threshold between past and future. We won’t accept everything all of the time, won’t be present all of the time, but what about right now? Can you be here right now, just for a moment? For a moment, can you let the past and future fall away and simply inhabit this body, this place, this unique, never-to-be-repeated flicker of time?
If you have a few moments to spare, then step outside or sit near an open window, make sure your volume is on, and follow along with the simple forest bathing exercise included in this email. It’s designed to invite you into your senses, into nature, and into the present moment. If you try it out, let me know how it lands with you!
For Just One Moment