Here’s what people are saying about their relationship to joy in nature, in response to the prompts Tami Spry is providing in celebration of Earth Day 2024.
Enjoy…and submit your own!
Prompt 1
What is your first memory of experiencing joy in nature?
“My first memory of experiencing joy in nature is from my childhood home in the suburbs of Boston. We lived in front of a swamp with frogs, turtles, snakes, etc. My brother and I would go to the swamp every summer with nets to try and catch a frog. It took a lot of discipline for a seven and twelve-year-old to swiftly catch a frog. When caught, my brother and I would high-five and observe our new amphibian friend. Usually, we would name them and jot down the frog before releasing it.”
“There was a gooseberry tree in the empty lot next to my childhood home. Its branches arched down to the ground, so it was possible to crawl through and under them and sit next to the trunk, completely enveloped by the branches, unseen. I remember it being so quiet, except for the birds above.”
“My first memory of joy in nature was my grandmother’s garden. It took up nearly half of her small-town backyard, a yard that seemed gigantic to five-year-old me who worked alongside her for a week or two each summer watering cucumber plants, deadheading flowers, pulling weeds and putting together the colorful bouquets we would then deliver to her neighbors.”
“I’m a girl sitting in the low branch of our backyard willow tree, smelling bark for the first time, happily hidden from the human world in the branches and leaves of the huge willow, not yet feeling the social pressure to dismiss this feeling of utter kinship to bark and branch and bird.”
“When I was young, my family always picked wild blackberries in late summer. With large board planks thrust into the middle of 10 feet high bushes, we walked into thorny environs and picked those luscious berries. Most of them went in my mouth with hot bursts of flavor. Joyfulness is one way to describe those memories!”
“When I was about four or five, growing up on a farm in Pennsylvania, one spring I smelled the very strong and unique odor of skunk cabbage. Skunk cabbage, a strange looking plant, grows in bogs and wetlands. It is not a bad smell, just big. Today, when I come across skunk cabbage, it triggers a flood of memories for me. A time of childhood, fresh with new life.”
“I grew up in nature’s playground - the wilds of Northwestern NJ on the Applachian trail. My first memory is of the comfort of the tall oak trees that surrounded my home, the multi-colored vista out my grandmother’s apartment atop our house on the mountains in the distance, and the smell of freshly chopped wood for our potbelly stove that kept our some a comfy 82 degrees all winter long. The joy I feel at being with trees is like coming home to a family reunion.”
Prompt 2
If nature (or the Earth) were a cherished friend, how would you describe them to someone?
“If nature were a cherished friend, I would describe them as temperamental but deeply loving—with their changes and variations only serving to deepen their character. Despite their own issues this friend is always there for you. They are generous to a self-destructive degree, and I am guilty of exploiting their kindness. But fortunately, this friend is as forgiving as they are generous.”
“Sometimes joyful, sometimes ornery, but always life-giving.”
Prompt 3
Describe a nature site where you feel/felt safe and free.
“I always feel safe and free in my garden. I guess it’s one of the main reasons I create gardens. I love being in the garden either alone or with friends, with birds and wildlife utilizing the plants and water and insects and air. I feel part of us, of everything.”
“A space in nature that inspires freedom and safety is the middle of a lake. Swimming outside lap lanes or designed swim areas, is a bit of a wild swimming rebellion but the freedom, peace, and safety found in the middle of a quiet lake cannot be gatekept. Nature and access to its peace and freedom should be for all.”