2020 to 2021

Oh, 2020. You little rascal. You got us all with your little surprises. I wrote about my hopes for you on January 1, in an essay called Peeping into 2020.


I’ve not been one to make resolutions, but my Twitter profile has become a place that sums me and my efforts in 160 characters or less. Revising it annually has become a fun practice. Here are my 2018 and 2019 ones:






And here’s my 2020.



It’s evolved a bit over the year- which is not something I’ve done before- all thanks to what 2020 ended up being and how I responded to it. I added the she/her. I switched my photo a couple of times- at one point I was so upset at the US political landscape I changed my photo to a picture of a tree stump roughly cut by a chainsaw. My pinned tweet became not a plug to sell my books, but to remind myself and others of my involvement in this country’s problems (more on that to follow).


In 2020, I had hoped to write about and learn new ways to present information on how we humans are amazingly linked to each other and to our natural surroundings. I had visions of officially studying and exploring first-hand in my own life and environment the types of connections I had read about in Peter Wohlleben’s The Hidden Life of Trees or Robin Wall Kimmerer’s Braiding Sweetgrass in 2019. I pictured filling myself and those I was privileged enough to teach with wondrous examples of these amazing truths and being inspired to project that new understanding into imagining and building a more unified and beautiful future for us all. I imagined bringing people together in closer harmony and understanding to both each other and all the green spaces.

Sometimes, our connections can threaten us or take us down unplanned paths.

Then, a new-to-us microbe living in China leaped into that web of connections and threw our globe into chaos. On top of that, the simmering racial inequities in the US blew up as more Black lives met early deaths at the hands of police. As each country in the world reacted to SARS-CoV2, we learned so many things about worldwide medical and science preparedness and how leaders can cultivate or destroy hope and direction. I saw political affiliation eat away at things I thought everyone could agree upon.

The US’s gutted interest in and means to provide communal needs like public health were dramatically exposed to the world this year.

Some might say this microbe is simply another facet of the world’s connections that we need to adjust to- that some individuals will perish but a new balance will eventually be found overall. Some might say that the loss of certain people or peoples is simply part of that every changing balancing act, too.


Those notions seem way too easy for me to accept. They free us from any responsibility for our choices and actions and that's not right. Cain’s story reminds us we are each other’s keepers. We are, or can be, stewards of all we touch. I think I spoke to that in my Twitter profile when I said “everyone has outside burdens”: we should try to HELP each other because we ALL have burdens. COVID19 became a universally shared one.


2020 hammered home to me that I need to be even more inclusive- my long-term belief in us being stronger together? For all my unity fervor (how many times have I typed "we're stronger together"?), I could do way more thinking, speaking, and writing to promote and argue for that truth. I will do so in 2021. Learning of historian Heather Cox Richardson this year has been an incredibly positive thing for me as she is able to wonderfully describe where we are politically and how we got here. Her social media and others have opened my view on how many people are on this path to understanding. Folks like Robert Reich and Stacey Abrams give pointers on what we can do about it all.

It’s ALL connected. WE are all connected. And NONE of us is more or less “human”.

Political sectarianism has settled into the US and I struggle against siloing or vilifying myself. In 2021, I pledge to speak up and stand up, but to also gut-check. Am I shaming or finding commonalities? Am I escalating a situation or cultivating space for us all to work through some stuff? I’m looking back at my experience with PlayWorks and places like tolerance.org for inspiration.


What could that look like?


“I hear you say…” Truly listen.

“I see you…” Validate.

“I also like…” Connect.

“What are your three favorite foods?” De-escalate.

“I’m interested in our success together…” Extend that hand.

“What if we…” Collaborate.

“Let’s table this for now.” Walk away from conflict.

What exactly do I hope for in 2021?

Here's my 2021 Twitter:

ONE BOAT: Nationally, we need massive efforts on multiple fronts: public health, social justice, green economy, education, infrastructure, and health care. Covid is top, but the others are vitally connected. By the end of 2021, I just want to see some progress on all these. We didn’t get here overnight. We won’t get out of it overnight, either. Dr. Richardson was a reminder to me of that truth and I hope to read one of her books this year to further my understanding.REAL PEOPLE AND THE PLANET: We need to show we care about both. That we need to care for both. It's not about years old customs and stock prices. 

STAY ENGAGED: To that end, I want to see an expanding political/societal participation by all the people at all levels- especially state and local. Volunteering somewhere. Supporting candidates. Talking with family and friends. Attending meetings as a citizenry. It’s important. Unfortunately, our problems are so big, many can’t do much more than try to survive. Those who can, should.


Personally, I just want us all to feel a little safer- to not feel like everything's hanging by a thread. That's #1. Then, I’d love to work with others and earn some sort of reward in return- money, food, other? Keeping busy would also help me shed some of those pandemic pounds. I’d love my kids to get back into society and the oldest to get a job and his driver’s license. A nature-based retreat sounds delightful: I want stars, water, and living stuff. And a bustling gathering of friends with great food, music, and drinks would be a dream come true. That's it. Well, that and finally see BTS again live. 


Here’s to a 2021 that sustains us. May we find ourselves more grounded by what we do and experience in the next 12 months. May we be open to fully experiencing all of it, but also able to not cling to any of it. It's the breathing of life that's crucial to our growth and development. 



Peace!

Humility from Trees

I’m finally reading Peter Wohlleben’s NYT bestseller The Hidden Life of Trees. Having a job that once again revolves around ecology, I find myself sliding back into the field’s writings. I should have always kept an eye on it, but Life pulled me this way and that over the years. I must humbly accept that fact and try to understand what’s been learned in the last 25 years.

As I began reading it, I immediately saw many similarities between Mr. Wohlleben’s observations and my own in my book, Dear Warriors. Specifically: interdependence. Even his cover and the first image I put in my introduction are similar. Both depict flourishing trees in modified cross-section. Whereas his focuses on 3 trees and their roots, I drew a single tree, its roots, and the elements it’s exposed to.

Initially, I experienced an embarrassed flush of nervousness. I worried that my book’s art and ideas would be construed as a copy, even though I hadn’t read Mr. Wohlleben’s work before publishing. I could have easily slipped into a mental canyon of inadequacy, telling myself that my work was yet another example of my lack of originality and hidden it. Instead, I’m choosing to wave it as another support for the veracity of this notion that life is all about interdependence.

My whole point in pulling trees into my analysis of living with type 1 diabetes was to draw an analogy between trees and people. I felt a connection. Mr. Wohlleben’s book focuses solely on the gorgeous details of what trees go through, emphasizing specific ways they relate to both others of their own kind and entirely different species. I would suggest reading his book first, then mine. If you can learn to believe that trees aren’t independent and self-contained, then you can be open to the notion that no human is, either. You can also learn to believe that our daily activities can reflect that we’re stronger together, as I tried to state in Dear Warriors.

We’re stronger together, whether we’re talking humans or trees.

I titled this essay Humility. Humility and being humble are vital to our best lives, in my opinion. With them as our foundation, the ego can’t take over. We cannot become engrossed by the “wonder” of our own ways and thoughts and act as though other humans are enemies.

The science behind Peter Wohlleben’s work shores up his claims about trees- ideas that many might find fantastical and easily discounted if they were not being tested and corroborated by others around the globe. If we’re open to seeing deeper truths. To me, they prove one thing: we cannot believe we know everything about this world we live in. We have to be open to “if”.

We must humbly admit that we are not omniscient.

The networks that trees appear to thrive best in reminds me of other networks being uncovering and studied in recent years. For instance, take the human microbiome. Nature.com has a great timeline review and specific deep-dive information on this expanding field of study. Over half the cells in and on our bodies are not human. They all can affect how we live and perhaps we can adjust our living to maximize our relationships with these other entities to improve how we feel and how well we live. Can we humbly admit that we need some of these other species and encourage them? Can we accept that they may need us and we might do best by allowing them to coexist with us?

Can we accept with humility that we need other humans and other species to survive and thrive?

It can be an uncomfortable shift in thought. But, it can also be comforting because we’re capable of seeing truths and falsehoods. We’re capable of testing to confirm. We’re capable of failing and trying again. We can move forward, even if the steps are painful.

I’m looking at trees a bit differently of late. I knew I thought of them in some sort of kinship, but Peter Wohlleben has given me some substance to firm up those feelings. If their bodies are linked to many others and if our bodies are linked to many others, then how far does this linkage idea go? It fills me with hope, wonder, and a sense of place.

Neither a tree’s life nor a human’s is idyllic. Both eventually come to an end. But I can pat a tree’s bark and consider its journey, as I can my own, with humility and kinship and smile.

We can be stronger together.