Three chapters
Two truths and an imagined future
The following three chapters were inspired by an exercise from the Bio-Leadership Fellowship program. The invitation was to think about your relationship to nature in childhood (beginning), your current life (now), and what you imagine might come later in your life (future). Thanks to Sophie Austin for the lovely prompts. I really enjoyed writing these stories.
Chapter 1: Beginning
When I was about 11 or 12 years old, I used to spend most of my weekends in the creek. Yes, in the creek. After what felt like a never-ending childhood of living in apartment buildings, my parents finally bought a house when I was 11 years old. In the backyard was a small creek, which separated our property from the city park behind our house.
During my younger years on the south side of Chicago, I never really minded living in an apartment. Aside from my friend Kate, who lived in a little row house, everyone I knew lived in an apartment, too. Hyde Park actually had more green space than you might imagine for a south Chicago neighbourhood, but being out of the house alone was an absolute no-no. As such, I could only ever enjoy the green space while accompanied by an adult, which never felt quite as adventurous as I hoped it would be.
For a short while, we lived in an apartment on Maryland Avenue that had an abandoned lot behind the alley. The lot was essentially a gravel pit, but it had been left untended for so long that it was full of grass and wildflowers and all sorts of other weeds. In spring it was actually rather beautiful (for an empty lot in an alley) and stray cats used to hang around. With my mother’s permission, and always under her watchful eye, I would climb down the wooden steps of our back porch, cross the alley, climb through the hole in the dilapidated chain-link fence and pick flowers in the abandoned lot. If I was lucky, I’d get to pet or at least coo at a stray kitten. Without fail, though, my mother would be standing on the back porch watching me.
South Chicago is no place for childhood freedom.
When I was 6 years old, we moved 600 miles away to the suburbs of Washington D.C., into another apartment in a huge “complex.” I put the word “complex” in quotes because, at the time, I had no understanding of what a “complex” was. It felt fabricated and strange, with identical trees and cul-de-sacs and perfectly trimmed grass. Each little apartment “section” was identical to the next and, I can only imagine, all the apartments were also identical to one another. On the far side of the complex were actual townhomes, which felt enormous and magnificent to me. But they were also all the same.
I had marginally more freedom there, but not much. I was allowed to play on the front lawn outside our apartment and climb the trees (my favourite activity as a 7-year-old), but only when my parents were at home and could watch me through the window. I was allowed to venture marginally farther if I was playing with the other neighbourhood kids, but even then, I couldn’t leave our little “section” of brown apartment buildings. Exiting the parking lot was strictly off limits.
When my parents finally bought their house, my entire perspective on what “outside” meant changed. We moved into the house in December, when it was too dark and cold to enjoy most of the surroundings. But when the first snow fell, I was beyond excited to help my dad shovel snow (“our own driveway to shovel!!”) and, most importantly, build an enormous snowman next to the magnolia tree in the backyard. It would be my snowman and no one else could touch him or knock him over or steal his nose. (I quickly learned that the last thing wasn’t true—deer are rather fond of carrots.)
And then spring arrived, and I quickly fell in love with the creek.
There were so many amazing things about living up against a forest park—we regularly saw deer and foxes and rabbits and squirrels in our yard. There were red robins and cardinals and blue jays and sparrows, and occasionally a hawk would settle into one of the large trees at the edge of the property, eyeing the yard for a snack. One year a tortoise moved into the backyard and lived there for 8 months before he peacefully died. We named him Bob and to this day his empty shell sits in my parents’ carport.
My dad once nearly killed a small garden snake with the lawnmower, and when he brought the snake to me I decided to keep it as a pet. I’d hunt for worms and crickets to feed him, and he lived in a terrarium in our dining room for two years. Another time, a much larger snake (at least a meter long) was coiled around the post of our carport as my dad walked out the door, and it’s one of the few times I’ve heard my father scream.
The wild nature of our backyard was a constant joy—and a pain in the ass when trying to grow vegetables or flowers, both of which my parents eventually gave up on. But the creek is what stole my heart. It was the first place where I was allowed to wander freely on my own, and I would put on my boots and clamber over rocks and wander along the creek for hours. I’d pick up stones to find tiny crayfish, I’d pet the toads, I’d watch the tadpoles in small pools and the water gliders atop the glassy stream. I’d jump over logs and slip off wet rocks and skin my knees and get my clothes wet. I’d show up at home, covered in mud but with an enormous grin on my face. I would easily spend an entire afternoon in the creek by myself, talking to the water, to the critters, and to the imaginary forest spirits that I believed may have been listening.
Even at age 12, after most kids my age had long stopped playing in the mud, I thought our minuscule creek was the most amazing thing. I was finally starting to understand what freedom in nature felt like, and it absorbed my attention like few things had ever done before.
Chapter 2: Now
I’m sitting in the living room looking out at the street in front of our second-floor apartment. It’s 7:30 in the morning and cars are passing by regularly as people begin their work commute. There is a relentless canal barge honking its horn in the distance. I can hear construction crews around the corner climbing up scaffolding. The garbage truck has just finished making an enormous racket as it empties the underground bin across the street.
Ah, the reliable sounds of Amsterdam in the morning.
It’s late April and the large trees out front are finally starting to show their tiny, green leaves. We will leave for a holiday tomorrow and by the time we return, the trees will be lush and we’ll no longer be able to peer into the neighbours’ windows across the street—and they won’t be able to peer at us, either. So at least there’s that.
It’s funny, sitting in this living room spot. This little corner of the couch is really my spot, but it’s by no means the nicest place in the house to listen to the morning sounds. The back of the house is where the “wild things” are. The courtyard is populated with several enormous trees and a dozen mostly-well-tended gardens, which have become home to families of magpies, fat pigeons, blackbirds, finches and parakeets. A blue heron regularly makes its way into the garden on many mornings, stealing frogs from a neighbour’s garden pond for breakfast. This is the side of the house I wake up on, so at least I am regularly awoken by the sounds of birds as opposed to the sounds of traffic.
Fortunately, a thirty-minute drive quickly whisks us away to somewhere more vast and wild—or at least as wild as one can get in the Netherlands, considering most of the nature in North Holland is man-made. Regardless, these spaces are at least bigger, even if they’re not empty of other people or totally removed from the sound of the highway. They are an approximation of what real nature might feel like.
We try to get out of the city at least once per week. If we don’t, I notice how irritable I become. Occasionally we drive to the coast and let our dog frolic along the wide Dutch beaches, but my preference is usually to head inland. Thirty minutes east of here are numerous forests, estates, and heather fields where you can easily wander for hours. We bring the dog and walk through the heath, enjoying the fresh air and casually ‘hello-ing’ at all the other dog-owners who arrived here with the same idea.
Very rarely, I go out to one of these forests by myself. On these outings, I really try to slow down, to breathe, to stop and listen, to let myself rest in nature’s embrace. Inevitably, however, the moment I stop long enough to really feel my breathing and lean into nature’s symphony, I hear the steady droning of the highway in the distance. It is always inescapable.
I find it nearly impossible to ignore these sounds anymore. I think the pandemic was the beginning of my shift in attention, when I first noticed what silence sounded like. But as soon as the world started turning again, I got caught up in running full speed and stopped noticing how affected I am by the sounds of the city.
But I am enormously affected. More than I realised, perhaps. And it’s taking a toll on my well-being.
Two months ago, I ran into a metaphorical brick wall when I got so stressed that I had to immediately stop working. This break from routine was a shock to my system and it took me more than a month to actually understand what slowing down and resting actually means. In the past few weeks, I’ve become acutely aware of how sensitive I am to noise. The moment I get into a quiet spot in the park, or better, somewhere completely away from the city, I feel like a different version of myself. The city sounds basically force me into a constant stress response.
Just last week, I realised how bad things were when I noticed how much guilt I was feeling about my husband walking the dog every morning. I love doing the morning walk, especially when we all go together, but he and the dog wake up earlier than I do and for over a year now I haven’t been able to get back into the morning routine. As I pondered this, I realised that it wasn’t just guilt I was feeling. It was fear. It’s gotten to the point that I actually hate leaving the house, because as soon as I’m out the front door the city sounds are fully magnified and I simply cannot cope.
The solution is quite obvious, of course. It is clearly time to move away from the city. But the practicalities of doing so are not as straightforward, so while we have started dreaming and talking and planning our next steps, it’s likely that we’ll be here for a while longer.
And so, I try to spend more time at the back of the house. To listen to the birds. To admire the pink cherry blossoms in the tree below our balcony. And, when I leave the house, I spend more time in my head. Drowning out the sounds that are outside, and dreaming of the sounds that are not.
Chapter 3: Future
I’m sitting in the sunroom of our country house and looking out over our small farm. It’s May and finally starting to get warm, but even so, sitting outside isn’t an option today. Not because it’s too cold but because of the unpleasant smog that hangs in the air.
Days like this arrive with increasing frequency. Despite being hundreds of kilometres from any major city, smog rolls through like a wet blanket, making outdoor activity unpleasant and unsafe. We wear masks and goggles to go outside and tend to the garden, and we bathe frequently. No one quite knows what it is that’s in the air.
Despite these unpleasant occurrences, life is really good. I’ve spent the last 30 years helping people to find their way out of the oppressive system that got us here and chart a new path forward. I’ve written books and told stories. I’ve reclaimed myself and built a new relationship with the earth. I feel grounded in a way that I didn’t think was possible.
We finally left the Netherlands three decades ago and moved to Scandinavia. We spent nearly a decade in the Arctic, living on the edge of a small city that grew from 25,000 to 50,000 inhabitants within our first few years there. While I would have preferred to live more remotely, we were part of a community that was at the forefront of the green revolution, transforming heavy industry into carbon-neutral practices. I never imagined living in a mining town, but being a part of a growing community of people who were fully committed to changing the narrative and building a regenerative future was intoxicating. It felt like we gained superpowers with our collective dedication and care for the future.
After a few years working for the city, we bought some land at the edge of town and built a nature-retreat of sorts. My husband mastered the art of hydroponic farming, and I set up our hospitality business. We invited locals to use our space for events, and during the high seasons (summer and winter), we invited tourists to experience a regenerative lifestyle. Even in the harsh and dark winters, we spent most of our days outdoors. In winter, we bathed in the glow of the aurora. In summer, we hardly slept under the midnight sun.
Eventually we decided to move south again. Life in the Arctic was wonderful, but our dream had always been to have a farm—a real regenerative farm, with animals and crops and four actual seasons instead of two. We didn’t go far but just far enough that winter days still saw sunlight and planting things was possible before the end of May.
And this is where I sit now, in the sunroom of the beautiful cottage we rebuilt after buying the land. We built several small guest houses, some overlooking the fields and others nestled in the small forest at the corner of our property. We still have regular guests, some who come for a weekend getaway from the city and others who come from farther afield for a relaxing holiday in the countryside. Many are eager to learn farming and we are happy to teach them everything we know.
We had animals for a while, but once the smog became a regular problem we decided to let them go. We hatched no more eggs and we let our horse and few sheep get old until they passed away. It felt unfair to keep animals when we didn’t know if we could protect them from whatever was in the air. Regenerative farming is more difficult without them here, but we are doing our best.
Despite this, so many things have changed for the better. Fossil fuels have been outlawed almost everywhere on earth, and the CEOs and board members of most of the oil companies were finally taken to court and imprisoned for their active role in destroying our planet. The number of international corporations has dwindled, with only a few holdouts remaining, including Patagonia. School systems in Scandinavia threw out their entire curriculum and started from scratch, with kids spending time outdoors and learning about ecology, natural history, and community building. We regularly get school trips at our farm, and we’ve worked closely with the local school system to design day-long activities that fit into the curriculum for each particular class.
The smog is a sharp reminder of how long we dragged our feet as a society before taking action. But we have finally taken action, and the collective energy surrounding these changes has lifted the spirits of nations and generations alike. It’s still too soon to say if the earth will “recover” from the damage we caused in a way that will allow us to sustain human life, but every single day we are doing things a little bit better. And that is all we can do.
I’m in my 60s now, and my husband is in his 70s. We’ve weathered unfathomable heat waves (over 45 degrees in Sweden) and brutal blizzards that left us snowed in under four meters of snow for more than two weeks. We’ve seen windstorms that brought down dozens of trees and rains that turned our entire property into a swamp. The smog is more unusual, because no one quite knows how to predict it or even what it contains, but we do our best. All of this is the result of our 20th-century folly, and we accept it. We reap what we sow, and we sowed some very bad seeds in the past century.
But it is still ok. Because, finally, after decades of inaction and anxiety and hopelessness, we are finally doing the right thing. National governments finally caught on and gave more power to the local communities. We live in one of these communities and we care for one another. After bad storms, we help each other rebuild. When our neighbours’ crops fail, we give away our extras that did well. We share. We tell stories. We help one another.
I am certain that I won’t live to see the end of all of this. The end might be the end of humankind, or the end might be the beginning of a new era. Of course I hope it’s the latter, but either way, I am content. The shift finally came. Even if it’s too late, I feel honoured to have been a part of it.
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Fun stuff
Some goodies and extras for you this week. 🙃
Read 📖
Another apocalyptic story for you this week from Emergence Magazine. The Basilisk by Paul Kingsnorth tells the story of our technological age in the form of letters between uncle and niece. The uncle is convinced that demons are using the internet to trap and destroy humankind, but the niece has a different perspective—in some ways much more beautiful (while still sad and haunting). It’s an excellent commentary on the technological age we live in.
Listen 🎧
Here’s another excellent conversation with Bayo Akomolafe from Dan Burgess and his Spaceship Earth podcast. (I promise this will be my last Bayo Akomolafe suggestion for a while. 😅)